OUR WORK
DEI Arts Consultants offer solutions tailored to meet our clients' goals and objectives.
MISSION, VISION, STRATEGY, and IMPLEMENTATION
Philadelphia Center for Arts and Technology
In 2008, Foundations, Inc.- a national non-profit organization working with schools and communities to build educational capacity and improve children’s educational experience - was looking to help stem the tide of chronic truancy for Philadelphia's most vulnerable students. DEI Arts created the mission, vision and business plan, development strategy and programming for an innovative arts and technology education center established in 2009 that serves hundreds of students each year.
PROGRAM DEVELOPMENT and
CAPACITY BUILDING
Urban Erie Community Development Corporation
In 2014, the Urban Erie Community Development Corporation was looking for new ways to connect corporations and local government in an effort to spark wide-spread economic development for the city of Erie's low-income and immigrant communities. DEI Arts helped create a strategic initiative that combined the arts, literacy, and job readiness for a program educating adults and preparing them for employment and wrote grants that garnered $550,000 in new funding for the organization.
COLLABORATIVE PROGRAMMING
Free Library of Philadelphia
For this city-wide celebration of literature designed to get the entire community reading one book, DEI devised educational concert that combining a live reading by the authors of selected books and classical music. Programs include:
(2005) Pairing a reading by Tim O'Brien of his Vietnam inspired memoir novel The Things They Carried with a performance Jennifer Higdon's Zones by the Philadelphia Orchestra's percussion section
(2009) Combining a live reading of The Soloist author, Steve Lopez, and a performance of Beethoven's Symphony No. 8. In keeping with the book's theme of homelessness and classical music, all proceeds from the concert benefited Project HOME, an organization in Philadelphia dedicated to helping break the cycle of homlessness and poverty
(2010) For this graphic novel and memoir about the author's life during and after the Islamic Revolution in Iran, DEI devised a program that incorporated Persian classical music and Sufi poetry in a English language version of the kind of artistic broadcast radio program - Golha- that was popular during that era. In the program, poems were read in both English translation and in Farsi by prominent members of the spoken word and the Philadelphia's Persian community.
DIVERSE AUDIENCE DEVELOPMENT through
INNOVATIVE PROGRAMMING
Black Pearl Chamber Orchestra
In 2008 DEI Arts Consulting Founder and Principal, Jeri Lynne Johnson, created a living musical laboratory - a model for the 21st-century American orchestra. Black Pearl embraces diversity, equity and inclusion at every level of the organization- from the performers, to the staff and Board members. It uses innovative community engagement programs, collaborative projects with leading cultural and educational institutions to build new audiences for classical music. As a result, Black Pearl's audience profile boasts 55% African-American and Latino participation, reflecting the demographics of the city of Philadelphia.
COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT PROGRAMMING Delaware River Waterfront Corporation
EnterActive Festival
For this festival inaugurated in 2010, DEI designed a concert program that married the orchestra in a blend of classical music and Philadelphia's unique neo-soul artists. The concert also incorporated opportunities for the audience to join the orchestra on stage for a fun hands-on engagement activity that allowed them to learn the art of conducting with the musicians on stage.