Arts Alive in Central Illinois

Last night I attended the annual meeting of ArtsPartners of Central Illinois, and I'm thrilled to announce that my good friends, Doug and Eileen Leunig were named 2012 ArtsPartners of the Year.  Most recently I've been working on an arts marketing committee with the Leunigs, along with Tracey Frugoli, Craig Stocks, Kathy Chitwood, and Suzette Boulais of ArtsPartners, helping to promote events in the Peoria area during National Arts and Humanities month in October.

One of the main projects of the campaign has been a series of images of local artists and arts enthusiasts which are airing daily this month on both WEEK-TV and WTVP-TV and which you can see HERE.

My slide, from a photo by Craig Stocks, was also featured at the meeting last night, and another picture of me appeared in the ArtsPartners annual report booklet, for my Marketing and PR for Creative Professionals seminar that I conducted at the Peoria Art Guild earlier this year.

I'm really inspired and grateful to be a part of the thriving arts community in central Illinois.

Workshop a Big Success!

A huge "Thank you!" to all who attended my Marketing and PR for Creative Professionals workshop at the Peoria Art Guild yesterday.  It was a big success, and I got lots of positive feedback from participants.  And a very special thanks to Suzette Boulais of ArtsPartners of Central Illinois in helping to make the whole thing happen, as well as Jenny Parkhurst at the Art Guild for arranging for us to hold it there!

Here's a shot of me during my talk, compliments of Suzette:

Mitch Talks Endlessly!

Marketing & PR for Creatives

Here's an early "mark your calendar" announcement to all you artists, performers, and anyone else who makes money from a "creative pursuit".  On February 13, in cooperation with ArtsPartners of Central Illinois, I'll be presenting a special workshop at the Peoria Art Guild on Marketing and PR for Creative Professionals.  If you want to make more money doing what you love, this is for you!

Here's the site for more information and registration:  ART MARKETING.

I Attended a Meeting with the PACVB and Peoria Arts Community

I almost forgot to write about this, but last Thursday I attended a meeting at the Peoria Art Guild hosted by the Peoria Area Convention and Visitors Bureau with various members of the central Illinois arts community.  The PACVB was wanting to brainstorm with the arts organizations and local artists on how we can all work together to use the arts and arts attractions to help better promote tourism to the central Illinois area.  This is something I've been strongly advocating for a long time, and I'm encouraged by the new openness to making this happen.

As you'll know if you follow any of my work, I'm a huge proponent of both the arts and of leveraging the power of the arts to help drive the economy, tourism, education, and many other important areas of our society.  I truly believe the arts, culture, and yes, entertainment, are a driving force and a foundation of progress and vitality in all these areas.

So it's great to see this new opportunity in the Peoria area, and I'm looking forward to working with the rest of the arts community to take full advantage of it.

Here's a shot of me in a thoughtful moment at the meeting:

Art Works in Peoria: Update

For those of you who have been following my work with the arts community in the Peoria area, here's an update from Arts Partners on one of the projects I've been involved with.

Friends of the Arts,

We are pleased to report that Congressman Aaron Schock presented our Art Works in Peoria poster to NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman this past week in Washington, DC. In a follow-up phone conversation with us, Rocco mentioned that he couldn’t be happier with his new poster (which is going up on the NEA walls) or with his conversation with Congressman Schock, who is a strong arts supporter and has voted in favor of maintaining funding for the NEA.

Thanks again to our many local area artists who submitted over 2,700 images to comprise this mosaic image. Special thanks also go to photographer Doug Leunig for letting us use his photograph of the skyline of Peoria and to George Brown of Bradley University for creating the composite image.