Guild Hall Exceeds $100,000 In Grant Funding

[caption id="attachment_75380" align="alignnone" width="1000"] The John Drew Theater at Guild Hall. Gary Mamay photo[/caption]

The Hearst Foundation recently awarded Guild Hall a $50,000 grant to support K-12 educational programming in 2018, allowing the East Hampton museum to broaden its on-site arts programs — including Drama Literacy, Project Hero, Word Up!, ArtLink, Student Art Festival, Teen Arts Council, artXchange, and a professional production of Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” that incorporates local high school students in paid roles as members of the cast and crew.

“We are honored and very grateful to be recognized by The Hearst Foundation,” Guild Hall Executive Director Andrea Grover said in a press release. “Their investment underscores the importance of the arts as a vital component of primary and secondary education and provides us with the opportunity to expand this critical pillar of our programming.”

Guild Hall also received $50,000 in 2018 funding from The Robert David Lion Gardiner Foundation — dedicated to the study of New York State history — and $20,000 from the Gerry Charitable Trust. Both grants support the digitization of Guild Hall’s Permanent Collection, bringing the museum one step closer to building a publicly accessible, searchable, online database of 2,400 artworks that “will become a critical resource for understanding Eastern Long Island’s legacy as an artist colony,” according to the release.

Finally, The Robert Lehman Foundation awarded a $5,000 grant toward the museum’s upcoming exhibition, “The Artist Curated Collection,” to be curated by Bryan Hunt, the first of a new series that will invite artists to interpret and inform art history by selecting an organizing a show of works from the Permanent Collection.

“These grants speak to the importance of Guild Hall’s mission of ensuring the legacy of the East End as a vibrant artist colony through the continued cultivation and celebration of artistry,” the release said.