Hip Hop Artist Ekknowledge performs during a folk arts showcase at the Little Loomhouse during KY RUX 2023. Photo credit: M. Tyler McDaniel.
The Rural-Urban Exchange (RUX) was founded in Kentucky in 2014 by Savannah Barrett and Josh May as a partnership of Art of the Rural and Appalshop. RUX is guided by our core values, and is supported by a distributed leadership structure through a statewide Steering Committee and dozens of local, regional, and statewide partners.
In Kentucky, RUX has hosted ten cohorts in 29 community intensives across 18 host communities. After a two-year learning exchange and technical assistance process between Kentuckians and Minnesotans, MN RUX was piloted in 2022-2023 and hosted in St. Paul, Mahnomen County, Winona County, and across the White Earth Nation.
The RUX network now includes 400 Kentuckians from 88 counties and 32 Minnesotans from 16 counties and Native Nations. These alumni are artists, educators, farmers, attorneys, factory workers, bankers, nurses, elected officials, small business owners, retirees, and more. RUX connects them through a network of deep relationships that bridges cultures, expands social capital, and unites diverse leaders towards a common vision.
RUX is grateful for ongoing support from Appalshop, the W. L. Lyons Brown Foundation, Kentucky Arts Council, The Foundation for Appalachian Kentucky, Fund for the Arts, Kentucky Foundation for Women, Kentucky Waterways Alliance, Kentucky Performing Arts, Louisville Public Media, the Greater Clark Foundation, the Devou Good Foundation, the Snowy Owl Foundation, the Lawrence & Augusta Hager Educational Foundation, Owensboro Health, Partners for Rural Impact, and the Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute at the University of Louisville, in addition to many individual sponsors and donors.
Meet KY RUX's 2024 microgrant recipients from the Artists Respond and Intercultural Microgrant programs.
Hear from 10 years of Kentucky Rural-Urban Exchange alumni, partners, and supporters, and learn about this nationally celebrated program's approach and impact.
External website for the Kentucky Rural-Urban Exchange (KY RUX), including blog updates and announcements about the program, cohort, and upcoming events & opportunities.
External website for the Minnesota Rural-Urban Exchange (MN RUX), including information about the program, cohort, and upcoming events & opportunities.
From the Rural-Urban Exchange and Bridging Network, read this field scan of civic innovation across Kentucky.
Check out this feature in The New York Times about the Rural-Urban Exchange and bipartisan division.
Hear about the program from our cohort members from throughout RUX's first decade.
A guide to the RUX approach and results in bridging difference & distance across the state of Kentucky.
An overview of MN RUX’s first year and first cohort, with two Community Intensives in Rondo and Frogtown in St. Paul, and in Mahnomen and the White Earth Nation.
A statewide film series celebrating racial justice actions in rural Kentucky.
RUX is featured in Issue 8 of FORWARD magazine, celebrating RUX among an international slate of organizations connecting arts and civic engagement.
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