Michigan · Nonprofit
Living Arts
Living Arts (Michigan) receives grants from 39 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,315,535 to it, the largest being FORD PHILANTHROPY ($1,015,000). 19 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $650k
- Funders on record
- 39
- Grants received
- $4.3M
- Net assets
- $588k
What Living Arts does
Mission
Living Arts ignites creativity in the lives of Detroit youth through the performing, visual, and media arts.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Out-of-School Arts (OSA) offerings provide sequential, standards-based arts ducation and instruction for Pre-K to teenage youth alongside youth development strategies that increase leadership, self-efficiacy, and other capacities that support success in school and beyond. OSA programs operate five days a week, 37 weeks a year at Living Art's studio paces and includes 40 summer and after-school class options in the performing, visual, literary, and media arts.
$446,019 spent$36,740 earned by the program43% of program spendingIn-School Arts residencies and classes directly support students' learning in English language arts, math, science and social studies by integrating those subjects with artisitic learning. For arts integrated education programs, Living Arts teaching artists work closely with classroom teachers to develop performing, visual, literary or media arts lessons integrated with their grade-level standards for ELA/Math/Science/Social Studies.
$148,681 spent$124,109 earned by the program14% of program spendingDetroit Wolf Trap offers artist residencies and workshops in school and community settings for children 3 months to six years, and trains their caregivers and educators in creative techniques that promote their development that they can use after the residencies. Fine arts residencies deliver arts instruction that immerse students in painting, drawing, sculpture, dance, theatre, creative writing and poetry, vocal and instrumental music, or digital media arts and activities that are not available in many Detroit schools.
$229,994 spent22% of program spendingCommunity & Family Arts endeavors to engage with fellow nonprofits and community organizations to highlight and explore culturally relevant themes, uplift Detroit artists, and be directed by community voice. Previous events include back to school nights celebrating various artistic styles, including communal songwriting, dunham dance, live music, ballet folklorico, and more. These events often include food, family friendly activity, and artistic practice with a lens of joy.
$213,242 spent21% of program spending
The 4 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $1,037,936.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2018 to 2019, from $838k to $1.6M (+93%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2017 3% · 2018 3% · 2019 2% · 2020 4% · 2021 15% · 2022 20% · 2023 4% · 2024 2% · 2025 6%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
72% of Living Arts’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (64% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 4 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Chief executive
Laura Scales
Executive Director
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 7 funders to 16 funders, grant income rose $405k → $450k.
7 of 39 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 7% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of Living Arts’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 39 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
Living Arts has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 24% of grant income, and it takes 3 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 3 funders to its left
30% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund Living Arts.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 49% · 2018 32% · 2019 40% · 2020 27% · 2021 23% · 2022 26% · 2023 33% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
41% of Living Arts's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 49% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
97% of Living Arts's grant income comes from Michigan funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $285k arriving through sponsors registered in 7 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
Living Arts's funding base is broadening — from 7 funders to 16 as grant income climbed.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 11,634 arts & culture nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2025
Government funding Living Arts receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $10k on record.
- National Endowment for the Arts$10k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like Living Arts
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In Michigan
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
86% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
91%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for Living Arts: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds Living Arts?
- Living Arts (Michigan) receives grants from 39 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,315,535 to it, the largest being FORD PHILANTHROPY ($1,015,000). 19 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Living Arts have?
- IRS filings report 39 organizations giving $4,315,535 in grants to Living Arts, 19 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Living Arts?
- FORD PHILANTHROPY is the largest funder on record, with $1,015,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Living Arts find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Michigan. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds Living Arts →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 39 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing