Serving Bay Area Communities

Brian Yoo participating in the 2009 Grand Slam Championship of the Youth Speaks Teen Poetry Slam.

For more than forty years, the Hewlett Foundation’s Performing Arts Program has played a leading role in nurturing the San Francisco Bay Area’s rich cultural diversity. The Program’s grantmaking supports organizations that use the power of the arts to reduce barriers for low income communities and communities of color in the Bay Area to access and participate in the arts.

More specifically, in recent years, we have made more than $4 million in grants to organizations that focus on reaching underserved communities throughout the region.

The Oakland-based EastSide Arts Alliance recognizes the arts and culture as powerful vehicles through which to address critical social change issues facing Oakland communities. Through community workshops as well as various programs and events, the EastSide Arts Alliance is committed to engaging communities across different cultural traditions and is an advocate of cultural and political awareness.

At Larkin Street Youth Services in San Francisco, the staff offers a comprehensive suite of support services to help homeless youth gain confidence in their creativity and realize their potential so they can exit street life permanently and become self-sufficient adults. The multi-year grant from the Hewlett Foundation supports Larkin Street’s efforts to attract additional financial support as it increases both the number and quality of its workshops, including one that shares new client-created media work online. Another Hewlett grant has helped Larkin Street expand from its traditional focus on visual arts and offer performing arts workshops.

The Young Musicians Program at the University of California, Berkeley, provides youth from low-income families throughout the Bay Area with year-round musical instruction from the region’s leading classical, jazz, and musical theater teachers. With Hewlett Foundation support, the Young Musicians Program offers a summer camp and weekly classes for free to admitted students and provides academic tutoring, preparation for SAT exams and college conservatory auditions, mentoring opportunities, and access to psychological counseling. Founded in 1968, the Young Musicians Program successfully prepares young people to excel on stage and off, routinely sending graduating seniors to college with scholarships and a strong sense of identity and confidence.

The Performing Arts Program is not accepting unsolicited Letters of Inquiry for its Serving Bay Area Communities grantmaking at this time. We encourage Bay Area performing arts grantseekers to explore funding opportunities provided with intermediaries and regranters with which we partner.