Carnegie Hall and Social Justice: Who Knew?

The late Dr. Maxine Greene, pioneering educator and champion for social justice through the arts, said that “the arts… cannot change the world, but they may change human beings who might change the world.” Some of the country’s most powerful and renowned institutions are putting this sentiment into action through the development and implementation of a far-reaching variety of programs meant to advance social progress through engagement in the arts. These programs harness the arts’ innate capacity to support creative self-expression and to connect people to each other. From some angles, our cultural climate has never been angrier or more divisive, but thanks to the work of these warriors for societal progress, social justice, equity and inclusion, the view does not look so bad from everywhere.

New York City’s Cool Culture is one such change maker working to increase literacy and success in education for some of the city’s most diverse families through expanded access to the arts. Education has long been one of the keys to upward social mobility, and those keys have often been purposely kept from minority demographics through lack of access to quality education and the tools necessary to succeed in school. Cool Culture is changing this narrative and opening the doors to scholastic success through their partnerships with 90 premier New York City cultural institutions and 400 early childhood development programs. Together, these social change agents provide over 50,000 low-income families with free access to New York’s museums. Cool Culture fosters an early love of learning, literacy, and the arts by involving the whole family and eliminating barriers to access. This is just one of many institutions putting their resources to work to change the world through the arts.

Carnegie Hall (full disclosure, Carnegie Hall is a client of mine) provides another example of a private non-profit organization dedicated to creating social impact and fostering social justice through engaging a wide audience of people throughout New York City and beyond. Weill Music Institute (WMI) reaches hundreds of thousands of students, young musicians, and teachers in classrooms and concert halls across the country, as well as through in-depth workshops and residencies in correctional facilities, healthcare settings, homeless shelters, and juvenile justice settings. While it may be known to some as simply an iconic concert venue Carnegie Hall is indeed an involved organization working tirelessly towards creating a brighter tomorrow. Carnegie Hall extends learning opportunities as broadly as possible, particularly where personal or systemic obstacles inhibit the development of self-expression.

Musical Connections, a Carnegie Hall program for social impact puts on a series of music workshops for the men at Sing Sing. Participants work with professional artists to learn how to compose music and play instruments and continue to meet, provide support for one another, and create together after release. NeON Arts is another program facilitated by Carnegie Hall that gives young people from seven New York neighborhoods the opportunity to participate in a range of creative projects. Participation in the program fosters positive peer relationships… social and career skills. Carnegie Hall’s collaboration with the Arts for Incarcerated Youth Network has developed Create Justice, an initiative that brings together thought leaders from across the country to leverage the power of the arts for youth justice and reform.

Another Carnegie Hall program, The Lullaby Project partners new and expectant mothers and other family members with professional musicians to create personalized lullabies for their newborns. The program nurtures an interest in music and music education while supporting the early childhood bonds between mom and baby that create the bedrock foundation for healthy families and communities. The Lullaby Project has expanded throughout New York City to reach mothers in schools, hospitals, homeless shelters, and correctional facilities. Extending across the country, The Lullaby Project enables partner organizations to support families in their own communities.

Behind many other social change is Agnes Gund’s Art for Justice Fund. Established in the summer of 2017 with approximately $100 million in seed funding from the sale of a Roy Lichtenstein painting, the Art for Justice Fund will support people and programs working to reform the criminal justice system and end mass incarceration. Gund’s other social justice through the arts programs include Studio in School, which provides art lessons to students in New York City public schools and supports a more diverse staff at New York’s Museum of Modern Art. It’s impressive. Agnes is disrupting white privilege as we know it.

In a world that can seem full of fear and uncertainty, these thought leaders and changemakers are proving that when we work together we can curate a future that we want to see. None of us are alone on this island, and programs like these and many others which are supporting social change through the arts, are providing an ever-growing platform for diversity, inclusion, equal access, societal change and ultimately social justice.