Artlink's 212 connects emerging entrepreneurs with resources, mentorship

Matt McClure is excited about the progress happening in northeast Indiana.

As Executive Director of Artlink, he works with grassroots artists launching businesses and projects and sees the community encouraging them to pursue their talents as full-time careers.

But he also sees the challenges that stand in their way.

Artlink is launching an art incubator program for creators nationwide at the Auer Center in downtown Fort Wayne.

“We talk in this region a lot about entrepreneurship, but we don’t talk about the limitations of what that looks like,” McClure says.

And for ambitious creators in Fort Wayne and other developing cities across the Midwest, the challenges of entrepreneurship can be overwhelming.

“If you look at just the regional creative economy, most emerging artist are stuck in that place of attempting to emerge because they are holding down one or two jobs in addition to creative or contract creative work,” McClure says. “That is just to pay the bills. Having access to the knowledge and equipment needed to complete a project and present that project to a producer, a publisher, or a distributor, is often an unscalable mountain.”
 
Grant recipients in northeast Indiana can use Artlink's space in downtown Fort Wayne. Recipients across the country will work remote.Access to the time, money, equipment, and industry connections needed to bring creative projects to life can stifle creativity or prevent artists from completing projects all together. So McClure and others at Artlink have put together a program called 212, aimed at giving artists and innovators access to those resources, based on the merit of their ideas alone.

Artlink’s 212 is a one-of-a-kind incubator program for regional residents and national satellite participants alike to compete for grants and use specialized equipment to take their ideas to the next level. It even connects them with industry experts who have agreed to act as mentors and guide their projects to completion.

McClure explains that the program, which recently selected its first 11 grant recipients, was inspired by a similar program at the Gray Area Foundation for the Arts in San Francisco. Artlink adapted the concept to fit northeast Indiana’s needs, and consequently, the needs of creators in other up-and-coming communities.

Ultimately, it gives innovators in the smallest towns the chance to compete on the same level as those in the creative metropolises of New York and Los Angeles.

“The goal is to provide access to knowledge, resources, and connectivity regardless of economic or geographic limitations,” McClure says.

It’s a challenge the mentors on 212’s advisory board know well.

As people who started small or overcame challenges to achieve high degrees of success in their fields, 212's mentors include professionals, like animators at Disney and screenwriters for popular TV shows like "Family Guy." Artlink has paired each of them with grant recipients in their fields who they will meet with at least once a week to offer guidance, feedback, and support on projects.
 Innes is a comic book writer and illustrator in San Diego who will be a mentor for 212.

A comic book writer and illustrator in San Diego, Lora Innes is one member of the advisory board who will help guide projects to success. Her historical fantasy webcomic series, The Dreamer, has been collected and released by IDW Publishing, and nominated five times in the Harvey Awards.

But before Innes made it big, she was simply an avid comic book reader and artist, growing up in a small town outside Pittsburgh. She didn’t get her official start in the industry until she attended the Columbus College of Art & Design, where the established comic book writer Beau Smith discovered her work and invited her to collaborate on projects.

Now, she wants to do the same for other budding illustrators.

Looking back, she recalls feeling like her struggles breaking into the industry and understanding the ins and outs of dealing with publishers and payments were unique to her. But after realizing several of her colleagues faced similar challenges, she wants to help others prepare.

“It’s a hard industry,” Innes says. “Even if you’re well known, jobs are hard to get and hard to keep. I just wanted to help other people not have to go through it the way I went through it.”