Artist Opportunity—Join the Rice Street Artist Team

Artist opportunity—Join the Rice Street Artist Team

At a Rice Street Visioning Project creative pop-up in September 2020, community members of all ages in Saint Paul, Minnesota shared with artist liaisons their vision for the future of their neighborhood.

In the middle of a pandemic, community artist liaisons developed a series of engagements—including giving out free plants—that made community members feel valued, respected, safe, and heard.

Forecast Public Art seeks an artist with connections to Saint Paul’s North End/Frogtown neighborhoods/Rice Street to join our Rice Street Artist Team.

Call Open: November 30, 2022 – early February, 2023

Compensations: $10,000 artist fee + access to artist group funds for engagement activities/materials

Project Overview

You will do deep community engagement work for the Rice Street Visioning Study, a Ramsey County funded initiative for the redevelopment of the Rice Street corridor between Pennsylvania Avenue and Wheelock Parkway.

These are temporary part-time independent contractor positions. Priority will be given to those who apply by January 2, 2023. Interviews will begin in January with an ideal start date in mid-January 2023. Your appointment would continue through fall of 2024.

Duties

Selected artists will

Work within a four-person Artist Engagement Team, with Forecast and other organizations hired by Ramsey County to host 6 pop-up events and participate in 4 open houses. Together the team will build relationships with neighborhood residents, local businesses and organizations who care about the future of Rice Street to ensure awareness of the upcoming construction work and provide opportunities for feedback and Q & A’s.
Develop and use arts-based tools to find out more about neighborhood residents’ opinions, hopes, and dreams for Rice Street.
Make recommendations to team and county regarding community supported changes to be made.

Compensation

Each member of the team will be paid a total of $10,000 in eight quarterly payments over the life of the project.
Artists will also receive mentoring and support to grow their artistic practice in community and as a group have access to $8000 in funds to use for their engagement activities/materials.
PLEASE NOTE: Due to the nature of this project much of the work will take place on evenings, weekends, and during summer months.

Desired Assets, Skills, and Abilities

Selected artists should have

Familiarity with the Rice Street Corridor including time spent living and/or working in the North End and/or Frogtown neighborhoods.
Experience designing arts-based activities for community engagement. This may include experience in a variety of mediums including organizing, social practice, drawing/painting, photography, writing, etc.
Comfort representing the project team in meetings and community events.
Comfort using computers including: Social Media, email, web browsers, and word processing software.

Artists with experience in and connections to multiple language communities – including immigrant and refugee communities present in the neighborhoods, are particularly encouraged to apply.

Rice Street Visioning Project community artist liaison Kazua Melissa Vang with artist Sai Xiong (Povhaum Studios) met community members at a creative pop-up event in September 2020, where families lined up to engage with the artists and take home a bandana. Photo courtesy Hawona Sullivan Janzen, Forecast consulting team member.