The Santa Monica Arts Foundation has launched the Arts Leadership Award to recognize people who have supported Santa Monica’s creative community. The awards will honor individuals and businesses in three categories:
Arts Patron: An individual who has provided extensive support for the arts in Santa Monica.

Artist in the Community: An artist who has contributed significantly to Santa Monica’s arts community through activism, patronage, and/or volunteerism.

Creative Community Innovator: An individual or small or mid-size commercial creative business contributing to making Santa Monica’s arts and culture sector ‘cutting edge’ through experimentation, design, or cultural sustainability.

The awards are a program of the Santa Monica Arts Foundation—a nonprofit organization dedicated to increasing civic engagement and support of the City’s arts and cultural community. “Volunteers, philanthropists, and creative industry are the backbone of Santa Monica’s extraordinary arts community,” said George Minardos, Foundation Chairperson, “and these awards will highlight the importance of their contributions.”

In fact, artists – in all media – are “the backbone of Santa Monica’s extraordinary arts community.” But the City seems to have a problem recognizing local artists. For instance, it is paying a Chicago sculptor $440,000 for a “fabrication” to be installed in the new $47 million park in the Civic Center. It will consist principally of 29 aluminum pipes.
And last week, it announced the artists whose work will be featured during the next iteration of “Glow.” All four of them are from out of town.
City officials often brag that 46 percent of Santa Monica’s residents are in the arts, but it gives prizes and awards to alleged local arts patrons and jobs to artists from other places.

Under the rules, both nominators and nominees must currently live or work in Santa Monica, and nominated businesses must be currently licensed and operating in the City. Self-nominations are accepted. The selection committee will consider the significance of nominees’ contributions and leadership as they reflect the breadth of Santa Monica’s creative community. Awards recipients will be recognized at a ceremony in early 2013 and will receive an original artwork by a locally renowned artist.
Guidelines and the nomination form are available at www.smgov.net/artsleaders. The deadline for nominations is 5:00 p.m., Thursday, November 29, 2012.