Dear Jasper Family,
Midlands Gives is just 2 weeks away and I’m happy to share that, thanks to the generous support of the Gerald L. and Judith M. Davis Foundation, the Jasper Project is eligible for a dollar-to-dollar match for up to $1,150 for any funding we receive between now and Midlands Gives Day on May 5th.
This is extremely meaningful for an organization like the Jasper Project because, to be honest, we’re the little guys.
While many worthy organizations cater to larger donors for whom writing a check for thousands of dollars is an easy swing, most of our donors are folks with modest budgets who, though they love and support the arts, are only able to give somewhere between $10 and $100. But with these matching funds, those valued dollars are doubled, with no extra cost to you. Your $10 becomes $20; your $100 becomes $200; and your $500 becomes a whopping $1000.
For Jasper, this is a big deal!
And we come to you during this time of giving with so much good news to share. Here are just a few of the results of our hard work that we’re proud of this year:
We just closed our project, Peter Lenzo: A Retrospective and Remembrance, during which we exhibited more than 30 rare pieces by the late SC sculptor, published a book entitled, In Memory of His Memory, which contains exquisite photography of all the pieces, and created a short documentary by the same name to accompany the exhibition.
Since last June we have presented two opportunities for Midlands area visual artists to express their feelings about the current socio-political state of affairs via our Degenerate Arts Projects I and II. In February we awarded checks and framed certificates to Cam Moore whose work was voted “Best in Show” by his fellow artists, and to Ivan Segura, winner of the “Zeitgeist Award,” which was juried by a panel of prominent judges including Harriett Greene, Peter Chametzky, and Xavier Blake.
Ivan Segura - winner of the Jasper Project’s Zeitgeist Award
Last fall we celebrated that the Jasper Project had produced our 100th indie film by a SC filmmaker during our 2nd Act Film Project. All 16 selected films were screened at a project closing party at Harbison Theatre and the winning scripts were, as always, bound into a book and shared with the filmmakers and sponsors, plus we distributed more than $3800 in seed and prize money to the 2025 participants in the project.
2nd Act Film Project 2025 Filmmakers
We workshopped, published, and produced, to the staged reading level of development, the 5th original play by a SC playwright via our annual Play Right Project. Ryan Jenkins was our winning playwright for Busted Open and, in addition to producing his play at the Columbia Music Festival Association, we published his script, registering it with the US Library of Congress, and awarded him a cash prize.
Via our various gallery spaces across the Midlands, in combination with our special projects, we have exhibited and facilitated the sale of art by more than 100 local artists. We just picked up another gallery space for First Thursdays on Main Street – it’s the Jasper Alley at Tapp’s and we’ll be there every First Thursday so please come by and see us and our monthly featured artists.
We have reviewed 19 local theatrical performances, publishing our reviews in Jasper Online and sharing them on our social media platforms.
Since last Midlands Gives, we have published two more issues of Jasper Magazine in May and November 2025, with the spring 2026 issue going to press in just a few days. And this fall we will be celebrating the 15th anniversary of Jasper Magazine by bringing back one of our favorite projects. Stay tuned for more info coming soon.
BEKAH RICE
In addition to officially moving Bekah Rice into the role of executive director, (I’m still here, living life for the cause, but enjoying less responsibility, and resting easy knowing our organization is in loving hands), we’ve added seven new members to our board of directors. That means there are 21 people at our table putting other things aside to fulfill our mission of being a “project-oriented, multidisciplinary arts facilitator …providing collaborative arts engineering and community-wide arts communication.”
As founder of Jasper Magazine and the Jasper Project, this last accomplishment is especially meaningful to me. It speaks to the staying power of the ideology behind Jasper—the belief that art is such an integral and powerful part of everyday life that it should not only be supported and recognized, but it should also be exalted. And I’m not the only one who believes this! So do the all the good people who volunteer their talents to serve on our board and all of you who play your incredibly important parts by investing your funds in Jasper. You can feel good about your investment because you know that every penny that comes to us goes right back to the arts community we all live in—we’re not asking you to help finance any kind of overhead; no salaries; no nice office or furnishings; no perks (other than stamps and insurance). Your donation will go directly toward publishing and paying the artists who create Jasper Magazine; promoting and providing for gallery exhibitions and annual projects; creating books that record for posterity the work of SC artists and placing them in the US Library of Congress; and, putting grocery money in the pockets of as many SC artists as we can.
I appreciate you giving your attention to learning more about why supporting Jasper during and prior to Midlands Gives is a fine and good thing to do. Thank you for your generous donation, no matter what amount you are able to give. We are all a part of the Jasper Family when we have each other’s backs. Thank you for having ours.
Please donate before May 5th while we have matching funds.
Humbly and with gratitude,
Cindi Boiter
Founder, The Jasper Project
Editor, Jasper Magazine