Professional Artist Collaborative Grants
Grant Summary
Creative Pinellas received a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Grants for Arts Projects award. Creative Pinellas will subgrant $10,000 directly to each of the 10 professional artists who will collaborate/partner with a non-profit art, social service, health, community, or environmental organization in Pinellas County, or actively serve the Pinellas County area, to bring the project to life.
The selected arts projects are intended to:
- Enhance the arts & cultural offerings in Pinellas County
- Create public projects that inspire innovative community solutions
- Contribute to cultural economic development
- Grow audiences and build new audiences through effective outreach & marketing
The 10 grants of $10K each will be awarded for creating projects that will improve the lives of people living, working, and visiting Pinellas County through art and creativity, using a community engagement project that acts as a connector between people, community and locations. Specifically, we will look for projects that are:
- collaborations with multiple artists or organizations or
- that partner with artists or organizations from historically under-resourced communities in Pinellas Counties, or
- that create a sustainable model that can be replicated and adapted for use in other communities throughout the United States
In addition to the $10K awarded, two awardees may be eligible for an additional $5K bonus award for transformative projects that go above and beyond for art projects:
- Intended to address historical or systemic inequities
- Expected outcomes/improvements in reaching diverse audiences
- Sustainable community engagement and/or collaboration
This grant program can support community engagement projects in the visual arts,
dance, music, theater, opera, presenting & multidisciplinary arts, literature, film or multimedia, and is designed to connect artists with cultural and social service organizations already delivering high-quality services.
Successful projects are transformative, collaborative and provide tangible outcomes in the areas of health & wellbeing (including behavioral health), education, community engagement, making art more accessible, environmental activities and action, the creative economy and placemaking.
Successful projects will also connect with a key nonprofit partner who is providing services or benefits to the community.
Project examples include multi-sector collaboration, performances, exhibitions, workshops, convenings/conferences, special events, creative products, teaching guides, and/or
creation of interactive artwork – with a tangible outcome.
CHANGEMAKING – BEYOND PLACEMAKING
Beyond Placemaking supports projects that advance access and cultural equity, foster change, and transformation, and demonstrate responsiveness and impact.
We would like artists to initiate arts projects that inspire and empower people, ideas, information exchange, organizations, and relationships – transformational projects that help change the way someone might think about a place and a community.
These transformational professional artist grants can support a work in progress or a bold new idea, resulting in measurable solutions to identified community problems. Projects can address things like transportation, mental health, physical health, community connectedness, education – math, literacy, ESL, or arts & technology, the environment, housing, well-being for artists, accessibility, and more. Artistic engagement can include music, theater, puppet theater, dance, visual arts, public art, convenings, conferences, exhibitions, and much more.
We encourage you to apply if you are a professional artist who:
- is a resident of Pinellas County
- has an art for social change project or opportunity that impacts a group, audience, or community
- is working with or can work with a “Change Partner” (a nonprofit organization located in or serving Pinellas County) in a mutually agreed upon way that is both consistent with the project and in alignment with the organization’s mission
“The NEA supports a wide range of projects that “enrich our lives and contribute to healthy and thriving communities,” says NEA Chair Maria Rosario Jackson, Ph.D.. “These organizations play an important role in advancing the creative vitality of our nation and helping to ensure that all people can benefit from arts, culture and design.”
Project Timeline
- October 17, 2023 – Guidelines and application announcement
- December 15, 2023 – Application Deadline
- December 15- January 15, 2024 – Panel Convening
- January 15-19, 2024 – Panel Review Meeting
- January 22, 2024 – Notification & Media Announcement
- January 29, 2024 – Earliest start date
- Subgrant Project Period: January 29, 2024 – December 18, 2024
- Creative Pinellas Project end date: February 28, 2025
Community
Our subgrant application calls for community engagement. Each of the 10 subgrantees’ arts projects will be engaging a different community in different ways. Creative Pinellas’ role is to select the projects that provide the most effective community involvement. We would really like to see/find/inspire something truly transformative and sustainable.
Pinellas County’s population is 75% White, 10% Black, 9% Hispanic, and 3% Asian. South Petersburg has the most Black residents, followed by Clearwater, Tarpon Springs, and Largo. St. Petersburg, Clearwater, and Largo also have the largest Hispanic populations in Pinellas County, and St. Petersburg, Lealman, and Pinellas Park have the largest Asian populations. Each of these communities has been identified as having high poverty/economic risk areas. Transformational arts projects are especially important to these economically and transportation-challenged areas of our county.
Pinellas County’s broad and diverse arts and cultural community will be targeted for applications, including 652 individual artists. Our 108 cultural organizations and numerous Social Service organizations will also be targeted for potential partnerships with the artists.
This program is intended to build/enhance audiences and community participation through the arts.
We have a Community Outreach Coordinator who will help subgrantees with ways to engage more effectively. Additionally, our project partners can help find and bridge more diversity.
Creative Pinellas is looking for out-of-the-box, exemplary projects that dive into making a positive change on the issues that have held our community back. We want to find and fund projects that can unify, heal and celebrate our communities. For example: one organization in the county is trying to educate young people on the value of a non-violent lifestyle. Another example is an artist who established an educational program to teach the visually impaired how to create a visual art curriculum and published a book in Braille.
Art for Social Change
Art for social change is art with a vision and an intention, and the ability to make positive change. It is an artistic or creative cultural practice that can be traditional or nontraditional. It is interactive, engaging people in the world they are a part of.
Art with a vision impacts people in many ways. It can:
- Raise consciousness
- Alter how we think about ourselves, our society, or our culture
- Create a vision of a more just world
- Be a tool or strategy for organizing and movement-building
- Preserve or reclaim traditional cultural practices using your artistic practice as a form of resistance or empowerment
- Create space for expression and build a sense of community
- Shift or transform the perception of justice, equality, and/or accountability
- Value healing practices focused on strengthening communities, not just individuals
- Engage and utilize a reciprocal process — where there is simultaneous teaching and learning, and the consent for engagement is mutual, as is the benefit for yourself as an artist and the community you are engaging with.
