The Private Sector Initiatives department of Americans for the Arts is leading efforts to stimulate additional support from the three major areas of the private sector: business, foundations and individuals. This support, which accounts for 40% of an arts organization’s budget, occurs across a broad spectrum of engagements from audience participation to volunteerism to board service and leadership to arts-based corporate training to sponsorship and funding. This work includes promoting partnership between the arts and business, in part through the national network of Arts & Business Councils, Business Committee for the Arts, Business Volunteers for the Arts affiliates, and United Arts Funds (UAF).
The Arts & Business Council of Americans for the Arts
The Arts & Business Council of Americans for the Arts supports national programs that build stronger private sector support for the arts. In addition to working to stimulate more financial support for the arts, efforts are also made to stimulate and support voluntarism, services the arts can offer to business, the transfer of management expertise from business to the arts, and sharing of knowledge and best practices. Local Arts & Business Council chapters also pursue this mission at a local level. The Arts & Business Council of Americans for the Arts serves as their “national headquarters." Click here to view a brief history on The Arts & Business Council of Americans for the Arts.
The Arts & Business Council of Americans for the Arts maintains these programs:
- Business Volunteers for the Arts
- Arts-based Corporate Training
- MetLife Foundational National Arts Forum Series
- National Arts Marketing Project
Business Committee for the Arts
The mission of the Business Committee for the Arts, Inc. (BCA) is to ensure that the arts flourish in America by encouraging, inspiring and stimulating businesses to support the arts in the workplace, in education and in the community.The Business Committee for the Arts, Inc. (BCA), founded in 1967 by David Rockefeller, is a national not-for-profit organization that brings business and the arts together. It provides businesses of all sizes with the services and resources necessary to develop and advance partnerships with the arts that benefit business, the arts and the community.
The Business Committee for the Arts maintains these programs:A UAF is a combined or federated appeal for arts funding conducted annually to raise unrestricted money on behalf of three or more arts, culture, and/or science organizations. While these campaigns traditionally focus on corporate, individual, and workplace giving, they also may include government support. Traditionally, distribution of the pooled funds has been for unrestricted operating support, but options for special projects and donor designated funding are increasingly being included. United Arts Funds (UAF) are community-specific fundraising organizations that distribute earned funds to the arts organizations in their communities.
The UAF movement began in 1949, when civic leaders in Cincinnati, OH, and Louisville, KY, determined that community-wide campaigns, loosely based upon the United Way model, could raise substantially more money to provide ongoing operating support to their major arts institutions. Over the past 54 years, more than 100 communities across the country—both large and small—have established UAFs with more than 60 currently operating in the United States.
UAFs have an extensive network throughout the country. Visit the network page to get involved in your state or region.