Print Sales to Non-Profits

GRFA offers a unique opportunity for other non-profits by allowing them to purchase a signed silkscreen print of our choice for their fundraising event for $500. (Limited to one print per year per organization).

These prints are specifically designed as a fundraising vehicle for non-profits to raffle or auction directly to their supporters. They are not for sale in any Rodrigue Gallery or elsewhere to the general public. These prints are highly collectible and even priceless, because they are only accessible to the general public through a donation to a non-profit organization.

In the past two years, similar prints have raised thousands of dollars at fund-raising events. However, if the print you purchase does not provide your organization with funds exceeding your original $500 investment, GRFA will accept the print’s return and refund your $500.

History of Relief Efforts

Blue Dog Relief began on September 11th, 2001, when Rodrigue created God Bless America in response to the tragic events of that day. The edition of one thousand prints sold out within weeks, raising $500,000 for the American Red Cross. This experience clarified for Rodrigue how he could sell his artwork to benefit causes important to him.

Perhaps foreshadowing GRFA, Rodrigue designed Honesty in 2003, raising $350,000 for the International Child Art Foundation. With ICAF he hosted a week long workshop for children from one hundred countries and all fifty states on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Together these children of varying languages and backgrounds created a “Pyramid of Peace,” using art as the international language.

But it was following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in August 2005 that Blue Dog Relief moved to the top of Rodrigue’s priority list. With the prints We Will Rise Again, You Can’t Drown the Blues, Throw Me Something F.E.M.A., and We Are Marching Again, Rodrigue raised $1.5 million for the Southeast Louisiana Chapter of the Red Cross, the New Orleans Museum of Art, the United Way, the Brees Dream Foundation (pictured) and countless smaller non-profits.

To date, George Rodrigue’s relief efforts, combined with the enthusiasm and generosity of his collectors, have raised $2.5 million towards helping our world. With the George Rodrigue Foundation of the Arts, Rodrigue embarks on a new mission to focus primarily on child development through the visual arts.

George Rodrigue Foundation

In 2009, George Rodrigue formed GRFA as a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization. In addition to providing financial assistance in the arts and other areas, GRFA will plan, develop, and implement a series of unique educational art programs that are specially designed to enhance and expand art curriculums, despite continuing state and federal cutbacks.

GRFA Objective

Student success at any age depends on self-confidence, specifically the belief in one’s own ability to walk on the moon, or fight fires, or raise a family, or perform on Broadway. Research proves that personal growth benefits from creative expression and that artistic accomplishment provides students the self-esteem needed for success in all areas of life. However, due to budget shortfalls and misperceptions, schools find it increasingly difficult to incorporate art in education.

George Rodrigue wants to reverse this trend. As a young boy he dreamed of being an artist, and as an adult he credits the support of his parents and teachers with helping him realize that dream.

Over the years, Rodrigue has assisted numerous non-profits, not only in the arts, but also humanitarian organizations, disaster relief, animal welfare and others. But today, although not entirely abandoning other worthwhile causes, his primary focus is to expose children to education in the visual arts, hoping to inspire in others an early and on-going creative passion similar to his own.

GRFA Mission

The George Rodrigue Foundation of the Arts (GRFA) advocates the importance of the visual arts in the development of our youth. GRFA encourages the use of art within all curriculums and supports a variety of art educational programs.