• Article

    Community Supported Art grows, gets New York Times’ notice

    Published August 5, 2013 by

    Above: Community Supported Art from SpringboardArts on Flickr I’ve been collecting contemporary art for over 35 years, and of all the amazing works I’ve come across, one of my favorite pieces sits on my desk at Knight Foundation. It’s a small wooden music box, about the size of a quart of milk. You take the lid off and it begins to play a series of quiet beautiful notes, just like a music box should. Then a chorus comes in and surprises you. Suddenly the hip hop artist Invincible begins to rap on top of the music. In a grand finale, you get a flashing light show out of the music box’s translucent top. It’s a total surprise, and one I never get tired of listening to, watching and showing to guests in my office. But the best part is that the work was produced through a program Knight funds called Community Supported Art, which the New York Times profiled today. 
  • Article

    Irresistible Menlomania

    Published August 3, 2013 by

    By Sebastian Spreng, Visual Artist and Classical Music Writer I have to admit that when David Finckel asked me to be [email protected]’s “2013 Visual Artist” I had little idea of what it was about or what I should do. Trusting the judgment of the celebrated cellist, who has just left...
  • Article

    Posters picture the last century

    Published August 2, 2013 by

    Jean D'Ylen, P. Vercasson, c. 1924.   Die Sünde Wider das Blut, 1917. You might think that an exhibit of poster art from the first part of the 20th century in Germany, currently showing at the Jewish Museum of Florida-FIU, would be...
  • Article

    Poet Yaddyra Peralta tonight at The Betsy South Beach

    Published August 1, 2013 by

    Yaddyra Peralta's work captures the fleeting and unstable essence of memories. Her poetry in many ways is a memory room, a space where the past lives on the page. Peralta's work has appeared in or is forthcoming in Ploughshares, Jai-Alai, Abe's Penny, Tigertail, Hinchas de Poesia, the Miami Poetry Collective’s...
  • Article

    Teaming up to share lessons on designing contests for impact

    Published August 1, 2013 by

    Webinar Recording: Open Contests from Knight Foundation on Vimeo. Below, Mayur Patel, Knight Foundation’s vice president for strategy and assessment, and Sonal Shah, senior fellow at the Case Foundation, write about the importance of challenges and prizes as a tool for social change. In a world where technology has opened up access to a vast pool of talent and constant change has become the norm, contests offer a path to new ideas, new players and new ways of solving problems. We have seen a revival in contests as a way to discover new solutions and bold ideas across industries and sectors. Leading companies, including Netflix, Google and Cisco, have tapped into challenges and prizes as a way to stimulate new business and technology innovations. Public agencies have also joined in, using contests as a way to make progress on a range of social issues, from reducing obesity to conserving household energy use. Last month, the U.K. government announced in grand fashion a new £1 million “Longitudinal Prize” committee to design competitions with the aim of tackling societies’ complex problems. The U.S. federal government continues to invest in its challenges and prizes platform, Challenge.gov. The platform provides opportunities for government agencies to tap into the potential of their citizens through prizes such as the NASA Centennial Challenges and public/private challenges such as Mozilla Ignite. Despite this growing trend, many foundations have yet to use contests as a tool to advance their work and support innovation. Apprehension and uncertainty affect the willingness of many to adopt this tool. Additionally, it is not always clear where to start and how to design effective contests. Good design is key for successful contests, prizes and challenges. Sometimes even the failures can teach a lot about the effectiveness of the challenge or provide a better understanding about behaviors.   That’s why Knight and the Case Foundation, early adopters in this space, have teamed up to share experiences on contests, prizes and challenges and offer some valuable lessons learned along the way. On Aug. 8, we’re hosting a joint webinar, “Designing Contests for Impact.” The webinar, which begins at 1 p.m. EDT, will be geared towards foundations and other organizations interested in launching their own contests. We’ll share tips and practical advice on designing, setting up and running contests.