RedLine is a proud partner and administrator of the Arts in Society grant. This collaborative program provides grants to both individuals and organizations that use art as a vehicle to promote social justice and community welfare. 

We love highlighting our Arts in Society (AiS) grant recipients and all the unique and impactful projects made possible by their grant.

We’re excited continue this series with the 2022 AiS Grantee: New Cottage Arts!

Learn all about their Arts in Society-funded project Refuge Arts and how group music and arts classes for refugee and immigrant youth and families help create communal bonding and increase family system resiliency.

What is New Cottage Arts?

New Cottage Arts is a Denver-based music and art nonprofit that provides year-round, youth- and community-informed music and art classes, workshops, performances, camps, and in-school programs for all ages of youth based in 2 physical locations: SW Denver/Westwood, 655 S. Federal Blvd, and North Denver/Cole/Clayton, 3851 N. Steele Street. 

Through our music and art programming, New Cottage Arts sees on average 200 students ages 2-21+ (50% teens) on a weekly basis, during the hours of 3:00-8:00pm daily.

Our mission is to provide safe, supportive, social, and caring learning spaces for all community members, and engaging youth with the arts to cultivate social-bonding, skill-learning, and the character traits of patience, determination, and practice to drive youth success, empowerment, and accomplishment.

We have developed lasting relationships in our communities and schools for youth impact through the arts. Community outreach programs include in- and after-school music and art programs at Beacon Middle

Schools, as well as developing programs with neighboring Bruce Randolph School and Columbine Elementary, Mile High United Way (bi-lingual music program for parents and youth through Instructions for Parents of Preschool Youngsters, HIPPY), and the Denver Broncos (Montbello) and Suncor Boys and Girls Club.

Music and art program specifics include:

• Weekly, one-hour group piano, drums, guitar, and art classes (average 10 weekly group classes, 3-8 students each class)

• Twice-weekly, one-hour guitar and drumming enrichment program for Westwood middle school students (including participants from Athmar Recreation Center)

• Weekly pro-youth mental health and self-care, anti-bullying, anti-stigma program engaging youth with the arts to express ideas and feelings, manage conflict, and promote overall emotional well-being (including participants from St Charles Recreation Center)

• Weekly Community Choir in Westwood for a consistent, safe and supportive space for families, as well as weekly program specifically for youth in Denver’s refugee and immigrant communities to experience social bonding, community building, and developing deep relationships with caring arts providers through music and art group experiences.

New Cottage Arts regularly participates in the Denver Office of Children’s Affairs Pop Up events promoting safe and supportive space for youth in both southwest and north Denver neighborhoods.

During these pop ups, 50 youth gathered to experience group music & art-making as a means to promote pro-mental health initiatives, anti-bullying, and suicide prevention measures.

Denver Human Services teams were available to directly speak with youth and families (some who were struggling with immediate social needs). 

New Cottage Arts’ programs also promote social justice, and minority youth empowerment through on-the-ground music and art programs that serve marginalized neighborhoods and communities.

Through a Denver Arts & Venues grant, New Cottage Arts completed a large-scale, community public art project in Westwood directly on Federal Blvd, with youth from Westwood and Montbello participating in creation and design.

Through our Redline Arts in Society grant, we will be continuing a program that brings refugee youth together for musical performance, and to complete a collaborative mural celebrating families and traditions.

Tell us about your Arts in Society project Refuge Arts

Refuge Arts started in January 2022 with weekly group classes in voice, guitar, piano, rock ensemble, visual art, and mural design for refugee and immigrant youth and families to create communal bonding and increase family system resiliency though group music and art work.

We work out of 4 sites between southwest Denver and north/northeast Denver neighborhoods, including two New Cottage Arts studios and two middle school.

Each group met one hour per week to practice individual creative skills, while working together in groups to develop teamwork, and community and social bonding through the arts. 

Soon after starting the program, the demand for classes grew beyond our initial scope, and we have now grown to offer the multiple classes listed on the slide — including Fashion Design & Runway and Youth Drumline three classes per week, group music classes such as piano and guitar specifically for families to play together, and multiple levels of classes for different skill levels. 

Solo and group performances and project presentations were held in February, April, June, and August, with upcoming performance opportunities to share musical and visual art presentations with families and community in October and December. Our final presentation and performance is scheduled as a project gala event. 

During summer 2022, Refuge Arts offered 2 full-day summer camps: June 13-24 (music ensemble group and instrument exploration) and June 11-22 (public art and collaborative mural design), that culminated in a group musical performance and a final group painted mural experience.

These camps championed the creative work of our youth and communities, while allowing us to optimize the program moving forward through pre- and post-surveys of youth and families, and providers.

Recognizing a demand from parents and grandparents and younger children, the program developed a bi-lingual music and movement class for ages 2-5 with accompanying parent, to experience bonding through early childhood music, exploration of imagination, movement, fine motor skills, and indigenous storytelling. Age range for program participants has been 2-70. 

We continue to work on project challenges revolving around scheduling and curriculum adaptability. We are being as flexible as needed to accommodate changing student schedules, while also encouraging maximum participation in programs to maintain group benefit and ongoing skill and team/community building.

In our group classes for families, we are also trying to adapt to a multi-age, multi-skill curriculum and teaching style that can benefit everyone in the group, as families prefer to come together, or instead of having different class, separated by age and levels which had been our previous schedule model.

This has been a welcomed challenge for our teaching artists, who are adapting to teaching skills to ages 5-50 a single group setting.

What's next in the pipeline for Refuge Arts in 2022? What other projects are you dreaming up, and how will your AiS grant help to support these projects?

In our upcoming projects on the horizon, New Cottage Arts will be expanding our youth ensembles, utilizing the momentum from our current AiS grant to launch three new and exciting youth initiatives in the upcoming year:

Jazz and Classical Chamber Music, Electronic Music Composers, and “Let My Beats Speak!,” a new drum line for queer and trans youth, and youth of color using the power of music, combined with parade float design/construction, costume, and celebration, as protest, and participation in 2023 Denver and Aurora Pride Parades. 

New Cottage Arts Youth Ensembles will meet weekly September 2022-December 2023 to practice individual instrument skills while working together to create dynamic final performances. Our target youth audience is under-served, under-resourced students of color ages 11-18 living in Denver’s southwest/north neighborhoods.

Jazz /Classical Chamber groups include piano duo, string trios, and jazz ensembles studying music written by women and BIPOC composers. Rock Band combines youth of similar ages to explore pro-social music-making in a fun and supportive environment, while developing creative and group musicianship skills.

Electronic Music Composers explores the creation of digital soundscape through modern music and beat-making technology to help youth tell stories and express emotion through digital music. Students create original compositions using digital beats and sound recordings (recorded poems, wildlife or city sounds, sounds from home, etc), and will upload final versions online to share with the world.

And last but certainly not least (and so very close to my heart as New Cottage Arts director), “Let My Beats Speak” teaches drum line skills to queer and trans youth and youth of color to promote the power of storytelling and protest through the percussive arts, mixing theatrical components of parade float design/construction and costume to participate in 2023 Pride events and Denver Parade of Lights 2022/23.

What was your experience like when applying for an Arts in Society grant? What tips would you share with other artists or organizations looking to apply for an AiS grant?

Personally for me, applying for an Arts in Society grant was a very challenging and honest process combining self-reflection with daring to put into action a dynamic, meaningful, and courageous project idea to drive direct change in our chosen societal challenge.

I found myself asking many important questions:

How can my project honor my organization's mission and current project initiatives?

What are issues that are pressing, relevant, and in need of addressing?

What are the limits of my programs in regards to producing achievable and inspiring results with the resources we have?

Ultimately, the process was immensely clarifying and helped me focus on what issues are important to our organization and communities, and how we are able to work together to continue moving society forward with our work.

Meet Another 2022 AiS Grantee: Youth Employment Academy

The Youth Employment Academy is a non-profit organization with a mission to serve young adults, ages 14-24, in breaking the cycle of generational poverty across Denver by gaining personal and economic stability through education, arts, technology, and employment training.

Learn all about their Arts in Society-funded project Edible Artscapes and how it taught youth to create a regenerative urban farming installation with integrated artistic elements in an under-resourced neighborhood!

Meet our 2022 Arts in Society Grantee: Youth Employment Academy >