1. Our organizational structure is now in place. We received our not- for-profit 501 (c) 3 tax exempt designation from the IRS in June of 2016. Since then It’s been a year of meeting a whole lot of people, gathering ideas, and working out details. Now, after more than a year of planning, finally Michelangelo’s Workshop is ready to launch its service program — teaching carving skills to our unemployed and underemployed neighbors.
2. Great news! On March20th the Wisconsin Department of Veterans Affairs awarded our project a $5,000 entrepreneur development grant which must be utilized by June 30th of this year. That’s motivation for action! For this initial round, identifying and engaging veteran participants will be our top priority, although others will also be welcome.
3. We have scheduled our first set of three one-day introductory workshops this Spring — two in Madison (on April 27th and April 29th) and one in Milwaukee (date to be determined). We plan to limit each workshop to a maximum of eight participants.
4. We have also scheduled the first full-scale nine-day core carving symposium for June 10th - 18th with the expectation of three to six participants.
5. We will learn a lot from these initial teaching experiences!
6. Our Studio Challenge: At this point we do not have a permanent location for our studio. While we are working on this, for the Spring we may need to utilize one of several temporary locations.
7. Now, we need your help in identifying the people who can most benefit from the experience of learning to sculpt stone. Copies of our workshop brochure and registration forms are enclosed. Please help us get them into the hands of those for whom this experience will be most beneficial.
