California for the Arts announced recently that the seventh annual Arts, Culture, & Creativity Month will kick off on April 1. The public celebrations focus on the essential role of the arts in promoting “Health, Healing, and Hope” across the state. 

California for the Arts

According to the recent California Arts Advocacy Survey, arts organizations and creative workers nationwide report that long-term public underinvestment in the arts is their top concern. Factors include rising rent costs, employee costs, and operational expenses that add stress and threaten to displace community artists and creatives. Funding for the California Arts Council, the state’s art agency, has remained since 2018, with California ranking 35th behind Utah, New York, and Mississippi. 

Julie Baker, CEO of California for the Arts, says, “We call artists’ second responders’ because after a first responder comes in and saves a life, artists and creative workers step in to help communities heal and rebuild” and “Research shows that not only do the arts help people cope, find their voice and agency, and build compassion and empathy, they are also essential drivers for community health and economic wellbeing. California should be leading, especially now, in recognizing the value and impact of culture and arts and the critical need for creativity. Instead, we are 35th in the nation for arts funding.” 

Events

Arts, Culture, and Creativity Month will be held in San Diego on April 4, Fresno on April 17, Oakland on April 18, and Sacramento on April 23. On April 22, Maria Rosario Jackson, Ph.D., who served as chair of the National Endowment for the Arts until January 2025, will deliver the keynote address at the CA Arts and Culture Summit in Sacramento.

Arts Advocacy Day

On April 23, advocates will rally at the state capitol and meet with elected officials to discuss the critical need to restore investments in initiatives that support creative arts employment. Advocates are urging their representatives to reverse a $5 million cut to the California Arts Council’s budget and to support the Film/TV Tax Credit.

Other advocacy priorities will include seeking funding support, expanding the California Cultural District Program, and reinstating funding for the Museums Grant Programs, which lost allocations in the previous budget cycle.

Arts Advocacy Day is focused on legislation introduced to support arts workers, including SB 456, penned by Senator Angelique Ashby of Sacramento. The bill creates a licensing exemption for muralists, allowing them to continue to engage in commissioned work for public and private art without acquiring a contractor’s license.

California for the Arts is also launching an “Arts & Mental Health Guide” and hosting webinars to educate the public about artists’ role as “second responders.”

Arts, Culture, & Creativity Month

California for the Arts successfully campaigned for California to recognize and celebrate the creative arts in 2019 by declaring April as the Arts, Culture, & Creativity Month. In 2021, an additional resolution was declared to recognize artists as second responders.

California for the Arts is a comprehensive, multidisciplinary advocacy service organization focused on building resources and public awareness of the value and impact of arts, culture, and creativity across California.