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Economic Security for New York Artists

Since October 2022, I have worked as Artist-Organizer with Creatives Rebuild New York (CRNY), a $125 million initiative to support the economic security of New York-based artists through Artist Employment and Guaranteed Income programs. Check out this announcement from the time I joined the team.
During this time, I worked on 4 projects to better understand and better support Deaf and disabled artists in the growing field to support individual artists.

 

Access Access Program Series

 

The resources from this series are about accessibility. Here are two ways we talked about “accessibility”:

  • We looked at how to build and grow accessibility. We call this “access design.” Organizations that want to do more accessible work need to learn how to do access design.
  • We also looked at how accessibility can be used to make art. This includes how disabled artists make art. We call this “disability artistry” or “disability aesthetics.”

The title of this series, “Access Access,” means a few things. It means making information about accessibility more accessible. It also sounds like a chant. We could all say “Access! Access!” when we need to pay more attention to accessibility.

Access Access could also mean that “access” is a topic we talk about. But at the same time, “access” is something we do together so that we have what we need.

For the full resources, including captioned, signed, and audio described videos, check out the CRNY site.

 

Deaf and Disabled Artist Employment Research

 

The cover of a report with the title Deaf and Disabled Artist Employment. Research on Work from Creatives Rebuild New York. By Kevin Gotkin, Ph.D. There are colorful objects designed by disabled artist Yo-Yo Lin. They are rounded shapes that blend into the white background, like tests of spray paint in warm reds and oranges to cooler blues and purples.

Design by Yo-Yo Lin

 

How does employment support the lives and careers of Deaf and disabled artists in New York State?

This document offers context, data, and analysis about artists’ lives and careers in a 2-year employment program (2022 – 2024).

This report seeks to:

  • Identify and reflect on the contexts for Deaf and disabled artists’ employment
  • Share knowledge about the unique experiences of Deaf and disabled artists in one program across New York State, Creatives Rebuild New York’s Artist Employment Program
  • Highlight the successes and challenges of the program
  • Inform those seeking to design new employment programs

It is written for artists, employers, funders, policy-makers, and arts workers/ administrators, especially those who are creating, sustaining, and/or evaluating artist employment programs.

Check back soon for the full report.

 

Plain Language for Arts and Culture

 

The cover of a report with the title Plain Language for Arts Organizations. A Guide from Creatives Rebuild New York. By Reid Caplan, Kevin Gotkin, and Isaiah Madison. There is a world of swirling blue and white vectors, a chaotic ecology in abstract. Cut out, through what could be an escape hatch to blank, clear, white space where the title information is.

Design by Kevin Gotkin

 

This guide will teach you how to write in Plain Language. Plain language is a way to make writing easier to understand. This guide is for people who work at arts organizations. You might be:

  • Someone who runs an organization that shows works of art
  • A volunteer at a place for artists with intellectual and developmental disabilities
  • The person who updates the website or social media accounts of an arts organization
  • An art teacher

Many other people might find this guide helpful too. For example, disabled artists might learn something from this guide. They can help others make their art more accessible.

There are many ways to write in Plain Language. This guide will not give you one “right” way. The goal is to help you get started. You will find ways to make your work better once you start using Plain Language.

How we write in Plain Language will change over time. This guide was made in 2024. There may be new ideas about writing Plain Language by the time you read this. You should search for recent Plain Language writing from disabled self-advocates. And you should talk to self-advocates about your work.

This guide is written in Plain Language.

Check back soon for the full guide.

 

Increasing and Protecting Access to Public Benefits

 

The cover of a report called Crip Coin. Disability, Public Benefits, and Guaranteed Income. By Kevin Gotkin, Ph.D. There are shapes that look like cash bills. But they're warped, glitched, and expanding past their edges.

Design by Kevin Gotkin

The U.S. movement for guaranteed income (GI) is growing. As more people experience the transformative potential of no-strings-attached cash assistance, we can better understand the limits of existing anti-poverty initiatives and how unrestricted aid can help fill the gaps. One question keeps surfacing among advocates, organizers, and program administrators: How does cash interact with public benefit programs? This is especially important for disabled people who use means-tested cash assistance, like the federal Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program, as their primary source of support. People who use public benefits are experts on the impacts of cash, but they are often left out of the design, implementation, and research about guaranteed income programs.

This report lays out some of the relationships between disability, public benefits, and cash and offers ideas for future movement work that harnesses the critical insights of disability organizing. We draw on lessons from the Creatives Rebuild New York (CRNY) Guaranteed Income for Artists program (2022 – 2024) and a convening of advocates from across the U.S. (July 2024). In the end, this document introduces the notion of a ‘crip coin’ as an essential currency for the future of the cash movement.

Check back soon for the full report.

 

 

It has been an honor working with brilliant, kind, and generous colleagues at CRNY to make this work possible.