Have you experienced awesomeness? Well Experience Counterpoint might get you close. They’re a guerrilla chamber orchestra dedicated to pushing the boundaries of classical music and performance art who won the March DC Awesome grant for their project “Audio Warhol”. We hope that with our support, Experience CounterPoint can bring their next exciting performance to a wider audience to experience awesomeness! You can listen to some of Counterpoint’s work here: http://www.experiencecounterpoint.org/experience/listen.html Here’s what they had to say about winning the Awesome Foundation Grant: Winning the Awesome Foundation DC grant is something that couldn’t come at a better time for us. We have recently finished a few amazing events, but we are still bursting with innovative ideas! While we would love to not have to think about it, money is definitely a major concern when we are creating and executing a project. This grant will help us bring to life one of our new projects: Audio Warhol. The Awesome Foundation’s support will help spur an exciting and artistically sophisticated experience for both the audience and CounterPoint to enjoy. It will be truly Awesome and we can’t wait to plan it. CounterPoint is about inclusion, bringing music and art to all people. As… read more →
Over at AF-San Francisco, we’ve been a little bit obsessed lately by the “X a day” category of Foundation applications. They’re discrete, highly do-able, and result in a ton of awesome products being released into the universe. We had such a great time seeing Meredith Scheff’s Scarf-A-Day project take shape last month that we decided to follow up that grant with another project that takes the model in a entirely new and great direction. To that end, thrilled to announce that our March Awesome Fellowship goes out to the endlessly wonderful Bay Area artist Adam Davis, who is embarking on a mission to paint one hundred bite-sized (around 4” x 4”) and big sized (yet to come!) paintings of dinosaurs over the next month or so. He will then engage in a worldwide hide-and-seek game, caching the dinosaurs in secret locations and releasing clues (some clues leading to yet more clues) to their location on his project blog. Once the dinosaurs are located, they are yours to keep. Four have been located so far around the Bay Area (including this crazy story and the first dinosaur being hidden at the weird and wonderful Jejune Institute), and there’s many more on… read more →
Come one, come all to our 2nd ever Awesome Foundation Los Angeles party to celebrate our new grant recipient, Jail Door Guitars! We definitely had a lot of fun last time (incriminating pics here). Details about the Fresh Bruises party can be found here and make sure you RSVP here. The $5 cover goes straight to the bands performing and will get you in for an open bar all night long! The fun night is hosted by our friends at Family Industries and sponsored by Brand X, Indigenous, and FILTER magazine. In addition to a ton of awesome live bands playing (Tape Deck Mountain, Handshakes), there will be live screenprinting, an art gallery, Grill Em All food truck, AND (everyone’s favorite) a hosted bar with drinks all night long from PBR, Red Bull, Alexander Valley Vineyards, and Jarritos! We love seeing ya’ll out there so please join us for this awesome event!
Drumroll please…Awesome LA has decided to award our 2nd grant to Jail Guitar Doors! Jail Guitar Doors USA is a non-profit that believes in providing new solutions for prisoner rehabilitation. They provide musical instruments, public concerts, and outreach programs to inspire hope and creativity in prisoners who have taken an oath of non-violence. In just 18 months, they have delivered over 30 guitars and various amps into 6 different prisons in California, Texas and New York state! Here’s how it all began (according to the Jail Guitar Doors website): In 1978, The Clash released the song, “Jail Guitar Doors.” The song tells the story of the imprisonment of their fellow musician Wayne Kramer. In 2007, to honor the life of Clash founder, Joe Strummer, Billy Bragg launches an initiative in England to provide musical equipment used to rehabilitate inmates serving time in Her Majesty’s Prisons in the United Kingdom. His initiative is named for that very same song, “Jail Guitar Doors.” In 2009, Wayne Kramer partners with Billy Bragg to found Jail Guitar Doors USA. Together, their combined effort continues the mission for prisoners in America. The circle is unbroken. This Awesome grant will go towards their next visit to the… read more →
Next month will mark the 1-year anniversary of the Awesome Foundation San Francisco, and we thought, “Close enough. Let’s have a party!” So on Sunday, February 13th, we held our first Awesome Foundation SF party (hopefully the first of many to come), and invited past recipients and friends to come celebrate with us. In true Awesome fashion, what started off as a just-for-fun get together turned into an inspiring look at how micro-financing of local innovators can encourage large-scale change. The party was produced on a modest budget with each trustee chipping in just enough to supply a little hummus, some wine, and perhaps 1 too many cases of beer (my bad). Hosted by the lovely people of PariSoma in downtown San Francisco, the spirited crowd was a diverse collection of go-getting artists, scientists, DIY makers, and general do-gooders. Jesse Taggert, our Dean of Awesome, kicked off the party with a few introductions to the trustees and a quick congrats to this year’s recipients. Then, since most of them have never met one another, each recipient got an opportunity to say a few words about their project and give thanks to their amazing partners in crime. And thanks to Rod… read more →