Helping clients break out of cycles of scarcity and stagnation to make new progress toward their visions.

Work with Substrate Arts Consulting to:

Set meaningful priorities: Make sure you’re asking the right questions so the answers help you to achieve the results you envision.

Increase your grant success: Increase your grant success rate, the size of awards you win, and set a clear path for growth over time.

Build your leadership skills: Build on your background as an artist and learn what you need to know to manage an organization effectively, sustainably, and joyfully.

Douglas Detrick, founder and principal of Substrate Arts Consulting.

I’m a musician and writer with over a decade of experience as an artist and arts leader. I specialize in grant writing, strategic planning, and leadership coaching, all to help clients build a strong foundation for their creativity over time. Why? Because I’ve learned lessons through experience, through many successes and failures as a leader, and I want to see arts leaders learn those lessons faster and easier than I did.

Grant Writing

  • Grant readiness assessments: A list of specific and customized recommendations to position your organization for success in grant seeking.
  • Grant prospect research: A detailed report containing profiles of funders that align with your mission and vision and a made-for-you grant calendar.
  • Grant master template writing: Carefully edited, data-supported language responding to the most common grant narrative questions that will be adaptable to any grant application for which your program is eligible.
  • Project or program design: A facilitated process to turn a project or program vision into a sustainable operation that achieves your organization’s goals.
  • Grant writing in customized long-term or per-project contracts: Customized applications to government and private funders for 6 to 12-month periods.

Strategic Planning

  • On-demand strategy consultations: A one or two-hour consultation to address a particular issue.
  • Full strategic plans or customized strategy packages: Create a tailored strategic planning process and outputs that suit your organization’s needs.

Leadership development

  • On-demand leadership coaching consultations: A one or two-hour consultation to address a specific issue.
  • Coaching packages for the “Artist-Turned-Executive”: A package of consultations that help arts leaders build critical skills and develop a personal approach to leadership.

Hands-on experience as an Executive Director with a small arts nonprofit.

I was the Executive Director of the nonprofit Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble (PJCE) from 2013 to 2022, leaving the organization as part of planned transition to an expanded new leadership team. During my tenure, the organization’s budget expanded by 600%, taking it from an all-volunteer to professional organization that is “a real cultural force in Oregon.” (Tom D’Antoni, Oregon Music News)

As the lead fundraiser and artistic director, I designed projects that were twice awarded the Creative Heights grant from Oregon Community Foundation, as well as other grants from the Regional Arts and Culture Council, Oregon Cultural Trust, Oregon Arts Commission, James F & Marion L Miller Foundation, Multnomah County Cultural Coalition and others. I have also built successful partnerships with Oregon Historical Society, Montavilla Jazz Festival, Vanport Mosaic, Portland Center Stage, and many individuals through the Portland metro area. My clients have also included PDX Jazz, Fear No Music, and numerous individual artists from all disciplines.

I currently or formerly have worked with the following organizations:

  • Oregon International Ballet Academy
  • Fear No Music
  • Montavilla Jazz
  • Oregon Mozart Players
  • Orchestra Next
  • Oregon Origins Project
  • enTaiko
  • SoundsTruck NW
  • Third Angle New Music
  • Alliance of Black Nurses Association of Oregon
  • Viroqua Chamber Main Street
  • Historic Temple Theatre of Viroqua
  • numerous individual artists

An experienced artist who crafts unique and award-winning projects.

As an individual artist, I was awarded the Oregon Individual Artist Fellowship in 2017, and won the prestigious Chamber Music America New Jazz Works grant in 2011. Before my tenure with PJCE, I led an improvising chamber group called AnyWhen Ensemble, which released three albums of my music and toured throughout the United States at venues including the Stone, the Phillips Collection and residencies at many universities.

Grant funding has been an integral and transformative part of my personal arts practice. I received a practical foundation as a grant writer by taking classes at the Foundation Center while I lived in New York City from 2010 to 2013. I love to share that knowledge with artists and administrators who might find grant writing to be confusing, intimidating, or too removed from the actual making of their art. To me, building an engaging arts project is an art in itself—it’s a problem-solving journey that requires equal parts planning and creativity.

Photo by Florian Van Duyn

Substrate Arts Consulting is inspired by the idea that the arts are like mushrooms.

This might be a strange way to think about the arts for some, but to me, this frame of reference is encouraging and animating. It’s important to remember that arts aren’t any one thing—the diversity of art we have in the world is as broad and deep as the humans who make it. So, a metaphor that embraces that wildness is a more accurate way to think about the arts.

The multiplicity and biology of mycelia is an apt metaphor for the arts.

Mushrooms can be delicious, they can be beautiful, they can glow in the dark, they can be weird or ugly, and yes, they can be toxic. And sometimes, just like the arts, they can be psychoactive, changing our minds so that new perspectives are possible.

Mycelium are the organisms that produce mushrooms, and they grow in an invisible thread-like network in the soil or in rotting tree trunks. Only when conditions are right can it grow a mushroom that can spread its spores, and, importantly, that people can see. If a performance or a finished piece of art are like a mushroom, then the mycelium network is the hidden infrastructure that supports it. Building that infrastructure is how I will help my clients.

A mycelium is not a plant. A mushroom is not a flower.

Since mycelia don’t do photosynthesis, all their energy comes from breaking down organic matter in the soil or whatever it is that they are growing in. So, if you’re trying to grow mushrooms—or arts projects—you pack all the nutrition the mushrooms need into your growing medium. You can think about these as artists, venues and rehearsal spaces, volunteers, board members, sponsors, audiences, marketing, equipment, and of course, funding.

The substrate is the medium in which the mycelia grows.

Let’s work together to build your substrate so you can keep making those shiitakes, porcinis, stinkhorns, inky caps, puffballs, lion’s manes…ok, I think you get the point.

My goal is to help my clients fund their projects, invigorate their audiences, and strengthen their communities. I’m looking forward to the possibility of working with you!

You can book a free 15-minute discovery call to talk about your needs here.

How I work

I’m an introvert who loves a good conversation. I love to meet with my clients for focused bursts via video chat or in person when possible to set priorities, generate ideas, and gather information. Then I work on my own to digest those ideas, and distill them into clear and compelling language for grant applications and other documents. I share drafts with clients and make revisions using their feedback, ultimately arriving at a final version that meets our objectives.

I send organized and clear messages to clients with all requests gathered into one document in order to avoid interrupting their concentration. I don’t answer phone calls or emails on weekends or evenings in general, and don’t expect my clients to either. However, I’m happy to schedule times to talk on evenings or weekends if needed with advance notice. 

I use project management software to organize my work, and work with my clients to integrate them into my systems or their systems. When I have all the information I need, I can write a proposal very quickly, especially compared to those who are inexperienced or uncomfortable with grant writing. Clients will find this can be less expensive than hiring a full-time employee, and provide better results that are tailored to your goals.

I now live in Viroqua, Wisconsin, and frequently travel to Portland, Oregon and other locations as needed. I work with clients most often via video chat.

Substrate Arts Consulting is a Business Affiliate Member of Nonprofit Association of Oregon, and a member of Grant Professionals of America.