The 2026 A-Corp Annual Letter

View this on the Artist Corporations website

There was a conversation last March when this project truly sparked to life.

Myself, a collaborator, and a group of lawyers were doing a Zoom call with an accomplished theater director. Not long before, she had gone through hell and a lot of money trying to create a legal structure for a new project. Eventually she found lawyers to make her a custom solution, but it continued to be an administrative and financial burden.

We listened to her story and asked lots of questions. Then we shared the idea for the A-Corp and what it would do. She was excited that a group of people were working on this. With an A-Corp, she said, next time she could get the structure she needed without lawyers and all the hassle.

The call ended with something I’ll never forget. As the Zoom window closed, I heard her voice call out. “Go get ‘em!” she said.

That was one of many dozens of conversations we had with artists last year that helped shape this project. Those discussions revealed how big the gap is between how the public values creative work and the economic power that lives with the people who make it. 

But that gap isn’t permanent or fated. That gap is structural and changeable. 

Here's what we're doing to change it.

What we did in 2025

Our work on Artist Corporations started in 2024. In 2025 that work became public. We introduced the Artist Corporation, which proposes:

• A new legal form designed specifically for creative people and artistic purposes
• An understandable structure that reflects how creative people operate
• Access to multiple forms of revenue and income sources
• Collective ownership including shares, and sophisticated tools for owning intellectual property
• Protection of creative control and decision making
• A path to better health care for creative people

Much of this is possible if you hire the right lawyers, as we’ve heard. The A-Corp establishes this as a preset form accessible and affordable to anyone.

Establishing this as a public good means passing laws. For most of last year, that’s what we focused on. We made a lot of progress. We:

• Focused on building a coalition for an A-Corp law in Colorado
• Made four trips there to meet with arts, business, and political leaders
• Built relationships with arts groups, the Governor's office, and other stakeholders
• Worked with lawyers to draft legislation that creates the A-Corp
• Hired an economist to complete a fiscal and economic analysis of the proposal 
• Secured a bill sponsor in the Colorado Senate

This behind the scenes, coalition-building work sets the stage for a more public profile in 2026.

What we’re doing in 2026

In 2026, we expect the Artist Corporation Act, the bill to make A-Corps a new corporate legal type, will be introduced as legislation in at least one US state.

A bill is not a guarantee that there will be a law. There’s a process to go through: hearings, debate, people from all sides weighing in. We embrace this process, and are eager to engage. We want to pass legislation that actually works, and that has a broad base of support. 

Bills based on the Colorado legislation are going into motion in other states as well. There’s widespread interest among policymakers in creating systematic economic support for creative communities. They understand that culture is what differentiates places people love from places people will never know.

Passing this law will continue to be this project’s primary focus in 2026. We’ll be asking you and the wider creative community to help us show to lawmakers how important creative work is. More to come on that front.

But a law alone doesn't close the gap. We're also building the infrastructure creative people need to actually use these new structures — from administrative proposals that make artists legible to policymakers, to dashboards that help any creative person see and shape the financial and legal structure of their work. More on this as it develops.

A long-term vision

This stuff is not overnight. Even if every one of our 2026 initiatives is successful, we do not expect instant change. We expect something subtle at first, but significant as it builds. While structural changes take time, they can produce huge outcomes.

When we imagine a world where A-Corps take hold, we see transformational change. Even to capitalism itself.

Today we associate capitalism with the C-Corp economy. The corporate focus on profit maximization. Companies deprioritizing employees, the public, and anything else to increase how much money they make.

The A-Corp economy will be different. Creative people aren’t wired that way. Yes we want to provide for ourselves. Yes we want to earn what we deserve from our work. But our motivations are different.

There’s a Virgil Abloh quote from the end of his life that puts it perfectly: 

"I have realized one thing at the end: it's all worth nothing compared to the freedom to express the next idea." 

This is what creative people are about: making another one. Doing it without going broke. Fairly paying the people we work with. Then doing it again.

The C-Corp economy exists to maximize shareholder value. 

The A-Corp economy exists to maximize the freedom to make another one. 

It sounds small but it’s significant. Consumers will face a choice between the kind of world they want to see: one of value extraction, which C-Corps continue to perfect, or one of creative manifestation, which A-Corps exist to manifest.

Over time, the A-Corp economy will start to compete with the C-Corp economy. A competition between mindsets and senses of value. A frontier where creative people, creative motivations, and creative visions have real advantages over the financially obsessed status quo.

As this goes on, creative people will become better resourced. We will build and become participants in mutually supportive networks. We will grow into a social and political force of our own.

We’re already many

None of this happens alone. 

More than 4,000 artists and creators have signed up to become an A-Corp. Hundreds of thousands have watched the TED talk and are following along. 

This year we hope to welcome many more.

In late 2025 we made the Artist Corporations Foundation — a 501c3 nonprofit dedicated to building economic power for creative people. I'm serving as Executive Director alongside Managing Director Lena Imamura, a working artist, with a board that includes Jennifer Arceneaux and Mikael Moore, CEO of Wondaland and manager of Janelle Monáe. We'll share more about our institutional supporters and the creative coalition we're building soon.

Last year the work began. This year the work will grow.

The TED talk closed with a line that back then was hopeful. Now it’s starting to feel real.

Artists don't need pity. Artists need power. Together, we're going to build it.

Let's go get 'em.

Yancey Strickler
The Artist Corporations Foundation