Commentary: Chicago funders called on to collaborate and sustain struggling arts organizations

In a commentary published in Crain’s Chicago Business, Mignon Stewart, the Paul M. Angell Family Foundation’s director of performing arts, is calling for arts funders to deepen collaboration to strengthen Chicago’s cultural sector through coordinated, flexible giving and shared infrastructure. In a commentary, Stewart underscores how philanthropy, when fragmented, leaves small and community-based arts organizations vulnerable amid rising costs, federal funding cuts, and post-pandemic strain. Highlighting the foundation’s collaboration with groups through the Arts Work Fund, which has expanded tenfold in recent years, Stewart calls for expanded, long-term, and funding, not as optional but essential to sustaining the city’s resilient, equitable arts ecosystem.