The Detroit Institute of Arts
Community Outreach

Community outreach is an integral part of the DIA’s mission, and in recent years the museum has focused on strengthening long-standing relationships and cultivating new ones with metropolitan Detroit’s diverse communities. The DIA’s community outreach efforts are designed to promote the museum as a resource, support mutually beneficial programs, and encourage involvement and ownership among its diverse audience.

To help fulfill its mission, the DIA established a Community Outreach Committee (COC), whose members come from a cross section of museum departments. While there are many different ethnic communities in metro Detroit, the COC decided to concentrate its initial outreach efforts on those with the largest populations: African American; Arab American and Chaldean; and Latino/Hispanic.

The museum continues to offer programs and exhibitions that feature the arts of many different cultures, including Asia Day and Fifth Fridays—that “extra” Friday four or five times a year on which we celebrate one of Detroit’s vibrant ethnic communities – from Puerto Rican to Polish, Irish to Indian. The Detroit Film Theatre features films from all over the world, and the music, artist demonstrations, and drop-in workshops featured during our Friday night activities bring the best of the world to Detroit.

Some recent Community Outreach Committee activities include:

African American

The African-American subcommittee collaborated with CAMP Detroit (Cultural Arts Mentorship Program) to develop an innovative program for Detroit area middle school students, called MeDIA. Through a series of 13 weekly sessions with 13 Detroit middle-school students, the program educated and immersed the students in visual language, art, and the museum through a series of guided gallery visits and museum studio sessions.

Students were also given access to the "behind the scenes" workings of the DIA in order to foster appreciation and to introduce potential job categories.

The MeDIA utilized a broad range of instructors including DIA staff, community artists and Detroit Public Schools teachers and provided the DIA the opportunity to see itself through the eyes of African American youth.

A mural project created by the MeDIA students has been installed in the DIA’s Student Lunchroom as a display of one of the projects completed by the students.

Arab American and Chaldean

DIA staff conducted a tile-painting workshop for over 300 students at Detroit’s Greenfield Union Elementary School, with the theme of “diversity.” The tiles will be installed in the newly opened Arab American and Chaldean Council’s (ACC) Youth Recreation and Leadership Center on West Seven Mile in Detroit. Greenfield Union has a large population of Chaldean students, and is located a block away from the ACC’s center. The project was particularly relevant to the Chaldean students, as tile making is an ancient part of their culture. The students will have the added benefit of seeing their own artwork on the walls of the community center.

Latino-Hispanic

This committee actively seeks out opportunities to strengthen relationships with community leaders, especially in Southwest Detroit.  The committee is currently involved in planning programs, activities and entertainment for Hispanic Heritage Month, which is September 15 through October 15 each year. 

In July 2005, this committee created a bilingual flyer to promote Hispanic Heritage Month activities that was distributed in Mexicantown/Southwest Detroit.  Other projects include translating DIA brochures, gallery guides and related materials into Spanish, including the gallery guide for the world-renowned Rivera Court, which contains frescoes painted by Mexican artist Diego Rivera. This committee also participates in neighborhood festivals in conjunction with the Membership department, Museum Shop, and Education Studio, and is currently planning projects that would engage young people of Latino-Hispanic descent.