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The University of Massachusetts Arts Council provides incentive through grant support, financial resource networking, and arts information services to student organizations and academic departments whose art programs address contemporary issues, aspects of identity, and values that are at the forefront of cultural awareness, The Council advances and defines the concepts that accessibility to diverse, and sometimes unexpected forms of artistic expression, is indispensable to an enlightened liberal arts education.
Council funds are administered by a representative board of eighteen members who review over fifty proposals within a year. Single Project and annual Block grants support identifying cultural projects from organizations who, aligned with the Council, have the collective goal of encouraging and presenting an informing spectrum of the arts that enrich the curriculum and engage the students of the University.
The UMass Arts Council has a rich and varied history. The earliest records date back to 1936 (when the organization was known as the Fine Arts Council), and indicate that the Council was the primary presenter of art events on campus. In the 1970's, the Fine Arts Center was built, and the Arts Council redefined its mission.
As early as the 1950's, one can find evidence of the Arts Council serving as a funding agency. Today, the Council continues this role, and provides $90,000 each year to over 70 campus organizations who request funding to support theater, dance, music, video and film productions, poetry readings and visual arts exhibitions on campus. The UMass Arts Council is funded primarily through a portion of the Arts Fee paid by University students. For this reason, the Council's programs and services are principally designed to serve University students. Council funds are administered by a representative board of 18 undergraduate students, faculty, staff, graduate students and alumni who meet regularly to review grant requests and handle other business before the Council.
As an educational outreach department of the Fine Arts Center, the organization provides students with a variety of free resources designed to help them to develop art programs on campus and seek funding to support these events. The Council also maintains several public art sites on campus and publishes literature which highlights these sites. As an advocate for the arts on campus, the Council publishes a poster which publicizes the exhibitions of the six galleries on campus.
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