Leading Voices

Leading Voices Opens Conversations about

the Importance of Philanthropy

by ROB WATSON Team Leader for Marketing and Membership

Livable communities don’t maintain their strong cultural and historic fabric by accident. It takes committed individuals and institutions to invest in an area’s public spaces, landscapes, architecture, cultural organizations, and creative and historic resources. At a time when charitable giving is especially strained because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Historic New England invited philanthropic leaders from the United States and beyond to discuss why cultural and preservation philanthropy is essential in building strong communities.

These conversations resulted in the five-part web series Leading Voices: Conversations on Preservation, Resilience, and Cultural Philanthropy. Each episode features individuals who have been involved in making or securing funding for preservation and culture.

“Typically in recessions, what we see is that giving overall tends to go down and also distribution of giving tends to change a little bit: giving to basic needs and human services tends to go up and giving to arts and cultural organizations tends to go down,” said Amir Pasic, the Eugene R. Tempel Dean of the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at Indiana University. Pasic spoke with Linda Johnson, president and CEO of the Brooklyn Public Library in New York City, about how the pandemic expedited the library’s digital transformation— and cemented its status as both a cultural and a social services organization.

“It’s as essential to have Internet access when you’re trying to educate your children via Zoom as it is to have water and electricity,” said Johnson. “We outfitted our traditional bookmobiles. We call them tech mobiles now and we drove them into neighborhoods and we were able to raise a lot of money to do that pretty quickly. We were able to drive vehicles into neighborhoods that had low penetration and get [WiFi] signals there.”

In another episode, Carol Coletta, president and CEO of the Memphis River Parks Partnership, spoke with Candelaria Silva-Collins, chair of the Designators of the George B. Henderson Foundation and a longtime leader in cultural economic development in Boston, about transforming public spaces to be more equitable. “You’re creating opportunities for joy,” Silva-Collins said. “Being out in open space and being on the grounds and seeing beauty, even if that beauty came from exploitation, it does something to your spirit. It does something to your soul, and so [we are] making sure that urban residents have opportunities to go to places that have sprawling grounds.”

Susan Whiting, chair of the National Women’s History Museum, explored the challenges of creating a new museum with Elizabeth Diller, partner at Diller Scofidio + Renfro, who is well known for designing groundbreaking cultural spaces in New York City such as the High Line, and the latest MoMA expansion. Pamela Fiori, former editor in chief of Town & Country, talked with fragrance packaging designer and educator Marc Rosen about the beauty industry’s longtime commitment to philanthropy. A lively conversation in France found Margery Arent Safir, founder and artistic director of Arts Arena Paris, and Alexandre de Vogüé, co-owner of the Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte heritage site, paying tribute to their friend and benefactor, Dena Kaye of the Danny and Sylvia Fine Kaye Foundation.

Leading Voices provides glimpses into what motivates today’s philanthropists as well as insights about how organizations are navigating in a complex philanthropic climate. The episodes are available at YouTube.com/ HistoricNewEngland.

A section of the High Line in Manhattan, New York City’s nearly one-and-a-half-mile elevated linear park created on a former railroad line and designed by James Corner Field Operations, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, and Piet Oudolf. Photograph by Matthew Monteith.