No Evil Project at the Fitchburg Art Museum Corporate Sponsorship

Request Summary

The No Evil Project requests $500 to support the No Evil Project: Fitchburg at the Fitchburg Art Museum. Sponsorship secured will help to cover the costs of public programs beginning in Summer 2018 and a temporary exhibit on display at the Museum from December 3rd through January 29th. Public programs and the culminating exhibit are open to participants and audiences of all ages and demographics. The goals of the program and the exhibit are: to promote a greater sense of commonality and understanding within the community; to celebrate the diversity of the area’s population; and to create awareness of the myriad opportunities for civic engagement in the Fitchburg region.

No Evil Project Overview

The No Evil Project, a federally recognized 501(c)(3), is a community photography program that challenges stereotypes in a fun way by giving a wide variety of people a voice to show how they are doing good things in the community and are not defined by societal labels. The No Evil Project team photographs each participant posing as the three wise monkeys – See No Evil, Hear No Evil, and Speak No Evil. Each person then chooses three labels that represent themselves, from categories including race, religion, sexuality, hobbies and occupations, politics, medical conditions, and favorite sports team. Participants then write a good deed they have done to show that they are "not evil" despite the negative stereotypes people may have about those labels.

Originally the project was to be limited to a small community of subjects; however, the response was so positive that over 8,000 people have been photographed so far. Recent exhibitions have been held at the Worcester Senior Center, UMASS Medical School, the Hanover Theater for the Performing Arts, Townsend Public Library, and Nichols College. Housed at the Denholm Building of Worcester, the largest No Evil Project exhibition displayed 1,456 people representing the beautiful diversity of the Central Massachusetts community. Recently, the No Evil Project expanded to the west coast with an exhibition for Cogswell College in San Jose, CA.

All of the participants appear on the project's website, and photographers and individuals from around the world can upload their photos as well. Seeing the collection online and in physical exhibits shows the variety of people doing good things, and the photos and stories humanize the labels the viewer may not be able to relate to, and helps challenge their assumptions and start new conversations. What is pitched as a fun and silly exercise also becomes a very deep and thought-provoking experience.

No Evil Project: Fitchburg Program Activities

In collaboration with the Fitchburg Art Museum, the No Evil Project will invite public participation throughout the Summer of 2018. Beginning on May 19th, the Fitchburg Art Museum hosted a Family Day Photo Shoot in which 50 family participants poised for the project. Since then the Museum hosted an open call photo shoot to the general public and museum audiences on June 23rd, and leveraging the Museum’s Free Fun Friday program on July 27th, the No Evil Project offered further photo shoots to capture more of Fitchburg’s personality in preparation for the early winter exhibition. There have been photo shoots at the Fitchburg Public Library, the Fitchburg police and fire departments, and other events and organizations around the city. The No Evil Project is currently working with a variety of community partners to offer several more photo shoots to encourage community participation.

The culminating exhibit will be created throughout the Fall of 2018 and prepared for display in November 2018. The No Evil Project: Fitchburg installation and will be completed for the December 3rd opening at the Fitchburg Art Museum. A formal exhibit reception will be hosted on December 8th. The exhibit will remain on display throughout the holidays and will be a point of pride for the community and the museum.

No Evil Project: Fitchburg Corporate Support Outreach Opportunities

Sponsors of the No Evil Project will be visibly promoted at all photo-shoots. In terms of the project’s outreach, the No Evil Project’s website and social media pages enjoy over 1,000 followers and leverage a mailing list of 2,000+ subscribers to promote the project externally. Photo shoots around the City will display customized marketing posters, fliers, and video slides all of which will honor the project’s sponsors. In addition to the No Evil Project’s website and social media, sponsors will be proudly displayed on all exhibit promotion materials, including a corporate sponsorship specific banner greeting visitors at the Exhibit entrance.

Sponsorship of the No Evil Project: Fitchburg includes myriad opportunities for participation and outreach for company employees. Employees can volunteer during photo shoots, assist with exhibit set-up and breakdown, invite further participation from their neighborhoods or community partners, and, of course, pose for the exhibit themselves at any of the public photo-shoots. To further participation for their company, Corporate Sponsors may consider an expanded sponsorship to host a mini-photo shoot on site to encourage team-building and community engagement. Within the No Evil Project’s website, the images of company participants from these mini-photo shoots can be displayed on a corporate sponsor specific webpage. This additional sponsorship support can be negotiated with the No Evil Project Team based on employee participants.

No Evil Project: Fitchburg Anticipated Outcomes

The overarching goal of No Evil Project programs is simple: to promote good will within a community. In general, No Evil hosting sites, such as the Fitchburg Art Museum, identify a need to create a greater sense of community and work with the No Evil Project Team to identify areas of concern and to determine goals. In this case, the Museum wanted to host an exhibit within their Community Gallery that literally displayed the people of the community.

The Museum and the No Evil Project Team will gauge the success of the programs and the exhibit by tracking both photo-shoot participation and audience numbers. Due to the personal investment that the community participants will have in the exhibition, it is anticipated that attendance numbers should be strong. During and following the exhibition, the No Evil Project Team will assist the Museum in developing evaluation forms, online surveys and focus group discussions to encourage community discourse and dialogue. Results from these evaluation tools will be shared by the No Evil Project and the Museum with invested community partners, including City Hall and the Historical Society to inform future community engagement projects and programs.