A Look at How Artlandish Began from Holly Seeley, President
How Artlandish Began
This wonderful organization began in December of 2021. Covid was still impacting every area of our lives. As a dance artist myself with a background in dance education, I wanted to provide dance classes and performance opportunities for my own children and others in my neighborhood, but venues were shuttered and indoor classes were not advised.
I trained and prepared a group of six dance students for a ballet performance featuring a professional guest artist for the benefit of Senior Women living in an area home. Each member of our audience that day was an over-comer, having lived through the trauma of homelessness to tell their unique tales of victory.
It was at that particular performance when it came to my attention that there are many children in our community who have overcome homelessness and are now living in a group/multi-family shelter home. Many working single parents have a hard time accessing enrichment programs in the after-school hours. I felt that it would be a great honor for me as an educator to offer children performing arts programming after school at no cost!
To properly steward this vision for volunteer work, I needed an organization that could grow, inspire volunteers, steward donations, and expand into the vision of a multi-disciplinary arts program.
I reached out to an artist colleague and a family member with a background in art, both of whom shared the vision for this organization. Artlandish was born!