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About

What is a Brolly?

The term “brolly” is British slang for umbrella, an appropriate name for an organization that has strived for inclusiveness since its inception. 

Background

Brolly Arts was founded in 1995 in Salt Lake City, Utah, to fill a niche in a burgeoning arts community.

Director and founder Amy McDonald recognized a need for an organization that would support and enhance existing arts organizations and independent artists by creating forums for collaboration and experimentation.

Our Mission

Brolly Arts is dedicated to creating meaningful art and vibrant communities through artistic and civic collaboration and experimentation.

We accomplish this by working with communities to identify and build positive change around pressing racial, social, climate and community development issues through: 

  • Courageous Art Making 
  • Grassroots Civic Engagement
  • Public Events that transform community stories and research into positive change

How Does Brolly Arts work?

Our Commitment to Community: 

  1. We increase the opportunities and impacts of artists and arts organizations in Salt Lake City and Utah. 
  2. Use art, culture and humanities as powerful non threatening platforms to bring communities together to address global issues of the day with local relevance. 
  3. Undertake projects of, by, for and with the communities we serve to ensure all voices are heard and represented.

Brolly Arts Methodology & Process

IDENTITY DEVELOPMENT

Honor and learn about rich community assets, identities, and cultures in our local communities

HOLISTIC RESEARCH

Bring light to local and globally pressing issues in our communities  through commissioning artistic, personal,  communal, scientific, & academic research

COMMUNITY ACTION

Develop diverse community partners to collaborate on  programming and events that engage all members of a a community toward the purpose of developing dialogue, awareness, and action in response to pressing issues

PLACE MAKING

Develop initiatives that invite the larger community to come together to build a sense of place through projects that honor individual stories, hopes, dreams, and struggles

PARTNERSHIP, COLLABORATION AND EXPERIMENTATION

Facilitate meaningful and longstanding artistic and civic collaboration, partnership and experimentation to increase outreach and impact of projects. 

Brolly Arts Impact

Since 1995, Brolly Arts has sponsored or supported over 750 artists
2024
Since 1995, Brolly has conducted over 130 events that have leveraged the arts to push the needle of social, racial, and climate justice issues in our community. 
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In 2022, Amy MacDonald  received Utah’s Lifetime Cultural Career Achievement Award through the impactful and enduring work accomplished through Brolly Arts Projects
2024

People

Amy MacDonald

Founder and Director
Amy MacDonald is the Founder and Director of Brolly Arts and owner of MacDonald Designs through which she consults, and implements creative placemaking programming for other organizations.  She graduated from Stanford with a BA in Human Biology and an MBA from UCLA in Arts and Non-Profit Management. A former professional dancer, Amy worked with companies in Europe and the United States for decades, and was a Rotary Scholar for dance in Germany. Since this time, Amy has been traveling the globe using movement and art to connect to people and ask the question, how can art build relationships and understanding? In 1995 Amy cleverly sought to fill a niche in a burgeoning arts community in Utah as she witnessed a desperate need to increase the opportunities and impacts of artists and arts organizations. She got to work developing artistic, civic and corporate partnerships to increase awareness and change around major issues of the day with local relevance through art. She increased access to the arts, created innovative arts programming and provided fiscal and artistic support for local and national independent artists. Amy believes that art, culture and humanities are the most non-threatening means we have to bring people together around important issues and ideas to lay the groundwork for change.  After tireless work building an arts economy that pushed the needle on racial, social and climate justice through art making, she is proud to say Brolly has provided opportunities to over 750 artists and produced 100’s of events and major projects earning Brolly Arts Utah’s first Creative Communities Grant Award for reinvigorating culture and society in Utah. As an educator, Amy co-founded the Arts, Culture and Community track at Westminster College as part of the Masters of Community Leadership (MACL) program to help build community leaders with creative skills.  As her career has unfolded Amy has built capacity in visual art and graphic design, become a local champion for environmentalism,  is a competitive athlete, and developed a career as a USSA certified nordic ski coach. In 2022, Amy received Utah’s Lifetime Cultural Career Achievement Award. 

Sofia Gorder

Director of Community Programs and Content
Sofia builds large scale community projects that bring people together to make intentional art and spark dialogue. Embodiment, placemaking, and connection are her platforms. She knows how to fill a room with willing people to confront pressing questions about the world around us through artistic and embodied processes. She recklessly indulges in learning and experiential research with whole communities no matter the age or background while collaboratively building public events that demand engagement and build excitement for change. Sofia facilitates coursework with groups in senior centers, non-profits, Indigenous communities, prisons, hospitals, pre schools, refugee centers, K-12 schools, and graduate-level leadership courses. Her ultimate goal: to build a more empathetic and vibrant world through the true embodiment of communal creative process. Sofia’s one guiding belief: No matter the population, if you can lead people back to themselves and their passions while urging them to work collaboratively with a group toward a common goal, you can create exponential momentum for positive change. She holds a BFA in modern dance, a Masters in Dance Education & Kinesiology, and is now pursuing a Certification In Arts and Public Health to further her work in fields that use art to make a healthier world.

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Brolly Arts has, from its inception, been an agent of change and community development through the arts for Salt Lake City. Every project undertaken has moved the arts community to work together and has creatively addressed a number of issues, both local and global.”

Nancy Boskoff

Former Executive Director
Salt Lake City Arts Council

YOUR SUPPORT IS APPRECIATED

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Your generous gift will go towards our mission of transforming lives through the power of art and to supporting our commitment to increase the opportunities and impacts of artists and arts organizations. Your tax-deductible donation is greatly appreciated.
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