Pleasant Home Foundation Receives Major Grant
Jan 3, 2014 12:00 AM
The MacArthur Fund for Arts & Culture at The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Grants
Pleasant Home Foundation Funds for their Arts and Culture Programs
The Funds will partially support the next three years of their Performing Arts Series
<Oak Park, IL, January 1, 2014> Pleasant Home, a living museum, which is open to the public and offers year-round educational programs, community events, festivals and cultural performances, has recently received a generous grant from The MacArthur Fund for Arts & Culture at The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation. With this support, Pleasant Home will be able to substantially cover the costs of operating their new Performing Arts Series from 2014 to 2016.
The power of the arts goes beyond entertainment; it stimulates our creativity and opens us up to new heritages, and perceptions. “We are thrilled to have been awarded this grant and to bring the Performing Arts Series to the community and surrounding areas. Our hope is that this program will bring unique stories to life through a multi-disciplinary approach to performing arts,” said Heidi Ruehle-May, Executive Director at Pleasant Home Foundation.
According to the Pleasant Home Foundation Program Manager, Georgia Braun, each month will feature a different artist, from dance, to music, to theatrical performances. Participating artists include Winifred Haun & Dancers, Lost & Found Productions, Wood, Bone & Steel African Drums, and Chamber Musical Theatre artists Karena Mendoza & Marilyn Chambers. Ticket prices will vary by performance, and the public has the opportunity to purchase season tickets at a significantly reduced rate. “Local artists will also have the opportunity to exhibit their work during the performance weekend,” says Braun.
The MacArthur Fund for Arts and Culture at The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation makes grants to small arts organizations with annual operating budgets of less than $500,000. It funds dance, music, theater, visual and media arts, literary arts, interdisciplinary arts, special projects, museums, and service, policy or advocacy groups.
To learn more about Pleasant Home, visit http://www.pleasanthome.org and for more information about the Driehaus Foundation, visit http://www.driehausfoundation.org/.
About Pleasant Home
Pleasant Home was designed in 1897 by noted architect George W. Maher for investment banker and philanthropist John W. Farson and his wife Mamie Ashworth Farson. Maher was a contemporary of world-renowned Prairie School architects Joseph Lyman Silsbee, Frank Lloyd Wright and George Grant Elmslie. He designed more than 300 distinguished structures in the Unites States; Pleasant Home is the only Maher building open to the public as a museum.
The Pleasant Home Foundation is dedicated to restoring, preserving and operating the home both as a beloved local civic institution, as well as a destination for visitors from around the world who come to Oak Park to enjoy its vast array of architectural and cultural treasures.
Media Contact:
Heidi Ruehle-May, Executive Director, Pleasant Home Foundation
(708) 383-2654
hruehlemay@pleasanthome.org
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