Working on something meaningful is a common desire – but how? We started asking folks to share the story of how they ended up working on a project they felt was meaningful because we wanted inspiration but also because we wondered if hearing from people from across a range of industries would help us identify patterns making it more likely for anyone to be able to find and work on projects that they would find meaningful.

Kalliope Panagiotopoulou

Since dance became a part of my life, I have been fortunate to have been part of numerous creative projects, many of which hold such dear memories. Read more>>

Lauren LaRocca

My most meaningful project to date is a book-length manuscript titled “Dear Road.” I think something profound happens to people when they live nomadically and spend months or years alone on the road. Read more>>

Katy Morris

The Rehart Gesner Fund really started decades ago when I was a little girl being ushered around by my grandmother from one musical performance or lesson to another. Read more>>

Missy Stevens

1990 was a banner year for me. I started making thread paintings (embroidered pictures) with a punch needle and also started learning about and practicing shamanism.  Read more>>

Carlos Andres Aponte Otero

I’m currently finishing a project called ‘Lifesavers’ ; a short story that I’ve held in my heart for quite some time now! This is the first time where I’m creating a project around something that’s greatly dear to me, so it’s very intimate, but it’s also been very daunting. Read more>>

Barbara Handy

I decided to take my love for cosplay towards a scholarship opportunity taking me down a path with meaningful projects along the way. Read more>>

Anna Elizabeth Anita Mayorga Voitsekhovskaia

I am half Colombian, and half Russian. However, most of my life I´ve spent in Europe studying and improving myself as a pianist and as a musician. My professional musical education is based on an academic European system (mostly Russian) that could be described as one of the best educational systems in the arts. Read more>>

Christopher Mitchell

For more than a decade, I’ve been deeply engaged in the production of two impactful documentaries centered around the rich cultural tapestry of Haiti. The first documentary delves into the profound spiritual journey of an annual Vodou pilgrimage in the northern region of Haiti, Souvenance, capturing the essence of tradition, spirituality, and community that define this sacred event. Read more>>

Holly Danger

I believe that what’s personal is universal, and because of that, there are always layers of myself and my personal quest for self-discovery in the work that I hope resonates with those who experience it. Read more>>

Jaren George

Right now, I am working on providing an educational, interactive workshop for youth program staff called Empowered Collaboration. When I was a summer camp counselor during my first year in 2007, I wish I had been more aware when working with others about the concept of team development. Read more>>

Emily Wolfe

The most meaningful project I’ve worked on is my most recent album, “The Blowback”. It’s the first time I’ve stepped into the producer chair and taken the reins on producing my own music. Read more>>

V.c. Rhone

I am so blessed to have a variety of projects in various forms of production that mean the world to me! One of the most recent ones, NOT AFRAID, received the Indigenous Film and Culture Award from The Windrider Institute and screened at The Windrider Summit & Sundance Film Festival Experience in Park City, Utah. Read more>>

Randy Williams

It started with the spread of a fashion-abomination called Crocs. You see, years ago, these dastardly embarrassments to mankind were only seen on a handful of rare humans, who obviously had zero fashion taste or shame whatsoever. Read more>>

Regina González

The most meaningful project I have worked on so far has been a production of The Cherry Orchard by Anton Chekhov that the theater company,The Chekhovians, took to Chiavenna, Italy. Read more>>

Kindred S0ULz

One of the most meaningful projects I worked on was my very first song! The reason is, when I made it, I had not intent of ever making another one! Read more>>

Chris Kane

The most meaningful project I’ve worked on is my first children’s book entitled “Guided by Grace”. The book started as a gift for my youngest niece Annastasia but evolved into something more impactful. Read more>>

Travis Van Alstyne

Without question, the most meaningful project I’ve ever worked on is my recently finished short animated film, “Love of the Land”. It’s based on the true and tragic story of Vermont farmer Romaine Tenney, who’s farm was in the construction path of Interstate 91 in the 1960s. Read more>>

Robert Liu-Trujillo

In 2023 a children’s picture book that I’d been working on for more than a decade finally debuted. Its called “Fresh Juice” and it came out last summer on Lee & Low Books. Read more>>

GRAHAM NORTHRUP

My previous short film “Stand Up”, was loosely based on experiences I’ve had, as well as my daughters, and I made it for them. The story is about a young adult woman who was in a terrible car accident, and it feels like her life was just stripped away in a moment. Read more>>

Sean Wing

Meaningful projects is all that currently matters to me. I’ve made hundreds of thousands of dollars on projects I didn’t care about and 0 dollars on projects that I care deeply about. Read more>>

SAINT CLOUD

My most meaningful project in being a part of this band has definitely been the song SOUL. I wrote that riff in early 2020 and Joe and I made an arrangement to it and jammed it in my basement for months on end. Read more>>

Stacey McAdams

When in college, I began doing commission work. This commission work is where I would paint or draw from photographs provided by the client. Sometimes it may be a beautiful landscape they saw on a recent trip, and other times it may be of their family. Read more>>

Rustam Vakilov

The most meaningful project I’ve worked on so far has been a feature film named “Hell Hath No Fury,” my first-ever feature film as a director. This project not only let me express my own visual storytelling style but also has a backstory that I think can inspire and help other artists who might be on the verge of losing hope. Read more>>

Laura Didyk

The first art-related project I did was almost by accident. I have both my degrees (BA and MFA) in creative writing, but visual art wasn’t an aspiration—not one strong enough to act on. One terribly cold and gray winter in Western Massachusetts where I live, in the midst of ending a relationship I didn’t want to end but knew I had to, I found myself … speechless. Read more>>

Avahara

Not many people survive a glioblastoma. About six years ago, shortly after my wife and I bought our first house, we heard the news that a friend of ours had been diagnosed and was going in for brain surgery in two weeks. Read more>>

Genevieve Esson

Meaningful projects that have resonated with me are the 26 Public Art Projects I have completed since 2009. Being involved with Community Art made me realize I was civic minded and that Public Art made a difference in peoples lives. Read more>>

Luyao Chang

An Intimate Relationship (2023) is a series of mixed media sculptures and an video installation that I created to explore individual and political identity through gestures and objects associated with intimate relationships. Read more>>

Vanesa Alvarez

The truth is that when my art makes the most sense is when I work with the community. Being a muralist, I have the honor of working with Thrive Collective, which is dedicated to this, of having received awards such as a commission for the Arts in Medicine Program of NYC Health and Hospitals, of having worked against the violence against the women in Spain … Read more>>

Anna Toberman

Some of my portrait commissions are for families who want to capture special events and create heirlooms for their children or grandchildren. A few years ago, an elderly man asked me to draw a portrait of his wife as she had looked on the day of their wedding more nearly 50 years before. Read more>>

Charles Crepps

Meaningful, by its very definition is a descriptive word. Since it is a descriptive word its meaning can also be subjective. So, the meaning behind an impactful project is completely in the eye of the beholder. Read more>>

Carlos Chavez

One of the most unforgettable experiences was getting a call to paint a canvas inspired by one of Kobe Bryant’s shoes, the KB X. It was then shown with the shoe at a Nike event with Kobe in attendance. Read more>>

Joanne Marracci

Since learning my craft in 2005 with Metalsmithing 101 class at Pratt Fine Arts Center in Seattle, I have been blessed with being able to connect with my customers through meaningful histories and heirloom re-make projects and even used cremains of loved ones in custom pieces.. Read more>>

Nancy Ring

I love the topic of “meaningful projects” because I believe that work is one of the things that gives life meaning, and I absolutely feel that way about my artwork and writing. Read more>>