Feast

Falling Through the Cracks: Funding Inegrative Socially Engaged Practice

2012-02-07T20:24:00.000-08:00

The video from our talk on arts funding and sustainability the other night, put on by Artists In Context:

This Thursday: Feast Mass Artist Talk

2012-01-16T19:03:00.000-08:00

We've been asked by Artists in Context to take part in a discussion about grassroots funding & the arts!

Falling through the Cracks:
Funding integrative socially-engaged practice

Thursday January 19, 7–9 pm
Cambridge Public Library - Main Branch
449 Broadway, Cambridge, MA

Artists involved in post-studio "integrative" practice for positive social outcomes face unique questions and challenges when it comes to funding their projects and supporting themselves through their work...

What are some other options for funding this work and supporting its practitioners? What part can crowd-funding, earned income strategies, and foundations play? What are the limitations of these approaches? What new funding models and institutions are being created or need to be created? What skills do practitioners need in order to make their projects and practices sustainable?

Please join us in exploring these questions and issues at a panel discussion featuring:

Cuong Hoang, Director of Programs at Mott Philanthropic.

Andrew Sempere, Trustee from the Awesome Foundation.

Nerissa Cooney & Alexander Hage, co-founders of Feast Mass.

The conversation will be moderated by artist Lisa Gross, founder of the Boston Tree Party and Hybrid Vigor Projects.

Call for Submissions

2012-01-06T12:49:00.000-08:00

Knit & Crochet to Cure Empty Net Syndrome

Former Feast presenter and friend, Maria Molteni, is taking her project to new levels and is looking for submissions to get it there.

Follow this link for FULL SUBMISSION GUIDELINES & DEADLINES

The project aims to create functional, hand-crafted basketball nets for neglected public hoops. Inspired by DIY slow production, this process fosters creative problem solving, urban upkeep, and re-purposing of abandon space to build a pro-active network between artists, athletes, and neighbors.

Find more information about NetWorks via: Facebook, Project Blog, or email Maria at: molteninetorks@gmail.com

Farmers To You

2011-11-15T22:41:00.001-08:00

We just wanted to give another plug for one of our generous sponsors at the last Feast Mass.
Farmers To You delivers highest quality food produced in Vermont to neighborhoods of Boston. It's like a CSA, but not only can you get vegetables, but also dairy, eggs, meat, fruit, bread, jam, pickles, honey, maple syrup; I could go on.

You create an account, order the food you want through their website, then pick up your order once a week at your closest pickup location, or get it delivered to your house by Metro Pedal Power. There are several pickup sites in Cambridge and Somerville, and recently, one in JP. The food is excellent, prices are very reasonable, and all of your food is coming from the Northeast.

If you were at the last Feast Mass, you got to try squash, garlic, turnips and salad greens that were donated by Farmers To You (amidst a spread of vegetables donated from some wonderful Massachusetts farms as well).

More info here: farmerstoyou.com.

Feast 5 Photobooth

2011-11-02T10:08:00.000-07:00

At the last Feast Mass, at 549 Columbus Ave, we had a very special photobooth. If you had your photo taken, thanks for your patience. Here are your photos:

We ate, we voted, we feasted

2011-10-24T09:51:00.000-07:00

Last night was a great success! We had two winners, six fantastic proposals, awesome locally grown hand–made food, and some hilarious video of everyone hamming it up.

Thanks to everyone who came we were able to give $600 to John Hulsey & City Life / Vida Urbana's Bank of America Projection. John will let us know when the projections are going to be shown and we'll make sure to let you all know. Make sure to check them out and show support for his fantastic idea. We also gave $250 to Nate Grossman, Leah Craig and Paul Butler's Publication Studio Boston. Stayed tuned so that once they start turning out books you can get your hands on one. Check our Past Proposals page for all of the full proposals.

We couldn't make the night possible and sustainable without the generous donations of: Red Fire Farm, Drumlin Farm, Powisset Farm, Farmers To You, Iggy's Bread, Taza Chocolate, J.P. Licks, Narragansett Beer and Cape Ann Brewery. The produce from the farms is picked for Feast the day before and our team of volunteer cooks plan, wash, prep and make the feast of Feast.

Keep a lookout for updates on projects and ways to get involved.

Feast 5 Deadline extended

2011-10-18T12:35:00.000-07:00

We have 5 excellent proposals on the table for Feast Mass #5. However, if you have an idea that you haven't submitted yet, you still have a chance; we've pushed back the proposal deadline to this Thursday. The expected first-place grant will be $500–600, and the second-place grant, $200–250 (that's 2 chances!), so take a minute and answer the three simple questions in our "Submit A Proposal" section.

Feast 5

2011-10-17T22:30:00.000-07:00

Feast Mass 5 almost here: Sunday October 23, 2011 from 7-10pm. If you haven't got your name on our guest list yet email us at: feastmass@gmail.com

The event will be held at 549 Columbus Ave. Boston, MA 02118
It is a block and a half off Mass Ave easily accesible by the #1 bus and Mass Ave T stop. Everyone pays at the door, 10 dollars or whatever you'd like to contribute toward the grant.
We're excited to be Feasting with you soon.

Int'l Day of Soup

2011-09-30T08:19:00.000-07:00

Nerissa and I are about to head to NYC for the International Day of Soup, which is part of Creative Time's "Living As Form" arts festival. The International Day of Soup is a joint effort by all the various Sunday Soup/Feast micro-grant supper initiatives around the country and around the world to spread the word, host panel discussions with arts and fundraising experts, give out giant instructional posters, and we're capping it off with a big micro-grant supper on the lower east side on Saturday night. Tickets may still be available?

Feast Mass' contribution to the event is creating the "How To Start Your Own Sunday Soup" poster, featuring wisdom, stories and photos from many of the Sunday Soup network initiatives. We may still have some available by the time of the next Feast Mass on October 23!

Feast, Philly Style

2011-09-29T11:27:00.000-07:00

In July, I attended Philadelphia's version of Feast. It's called Philly Stake. The model is the same, but they do things a little differently than we've been doing them at Feast Mass. For one, it was outdoors, in a beautiful historic estate on Schuylkill River called Bartram's Gardens. The audience was nestled into a hillside, with the presenters at the bottom center, creating a kind of natural amphitheater. Another great idea was that all the presenters, in addition to their two-minute presentations to the crowd, set up science fair-style displays for voters to peruse before getting their food. The menu was delicious handmade tamales with ranchero sauce, black beans and salad. We ate off real plates purchased from local thrift stores, and afterwards, each guest washed his or her own place setting.

There was a trend among the evening's proposals toward gardening, farming and local food growing, though they ran an awesome gamut from letterpress flash cards for kids with autism, to public art bus stop benches, to a Halloween Philly Thriller Dance. The winner was a series of river tours called the Tidal Schuylkill River Project.

It was wonderful to meet our microgrant-supper brethren in Philly: Theresa, Lauren, Kate, and the big, beautiful team that makes Philly Stake happen. More info: phillystake.org.

Calling All Proposals

2011-09-26T12:30:00.000-07:00

The time has come! We are looking for new proposals for the next Feast Mass soon to be announced. Put your thinking caps on, click "Submit a Proposal" and tell us about your awesome idea that needs some funding to come alive. Can't wait to have our minds blown.

Freedom Art Theatre Retreat

2011-08-24T09:57:00.000-07:00

Ilana Brownstein's Theatre Art Freedom Retreat happened up in White Mountains about a week ago. She posted on their blog, MEET ME ON THE COMMONS, about the experience and it is very much worth a look. There is zip-lining, creative collaboration, specialty cocktails, and a play with heavy metal acoustic guitar (maybe inspired by the specialty cocktail?) Can't wait for her wrap up at the next Feast Mass.

Catching up to the Joneses

2011-05-27T17:15:00.000-07:00

Feast 4 was wicked

2011-05-27T16:57:00.000-07:00

Erika Hess won $600 for, Contain This: How your urban garden grows.
We can't wait to see this project bloom.

Ilana Brownstein, won $300 for Freedom Art Theatre Retreat.

Oh, you know, just frittering.

Thank you to all the amazing folks that help make Feast happen.
Be sure keep a look out for them at your local farmer markets and shops.

For more photos, take a look at our Feast Facebook page.

This is how we Feast

2011-05-06T15:05:00.000-07:00

The call for proposals is open until May 14. Just think, this could be you in this video.
Thank you Rough Mountain

Feast is full

2011-04-25T12:29:00.000-07:00

We are at capacity for Feast 4, and can no longer put anymore names on the guest list.
If you drop us an email we will add you to our waiting list and let you know if any spaces free up.
We can also add you to our contacts so that you'll know right away when we have our next one.

We are still accepting proposals for May 21. We'd love to hear your great ideas. Click on "Submit a Proposal" to find out what you need to do.

MOLTENi NET WORKS

2011-03-30T12:31:00.000-07:00

MOLTENi NET WORKS, a project that facilitates the fabrication of hand-made basketball nets, will inhabit MEME Gallery from March 25-April 3rd as an art exhibition and project space. Gallery hours are simultaneously open studio hours where all are welcome to drop by and check out the show or stay to work on new pieces and collaborative nets. Her closing show will be Sunday April 3, 6-10pm.

Organized workshops are posted on MOLTENi NET WORKS blog. Artists Taylor McVay, Andrea Evans, Kendra Biddle, and Susan Tornheim will be hosting presentations on their art practices and providing instruction for various methods of knit and crochet. When weather allows, we will install the nets on a court down the street from the space to play a scrimmage! For more information and day to day postings of gallery and workshop hours, please visit molteninetworks.tumblr.com. Also visit KICKSTARTER to support the project!

Creative Economy Summit

2011-03-04T11:37:00.000-08:00

We will be participating in a panel discussion, A New Crop: Harvesting Our Own Art Funding, at the Creative Economy Summit 2 in Shelburne Falls, MA, Saturday March 19th. We will be joining other New England supper based grant-making organizations in a dialogue about this movement and method of funding creative, community based projects. Please email us questions that you would be interested in us discussing. We will be answering audience questions, but your input will help us develop a more meaningful conversation. The Summit will run Friday March 18 and Saturday March 19 from 8am - 6pm, our panel will take place from 2:15 - 3:45 on Saturday the 19th.

Visit Creative Economy Summit website for full details. Registration deadline in March 8th.

Cook-In-Residence

2011-02-20T22:05:00.000-08:00

Cook-In-Residence, a collaboration between Golden Arrows and Lucia Jazayeri, and an investigation into the world of Irish Soda Bread. Lucia went to work researching and baking piles of Irish soda bread, which were sold in a one-day store for one dollar a piece. 66 morsels were scooped up by happy customers. There were 3 kinds of soda bread made: Traditional Brown / Yellow Cornmeal / American Style. Want to know what makes them different and how the variations came to be? We did, and so began the delve into soda bread's history, ingredients and recipes.

Soda / A Chemical—Taste that? Crumble through that chewy crumble and notice the taste of something clean, powdery, and not entirely natural. That taste is soda, but not the Dr. Pepper kind. It's a sodium bicarbonate, the same baking soda you mix with vinegar to make a volcano for a science fair. When soda meets an acid like buttermilk, air bubbles form, and when those bubbles rise within a floury dough, you get bread.

Traditional Brown / A Weak Wheat—Yeast is the other way to make air bubbles rise, but yeast bread didn't work in Ireland because the local wheat grown under the temperate climates of the island was too "soft," too weak on gluten, to stand up to the demands of yeast. But this weak wheat happened to be the perfect match to baking soda. Irish Brown Bread, a whole wheat bread, was formed into a loaf, marked with a cross, and cooked in a clay pot over an open fire.

Yellow Cornmeal / A Bad Potato—In early centuries, Irish people ate a varied diet including seaweed, salmon, bacon, and wheat bread. But in 1647, Oliver Cromwell's army invaded Ireland on behalf of the English Parliament. It's not widely know, but one of the soldiers that day was a single Peruvian potato. That potato's descendants would come to the forefront as the main source of (cheap, easy to grow) calories for the tenement farmers who used most of their fields to grow food for export to England and the world. When the famine hit and potatoes rotted in the earth, the fields were awash with edible grain, all destined for elsewhere. In a strange twist of fate, yellow corn was sent to Ireland from America to try and assuage the famine. This was Yellow Soda Bread.

American Style / St. Patty's Day—When Irish immigrants (like Nellie's ancestors) came to the U.S., they took with them no food traditions. Unlike immigrants like Jews, Italian, and Germans, who recreated the tomato sauces, beef stews, and gefilte fish of their home countries, for Irish immigrants, food was a sad reminder of the potato that had killed their family members and forced them to leave home. Irish immigrants—mostly women who found jobs as servants—were stigmatized as being lazy, bad cooks. A lot has changed. How we celebrate St. Patrick's day with a parade in Southie, and with food now named proudly as Irish, like the American version of Irish soda bread, which contains all the bounty of a rich country: raisins, sugar, caraway seeds, eggs, and butter. It's not traditional and it's not eaten in Ireland.

Oh, and way we get St. Patrick's Day off in Suffolk County? St. Patrick's Day, March 17, 1776, was the day the yearlong British siege of the city of Boston ended. Washington's first victory of the Revolutionary War, at Dorchester Heights, Boston.

* Special thanks to our guest librarian, Elizabeth Bevington-Seawright, who helped us find old cookbooks at the Schlessinger Library.

ENDROIT: The Art of Traveling

2011-02-20T21:05:00.000-08:00

Feast Mass 2 winner, Christian Greer, used his grant to produce a book, ENDROIT: The Art of Traveling, inspired by and compiled of works from a class offered by the Cambridge based free skool Corvid College.

13 UNDER 30

2010-11-29T14:21:00.000-08:00

A SELECTION OF WORKS BY BOSTON'S YOUNG EMERGING ARTISTS

December 2 - 23, 2010
Opening Reception: Thursday, December 2, 2010, 6-8pm

Autumn Ahn / Andrea Bergart / Leslie Condon / Holland Dieringer / Emily Garfield / Daniel Harris / Emily Manning-Mingle / Elizabeth Menges / Courtney Moy / Kristie O'Donnell / Bevan Weissman / Ilyn Wong / Ben Zawalich

Rubin-Frankel Gallery 213 Bay State Road, Boston MA 02215

Thanks For Giving

2010-11-24T14:21:00.000-08:00

The November 6 Feast!

2010-11-08T07:34:00.000-08:00

pix by Nellie Kluz

November Feast Is Sold Out

2010-11-04T12:05:00.000-07:00

We are both happy and sad to announce all 100 tickets for this Saturday's Feast are sold out. Keep an eye out for the next Feast, which should happen in February. We hope to see you there!

It's almost here...

2010-10-26T06:25:00.001-07:00

Tickets are almost sold out for the November 6 Feast, so email us if you want one. We've still got a couple slots left for proposers, too. By the way, our venue is going to be amazing.

the next feast

2010-09-19T11:31:00.000-07:00

We just picked a date + venue for the next Feast. It's happening on Saturday, November 6, 7-10 pm.

Location: Voltage Coffee and Art, Kendall Square, Cambridge

Proposals are due on October 30.

Email feastmass [at] gmail [dot] com to reserve your spot, and you'll pay at the door.

Tickets are a minimum of $10, whatever you'd like to pay.

The first proposal happens

2010-08-08T06:22:00.000-07:00

Here's Christine Liu, the first Feast Mass grant recipient, at the food truck festival she organized with the help of our $320 grant.

With over ten trucks and carts from around town, the festival definitely succeeded in bringing together the handful of trucks that are usually scattered across the city. It was exactly the sort of project we were hoping Feast Mass would fund: it brought a ton of Bostonians together, helped to solidify a community (or at least prove that a food truck scene does exist here), and it was a fun thing to do on a Sunday.

We're excited about the new friends and connections that are already starting to form around Feast Mass and the projects we fund. We saw people there who had come to the first Feast and voted for Christine's proposal. And, after meeting them at the first Feast, Christine hired the same design duo who made our logo to do the identity work for the festival.

And then the event itself, the afternoon of barbeque/lemonade/chicken + waffles/pickles/ice cream, sweating and searching for shade, running into people we know, even the excitement of a bike ride to the South End, was so summer and so Boston, and we're glad we played a tiny part in making it happen.

And the winner is...

2010-07-30T12:31:00.000-07:00

The winner of the second Feast Mass grant, of $400, is an anthology to be put together by the students of a class at Corvid College. The class is called "The Art of Traveling: Urban Sojourns." Their teacher, Christian Greer, made a great presentation, and we're all excited to see the anthology when it gets printed (and find out some secrets about Boston).

How much?

2010-07-19T19:17:00.000-07:00

We just sent out an email to everyone on the guest list, and I realized I forgot one important thing.

How much should you pay for your ticket?

The answer is, whatever you want. But at least $10. We're not taking any of the money home. After we pay our costs (renting the space, buying the food) all the money we get in dinner tickets goes directly to the grant.

SOLD OUT

2010-07-12T09:26:00.000-07:00

All 60 tickets for the Feast Mass on July 24 have been claimed! We're starting a waiting list, so email us if you want to come, and we'll let you know if any spots open up.

Thanks!

Feast Mass on the Radio

2010-07-09T04:49:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we were on Boston's NPR affiliate. We talked with JJ Gonson, who puts on the O.N.C.E dinners. It was really fun.

Check out the link here. By the way, the hour also featured segments on attack beetles and urban gymnastics. So it was a wild time for all. If you heard the piece and want to submit an idea for the July 24 Feast, we'd love to hear from you.

Calling for Proposals

2010-07-07T11:41:00.000-07:00

The next Feast Mass is July 24. Do you have an idea for a project? Let us know. It's easy:

Second Feast: Menu

2010-07-05T22:10:00.000-07:00

The next Feast Mass is coming up soon, July 24, and some people have asked about the menu from the May dinner. Thanks to Pretty Things Beer, Sherman Market, Taza Chocolate, Clear Flour Bread, Farm Fresh Rhode Island, and our friend Homefries, the menu looked something like this:

pretty things st. botolph's town
strawberry rhubarb soda
bread + radishes + sea salt + butter
boston baked beans + molasses + mustard
onion soup
salad: lemon, garlic, turnips, parsnips, potatoes
chocolate cream pie
molasses spice cookies

The Next Feast!

2010-06-28T15:30:00.000-07:00

The second Feast Mass is happening on Saturday, July 24, 6-9 pm, in Union Square (Somerville).

Tickets go on sale July 10.

Proposal submissions are due July 17.

Thank you

2010-05-15T19:38:00.000-07:00

The winner has been named, the molasses baked beans have been cleaned out of Kevin's Volvo, and we hope you all had a good time.

We want to thank everybody who helped out to make the first Feast Mass happen. Over the next week we'll be posting about each of our proposers, and letting you know the winner.

And! We've already gotten our first proposal for the second Feast Mass, which will happen late June or early July. Let us know if you have an idea for a proposal, or if you went to the first event and have suggestions on how we can improve on the second one...

Today's the day

2010-05-01T13:48:00.001-07:00

Today, May 1, is the deadline for proposal submissions for the first Feast Mass on May 8.

WHOA, THAT WAS FAST

2010-04-20T14:47:00.001-07:00

After three days, all 50-ish tickets to the first Feast have been claimed! This is amazing!

At the moment we can't promise tickets to any more people (we need to stay under the capacity of our venue), but check back before May 8 because some slots might open up.

(We still have room for presenters, so let us know if you have an idea you'd like to submit!)

Thanks, everyone!

Today, tickets are on sale

2010-04-18T12:19:00.000-07:00

Email feastmass@gmail.com to buy a ticket.

Pay what you'd like, at least ten dollars.

Feast Mass will happen May 8, from 6-9, in Union Square, Somerville.

We'll sell tickets until we're sold out, and the guest list will be posted on this page.

Where to Feast?

2010-03-24T11:28:00.001-07:00

Here's where Feast Mass, our first recurring dinner and grant-making evening, will happen on May 8.

Samantha and I have been looking at locations since right after we got back from Feast Brooklyn. We've called up pastors of Brazilian congregations, peeked in abandoned shops, and bothered all our contacts in the food world. We found it's very expensive to rent space in Boston. And we had to rethink our ideas about how we want to accomplish Feast.

We thought we were going to hold Feast in a big church in Harvard Square that had everything we thought we needed: a large kitchen, plenty of tables and chairs, and most importantly, the capacity to fit 100 guests. Big numbers were important to us, because we figured- more guests, more money for the grant.

The only problem: renting the church and kitchen for one evening was going to cost $525. This was after Samantha had talked them down. We did some math. Say we got 80 guests. 80 guests at about $10 per guest = $800. $800-$525 = $275. To cover a grant of $250, this would leave us with no money for food and supplies.

We went back and forth about how we could make this happen. We thought about putting in some of our own money, say 100 bucks each, to cover food and supplies. But isn't the first rule of business to never invest your own money?

Ultimately we want each guest to feel like most of their money is going directly toward the winning proposal and the meal, not an expensive venue. We want Feast Mass to be sustainable. If that means less people can come to each Feast, that's okay with us for now. Plus we're incredibly excited about the location we decided on. Expect a full post on it soon.

--Lucia

Feast Mass

2010-03-17T07:00:00.000-07:00

(the tamales and salad at Feast Brooklyn)

We went to Brooklyn in February to go to a big dinner party. The idea was you pay to eat, see a bunch of proposals for art and community projects that people want to do, and vote on the one you like the best. We ate pork tamales and hot sauce and an amazing butternut squash salad with about 300 people. And we voted for a project called Shower Room. The person behind Shower Room ended up winning $1000, funded entirely from our dinner tickets, to re-tile the moldy shower at her community pool with bright multi-colored tiles.

This was Feast Brooklyn, a really direct way to get good ideas up and running. The Feast model (Feast stands for Funding Emerging Art with Sustainable Tactics) is a way to sidestep traditional ways of grant-making, support small-scale neighborhood projects, and enjoy good food in the process.

We thought, maybe we can do this in Boston. So Feast Mass is going to happen this May. We’ll have really great food from New England and lots of old and new friends in attendance. So to make Feast Mass happen, we need your proposals. If you have an idea that you want put into action, let us know.

Stay tuned for more reports on Feast Mass.

--Lucia and Samantha