2022: The Year in Review

Celebrating a Transformative Year in Creative Aging

  • Maura O’Malley, Lifetime Arts’ CEO/Co-Founder, and Annie Montgomery, Senior Education Designer & Trainer, with Singapore-based community artists during the Arts & Ageing Forum in Singapore. Credit: National Arts Council of Singapore
  • Teaching artist, Stephanie Lee, with a participant during the program, “Korean Folk Art ‘Minhwa’ Coloring,” held at Selfhelp’s Clearview Senior Center in Queens, NY and part of the Leveraging State Investments in Creative Aging Initiative. Credit: Haihong Chen
  • Gahlia Eden, Lifetime Arts’ Education Producer, co-facilitates a workshop with a training cohort at the Ohio Creative Aging Summit, hosted by the Ohio Arts Council and part of the Leveraging State Investments in Creative Aging Initiative. Credit: Terry Gilliam
  • Participants during the program, “Acrylic Painting Exploration,” held at the Sweetwater County Library in Wyoming and part of the Creative Aging in Wyoming Public Libraries Initiative. Credit: Debora Soule
  • Teaching artist, Steve Palermo, with participants during the program, “Person, Place or Thing: Where Do We Belong?” held at the Selfhelp’s Clearview Senior Center in Queens, NY and part of the Leveraging State Investments in Creative Aging Initiative. Credit: Haihong Chen
  • A participant during the program, “Drawing Basics,” held at the Sheridan County Public Library and part of the Creative Aging in Wyoming Public Libraries Initiative. Credit: Denise Gillenwater
  • Participants during the program, “Barn Quilting: From Inspiration to Installation,” held at Traditional Arts of Upstate New York (TAUNY) and part of the Leveraging State Investments in Creative Aging Initiative. Credit: Ruth McWilliams

If there’s one thing that we can take away from our collaborative work in 2022, it’s that responsive, purposeful, and accessible arts education programming is a foundational pillar for lifelong learning. This work can only be achieved when every older adult is seen, valued, creative, proud, and part of a community.

Through new and existing partnerships with state arts agencies, area agencies on aging, state and local library systems, state arts councils, and museums across the country:

We provided nearly 180 hours of training to 1,300+ teaching artists and programmers in-person and online and hundreds of hours of coaching and guidance to 50+ organizations.

Most importantly, over 1,200 older adults participated in 82 in-person, remote, and blended creative aging programs across nearly 30 states.

We couldn’t have accomplished this work without the abundant support of our staff, trainers, partners, and funders. Click on the table of contents below to explore highlights from our 2022 collaborations!

Leveraging State Investments in Creative Aging

This featured video captures programming highlights from the Delaware Division of the Arts‘ state-wide initiative, “Access Creative Aging,“ in partnership with the Delaware Division of Libraries. Lifetime Arts trained and coached Delaware teaching artists and librarians in program design and implementation.

From 2021-2022, Lifetime Arts built the capacity of 22 state arts agencies across the country to expand their creative aging programming, partnerships, and practices via the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies‘ (NASAA) Leveraging State Investments in Creative Aging Initiative, supported by E.A. Michelson Philanthropy.

Lifetime Arts and state art agency staff members from Ohio and Utah presented key insights and takeaways from the initiative during the panel discussion, “From Training to Practice: Embedding Creative Aging in Our States,” at NASAA’s 2022 Creative Aging Institute.

“Ultimately, we hope to leverage our work in creative aging to tap additional partners and resources to make this work scalable and sustainable, where the Ohio Arts Council is a leader and contributor to a statewide network of teaching artists, older adult-serving institutions, and older adults themselves.”

— Chiquita Mullins Lee and Jarred Small, Arts Learning Coordinators at the Ohio Arts Council

*Read our blog post, “Lifetime Arts Extends Capacity-Building Efforts with State Art Agencies in CT, DE, UT + MI,” to learn more about this work beyond the NASAA initiative.

Vitality Arts Project for Art Museums

Lynda Monick-Isenberg, Lifetime Arts Trainer, leads a visual arts demonstration class during a remote training with staff from the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art.

As part of Vitality Arts Project for Art Museums, E.A. Michelson Philanthropy awarded grant funding to 25 nationally prominent art museums to launch a new series of arts programs for older adults happening now through August 2024. Lifetime Arts is providing programming support to all museum staff via training, technical assistance, and consultation.

The museums are also eligible to use their grant funds to seek further professional development services from Lifetime Arts. In September and November, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art hired Lifetime Arts to train a total of 50 teaching artists in Missouri and Arkansas via our 6-hour Creative Aging Foundations Training. Additionally, we facilitated a workshop series on age equity for museum staff at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.

“The work I did with Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art helped me understand the needs of museums in relation to older adults in a more thorough and thoughtful way. It helped raise questions regarding barriers for our older adults and diverse communities. It also helped me to pursue change and connection for our older adults in museum education.”

— Lynda Monick-Isenberg, Lifetime Arts Trainer

Brooklyn Digital and Connecting Through Creative Aging

Lifetime Arts partnered with the Brooklyn Public Library through two initiatives: Brooklyn Digital (2021-2022) and Connecting Through Creative Aging (2022-2023). Both projects were created to advance creative aging programming for older adults throughout Brooklyn in collaboration with local library systems.

As part of the Brooklyn Digital Initiative, made possible through support from The New York Community Trust, Lifetime Arts trained nearly 100 librarians throughout 20 Brooklyn library branches and nearly 1,000 older adults participated in 40 remote programs.

This past fall, Lifetime Arts trained 30+ more librarians as part of the Connecting Through Creative Aging Initiative, supported by Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation. Up to 30 additional creative aging programs will be implemented throughout BPL library branches by June 2023.

Creative Aging in Wyoming Public Libraries

Participants share their final work and process from the program, “Intro to Watercolor Painting,” taught by Jenn Beachler and held at the Uinta County Library in Wyoming.

Lifetime Arts partnered with the Wyoming State Library and Wyoming Arts Council via the Creative Aging in Wyoming Public Libraries Initiative (2021-2022) to implement creative aging programming in 23 county libraries throughout the state.

Lifetime Arts trained nearly 100 library programmers and their community teaching artist partners in the delivery of innovative in-person and online programs. Over 470 older adults were served via the implementation of 40 creative aging programs throughout the libraries.

“This project has been the most personally rewarding part of the work this last year. Learning more about rural libraries and seeing the library staff develop incredible programs for the older adults in their communities has been really incredible to witness and contribute to.”

— Nathan Majoros, Director of Programs, Lifetime Arts

New York State Creative Aging Initiative

Participants share their work during the program, “An Introduction to Chinese Brush Painting,” taught by Jade Lam and offered through the Westchester County Department of Senior Programs and Services and Essex County Office for the Aging. Credit: Jade Lam

The New York State Creative Aging Initiative (2020-2022) was launched during the height of the pandemic through a partnership between the The New York State Council on the Arts, The New York State Office for the Aging, and Lifetime Arts. We trained seven New York State area agencies on aging and nearly 70 New York State-based teaching artists to plan, design, and implement 14 remote creative aging programs throughout the state.

Nearly 130 older adults learned artmaking skills, created artwork, and shared their accomplishments during online culminating events attended by family, friends, project stakeholders, and community members. Read more on how this remote work reduced social isolation in older adults.

Advancing Creative Aging in Arizona’s West Valley

In the spring, Lifetime Arts partnered with the West Valley Arts Council to advance their creative aging program offerings in their region of Arizona via the Advancing Creative Aging in Arizona’s West Valley Initiative. Lifetime Arts provided training, executive coaching, teaching artist curriculum coaching and implementation support for two 25-person cohorts of teaching artists and community educators/public programming professionals in the delivery of innovative, direct creative aging programming for older adults (online and in-person).

Maura O’Malley Named a 2022 NYU Alumni Changemaker

Maura O’Malley, Lifetime Arts CEO and Co-Founder, was named a 2022 NYU Alumni Changemaker for her 40+ years of experience in the arts and public sector and creating infrastructure around sustainable and anti-ageist arts education programming for older adults nationwide.

In the 9 minute interview above, Maura discusses her life in the arts and public sector, how she pursued arts education programming for older adults, and how she envisions equitable lifelong opportunities expanding in the creative aging field. Access full audio transcript

Lifetime Arts Goes Global

In 2022, Lifetime Arts were featured speakers at several in-person/virtual arts and aging events across the country and globe. The international conferences included MuseumConnections Paris, the Arts & Ageing Forum hosted by the National Arts Council Singapore, and Ageing Artfully: Going Global, hosted by the Creative Ageing Development Agency (CADA). National and statewide speaking events included the American Alliance of Museums, The Creative Center at University Settlement, Senator Krueger’s Virtual Senior Resource Fair, Creating Healthy Communities Convening, among others.

Creative Aging Resource Newsletter + Self-Paced Course

In January 2022, we launched The Creative Aging Resource Newsletter, a publication featuring research, audio interviews, and instructive examples of arts education benefits for older adults. Topics focused on research and programming examples in the theatre arts, LGBTQIA+ community, the intergenerational sphere, museums, and more. Each issue is curated and written by Diantha Dow Schull, Lifetime Arts Consultant, and published on our resource website, The Creative Aging Resource. Join our growing list of 800+ subscribers to receive more creative aging research and news in 2023.

Subscribe to Our Newsletter

In March 2023, Lifetime Arts will launch Creative Aging Foundations On Demand, a free and self-paced online course designed for institutions and individuals seeking to successfully run participatory artmaking programming for older adults. The course would not have been possible without the generous support from E.A. Michelson Philanthropy and the New York State Council on the Arts. We are grateful to Lifetime Arts’ Shannon McDonough (former Deputy Director), Saul Baizman (Consultant), and Jacqueline DuMont (Digital Media Producer) for guiding the production and design of the course in partnership with Lifetime Arts staff and consultants.

Welcoming New Staff + Planning for 2023

In 2022, we met in-person for three staff retreats to reflect on past work and plan for an exciting year ahead. We also shared much-needed laughs, hugs, jokes, performances, and nature walks. The retreats were valuable to our organizational development and morale. We look forward to continuing our work — remotely and in-person — in 2023.

“There is a lot of research and updated studies that are coming out that will inform how we approach training (both in-person and remote) and I am so excited to utilize this information. I also am really excited about Lifetime Arts becoming a convener — a welcoming and inclusive resource for organizations and teaching artists to share their work and their learning.”

— Annie Montgomery, Senior Education Designer & Trainer, Lifetime Arts

“There is more of a commitment to DEIJ (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice) and intersectionality in the creative aging field than ever before. When I worked with the 400 Years of Inequality Organizing Committee, we asked organizers to respond to the question: ‘Whose shoulders do you stand on?’ in our Observance Starter Kits. I think this question is being asked within the field and there is this desire across sectors to explore the answer with more intention.“

— Gahlia Eden, Education Producer, Lifetime Arts

We also welcomed two new team members; Heather Ikemire, Deputy Director, and Toni Salmi, Senior Manager of Institutional Giving. We are grateful for their contributions to the organization.