SOU’s Schneider Museum Receives $36,000 Grant from the Ford Family Foundation

(Ashland, Ore.) – The Ford Family Foundation’s Visual Arts Program has awarded the Schneider Museum of Art (SMA) a $36,000 grant to implement the Southern Oregon Site (ART) Project.
Working in concert with the Southern Oregon University Art department, the SMA will invite six mid-career Oregon artists to create new work, made in response to ‘site’, which will be shown in six, one-person museum gallery (or outside courtyard) shows between September 2013 and June 2014. Six Oregon writers will be invited to produce one essay each on one of the artists and their new work.
SOU student artists will assist in the installation and/or construction of the work/shows.  Chosen artists will visit Ashland during May and June 2013, and will then return home to develop ideas for this ‘site.’ The SMA and art department see the Southern Oregon Site (ART) Project as a prototype for an annual new works program at SOU.
“The Schneider Museum of Art is grateful for the generous support of the Ford Family Foundation,” says  Schneider Museum of Art Acting Director Erika Leppmann.  “The Southern Oregon Site (ART) Project award is the second grant given to the Schneider Museum of Art by the Ford Family Foundation in the last two years.”
The Ford Family Foundation was established in 1957 by Kenneth W. and Hallie E. Ford.  Its mission is “successful citizens and vital rural communities” in Oregon and Siskiyou County, California. The Foundation is located in Roseburg, Oregon, with a Scholarship office in Eugene.