The Kentucky Crafted Market is March 16-17 at the Kentucky Horse Park’s Alltech Arena. We’re excited to be back in Lexington for this annual event that puts a spotlight on the best in Kentucky-made art and craft. In addition to work by Kentucky artists, The Market will feature great products from Kentucky Proud food producers, music by Kentucky acts, and activities for the entire family.
The word “Kentucky” appeared six times in the previous paragraph, so we hope you get the idea that this is a Kentucky-centric event.
With that in mind, I’d like to turn your attention to March 15, a day we set aside for wholesale buyers, interior designers, corporate gift buyers and others involved in purchasing for clients to have access to The Market for the purpose of seeing artwork and placing orders. This is a service we provide every year at The Market. It allows those buyers to peruse the artwork and speak with the artists in a more relaxed environment.
So if you’re a retail business owner who’d like to start adding Kentucky-made products to your inventory, we want you at The Market. If you’re in charge of purchasing corporate gifts for your company and you’re looking for items that have a story to them, this is an ideal event. If you’re an interior designer who’s looking for that piece that will pull your concept together, come on down!
Welcome the Podcast: KyArtsCast
The Kentucky Arts Council is proud to announce the debut of a monthly podcast that will focus on arts council programs, events and Kentucky artists and the work they are doing. We’re calling it KyArtsCast, and it’s downloadable at kyartscast.ky.gov and on iTunes and Google Podcast.
This podcast has been in the works for several months, and we’re excited to be able to branch out into another area of communication. It will be a good opportunity to connect with Kentucky’s arts community in a convenient way. If you don’t have time to listen to the podcast right away, just download it and save it for later.
The first episode debuted last month and we look forward to uploading our second episode later this month. We hope you’ll subscribe.
Update on the Creative Industry
At the recent Kentucky Creative Industry Summit the arts council hosted in Georgetown, we were able to report some gains in two out of three categories we are tracking. Kentucky saw 1 percent gains in the number of jobs related to the creative industry and in industry earnings between 2015 and 2016. At the end of 2016, total creative industry earnings were $2.2 billion, a gain of $13.3 million in one year. For that same year, Kentucky created 1,000 more jobs in the creative industry, bringing that total to more than 94,000. This includes creative industry workers in full- and part-time positions, extended proprietors and self-employed.
The arts council is tracking this information via a new data reporting service called Creative Vitality Suite. This service allows us to track creative industry trends and information down to the county level. With this tool, we can look at individual counties, clusters of counties or entire regions of the state. We are looking forward to using Creative Vitality to better understand the needs and strengths of each area of Kentucky.
Chris Cathers is interim executive director of the Kentucky Arts Council.
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