Bloomington, St. Paul and Minneapolis have consistently appeared on the SMU DataArts, the National Center for Arts Research, Arts Vibrancy Index since the rankings began in 2015.
This year, the Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington area is ranked sixth on the annual list of the 20 most arts-vibrant large communities in the nation.
“The arts have an important role in Bloomington, and have a positive economic, social and cultural impact on the community. Bloomington has many arts and cultural organizations, and artists and culture bearers who contribute to the vibrancy of Bloomington,” Creative Placemaking Director Alejandra Pelinka said. “The Creative Placemaking Commission is pleased to know community members support our work, and we are eager to expand our efforts citywide. We look forward to building partnerships and engaging with more artists and stakeholders.”
Arts-vibrant communities can be found in every region of the United States—a finding which arises from an objective analysis of the data, and not from selecting communities by hand to achieve geographic representation.
The overall Arts Vibrancy Index is composed of 13 unique measures which cover aspects of supply, demand, and public support for arts and culture, and are adjusted for cost of living and population differences among 900 communities across the country. In this year’s index, the analysis approach was updated to weight the 13 inputs based on their relative explanatory power for the underlying concept of arts vibrancy.
Related research by SMU DataArts shows that Local Arts Agencies (LAAs) like the City of Bloomington are powerful catalysts of arts vibrancy which ensure that the arts remain an integral part of community life.
