By Jess Frazier | Manager, Advancement
After announcingthe largest winner cohortin the history of YoungArts’ national arts competition in November 2024, we have been excited to introduce these young artists, each of whom is between the ages of 15 and 18 or in grades 10-12, to the YoungArts artist community (with 23,000+ members) and the lifetime of opportunities they have access to. We continue to be grateful for the support of our community, which makes this meaningful work possible!
National YoungArts Week
In January, YoungArts hosted National YoungArts Week, a seven-day intensive training program for the highest scoring winners of YoungArts’ national arts competition. The 177 young artists gathered in Maimi to develop their craft with internationally recognized arts leaders including: Emmy Award winning director Mary Lou Belli, ballet dancer and author Misty Copeland, Tony Award-winning actress Lorna Courtney, legendary jazz composer and trumpet player Jon Faddis, Tony Award-winning vocal coach Joan Lader, andGrammy Award-winning classical musician Charles Yang, among others.
Artists participated in 40 hours of classes, coaching sessions, rehearsals for performances, and interdisciplinary workshops, where they learned discipline specific techniques, methods for how to incorporate feedback into their practice and strategies for how to work collaboratively with peers. These skillsare invaluable to young artists who seek professional experience and feedback in a highly competitive arts market.
Each evening throughout the week, the winners presented their work through four nights of performances at New World Center in Miami Beach, an evening of Writers’ Readings and the exhibition opening at YoungArts Campus in downtown Miami and a film screening at Regal Cinemas South Beach in Miami Beach. This year we had 2,533 people attend presentations in person and 2,641 unique individuals watching the livestream on youngarts.org.
Lin Arison Excellence in Writing Award
One of the winners who participated in National YoungArts Week also receivedthe 2025 YoungArts Lin Arison Excellence in Writing Award, a $50,000 scholarship given each year to a YoungArts award winner in Writing. This year's recipient Honor Giardini may apply the financial award against the cost of tuition, room and board to attend an accredited school of her choice. Honor will be using this award to attend Bennington College in Vermont starting in Fall 2025.
“Honor Giardini’s writing is simply a marvel,” said YoungArts Writing Panelist Nicole Cooley (1984 YoungArts Winner in Writing & U.S. Presidential Scholar in the Arts). “Risk-taking, stunning, asking urgent questions about the world we inhabit and about ourselves. From the beauty of Honor’s sentences to her narratives, she is a writer to watch, and I can’t wait to see her unforgettable and original work as it goes forward. What a joy to meet her at the beginning of what will be an amazing writing life.”
To learn more about YoungArts and its programming, visit www.youngarts.org.
Links:
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
Support this important cause by creating a personalized fundraising page.
Start a Fundraiser
