2025 Updates from Unmanageable
Our 2025 Year In Review
Unmanageable’s mission is to mobilize resources and build power for independent artists engaged in social change work. We uplift artists and projects with large-scale creative visions that promote social and racial justice, with priority given to artists in the South who consistently operate without the resources they need to thrive.
Since our start in 2020, we have raised more than $3.5M in funding for artists and their visionary projects. These funds came from government grants, foundations, sponsors, and generous individual donors. Funding went to project and tour support, recordings, disaster relief, and childcare support for artist mothers.
We are proud to report that a transformative organizational capacity building grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation contributed significantly to this growth, helping us to add staff to meet this moment of expansion this year and beyond.
Best of 2025
Expanding our team! This year our small but mighty team grew, which has helped our capacity and reach significantly. We are over the moon to have Octavia Yearwood on board as our Special Projects Director, Tivi Jones from Hey Awesome Girl as our Fundraising Project Manager, Else Duff as Fundraising Consultant, in addition to grant-writing support from our existing team Alicia Jones and Sara Hollifield. We have also increased our bookkeeping and legal support too to help all of the artists and projects we serve.
Biscuits & Banjos Festival – Unmanageable was a core part of the producing team providing fundraising and festival management for Rhiannon Giddens’ inaugural Biscuits & Banjos Festival in Durham. Curated by Giddens, Biscuits & Banjos is dedicated to the celebration and exploration of Black music, art, and culture in her home state of North Carolina.
Cover Crop – We are proud to be a producing partner of Amber Rubarth’s new docuseries, bringing musicians to family farms across North America with the aim of creating more generosity, connection, and sustainability through food, community, and music. Stay tuned for the premiere of the first episode in 2026!
We Are North Nashville – Led by artist and community leader M. Simone Boyd, We Are North Nashville is a large-scale storytelling project to gather, document and share wisdom and sacred knowledge from North Nashville community elders.This year marked our second year partnering with the creative team of M. Simone Boyd, Steve Haruch, and Andrea Tudhope, with new episodes of the We Are North Nashville podcast released, plus a radical rest retreat, a media lunch, and intergenerational gatherings.
Shockoe Institute Presents – Unmanageable is a producing partner for artist conversations and events curated by Founding Artistic Director Leyla McCalla, at the Shockoe Institute. The Shockoe Institute is a new national institute headquartered in Richmond, VA dedicated to revealing the enduring impact of racial slavery on our shared American experience.
Rancho La Puerta Artist Retreat – Unmanageable co-produces this annual retreat to offer artists time to rest at a stunning wellness resort in Tecate, Mexico.
Joshua Moore’s The Recissions – 'The Recissions' is an archival mapping project that looks to create a visible record and a network of solidarity and awareness among artists, agencies, and organizations in the regional South East that have experienced funding shortfalls, disruptions, and cancellations due to the 2025 claw backs in Federal arts spending.
Stay Righteously Unmanageable – This year marked the launch of a monthly zoom convening for artist-activists facilitated by Octavia Yearwood and JeNae Taylor (Founder of Taylor Space and Cultural Organizer at the incredible Highlander Center).
In addition to the projects above, we also act as a fiscal sponsor for several works that align with our mission:
+ several additional multi-disciplinary projects. Learn more here!
Unmanageable is at a moment of incredible growth. If you’d like to help, we welcome ideas of artists and partnerships that align with our work. We are also seeking support to help cover the costs of our operations, which are about 10% of our annual operating budget. If you are interested in making a gift specific to any of the projects above, or would like to support our team’s work, please click the button below.
GRATITUDE
This year we continued to strengthen the family of support around our work through our Board of Directors and Advisory Board. We want to recognize them and express our deep gratitude in the many ways they have helped us build a family around this work:
BOARD OF DIRECTORS:
Erin Malone-Smolla, Board Chair
Christina Horn
Christy Frink
Kortney Toney
Abigail Washburn
ADVISORY BOARD:
Amber Banks
Tracy Gershon
Ali Harnell
Fiona Prine
Allison Russell
Shannon Sanders
Carolyn Snell
Rachel Whitney
Unmanageable is grateful for general operating support from the following generous partners:
This support has allowed us to offer more robust and expansive assistance to artists.
Unmanageable is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) public charity. Tax ID #85-1193914. Your donation is tax-deductible to the extent allowable by law.