Grants in Film and Music.

Deadline: September 7, 2012
MacArthur Foundation Announces Open Call for Documentary Film Proposals

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation's Media, Culture, and Special Initiatives program supports the production and distribution of social-issue documentary films that address important contemporary topics and are intended for a broad audience, particularly in the United States. The program seeks to fund documentary projects that address the significant social challenges of our time or explore important but under-reported topics.

Applicants may request any funding amount, but the typical grant range is between $50,000 and $200,000. In each round of funding, the foundation is able to support eight to twelve projects.
 Link to Complete RFP

Deadline: October 1, 2012 
Grammy Foundation Accepting Letters of Inquiry for 2012-13 Grants in Music Research and Preservation Projects 

Funded by the Recording Academy, the Grammy Foundation's grant program annually provides support for music archiving and preservation efforts and for scientific research projects related to the impact of music on the human condition. The scientific research projects grant program awards funding of up to $20,000 to organizations and individuals working to research the impact of music on the human condition. Examples include the study of the effects of music on mood, cognition, and healing; the medical and occupational well-being of music professionals; and the creative process underlying music. Priority will be given to projects with strong methodological design as well those designed to address an important research question.
 Full RFP here.

Deadline: November 5, 2012
Tribeca Film Institute Announces Guidelines for Documentary Fund

The Tribeca Film Institute Documentary Fund provides grants and guidance to exceptional filmmakers with character-driven nonfiction works-in-progress that sit outside of the social issue landscape. By supporting work that engages in unexplored perspectives, the fund aims to help take audiences into someone else's environment and spotlight the journey of the individual.

Grants of at least $10,000 will be awarded. The program will accept submissions beginning September 5, 2012, and close November 5, 2012.
Visit the TFI Web site for complete program guidelines and submission requirements.


  

Community Foundation Arts Grants, Sept 15.

The following Community Foundation arts grants have a September 15 deadline. Information about these, and other opportunities can be found at the Community foundation grants page. 

The Belvedere Historic Preservation Fund
Maximum grant size: $22,000
The Belvedere Historic Preservation Fundin partnership with Maine Historic Preservation Commission’s New Century Grant Program, is offering grants to support the preservation or restoration of historic buildings, primarily in Washington and Hancock Counties and in under-resourced rural communities in other parts of the state. The grant program focuses on the preservation and reuse of historic buildings that serve as civic, cultural, or economic hubs for communities. Grants will primarily be focused on capital projects.

Maine Expansion Arts Fund
Maximum grant size: $5,000
The Maine Expansion Arts Fund is the result of a collaborative effort of the National Endowment for the Arts, Lillian M. Berliawsky Charitable Trust, Maine Community Foundation, and Maine Arts Commission to strengthen and ensure the future of these artistic traditions. A permanent endowed fund held by the Maine Community Foundation, the Maine Expansion Arts Fund supports indigenous, ethnic, or rural arts programs or projects, particularly those that serve areas with limited access to arts events. Additional funding is provided through the Elizabeth Laughlin Anderson Memorial Fund at the Maine Community Foundation. The Maine Expansion Arts Committee seeks to support indigenous, ethnic, or rural arts programs or projects, particularly those that serve areas with limited access to arts events.

Maine Theater Fund 
Maximum grant size: $5,000 
Recognizing the connection between vibrant communities and support for the arts, in 2005 an anonymous couple established the Maine Theater Fund at the Maine Community Foundation. The goal of the fund is to strengthen and sustain theater performance throughout the state. Awards are typically between $2,500 and $5,000, although larger awards may be considered. The Maine Theater Fund is designed to support professional and community theaters in the production and presentation of live theater. Theaters whose main purpose is to present social messaging and/or health and wellness education will not be considered for funding. Proposals for funding will be accepted from local, regional and statewide nonprofit theaters or theater groups in Maine whose primary purpose is the production of live theater. Funds will be awarded for programmatic, capacity-building, operating, and capital support.

 

NEFA, Touring Grant Deadline Sept 4

New England States Touring (NEST) provides support to New England-based nonprofit organizations (presenters) for performances and community activities by select New England performing artists. NEST support is primarily designed to support presentations of New England-based artists from outside of the presenter’s state.

Any nonprofit, school, or government entity based in New England (Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont) is eligible to apply for NEST funding. The nonprofit organization does not need to be an arts organization. An organization that does not have a federal tax identification number may apply as long as it is part of an official government agency.

NEST artists are performing artists from New England who meet the NEST Artist Requirements on MatchBook.org. They represent a wide range of disciplines, such as music, dance, opera, musical theater, poetry, writing, storytelling, interdisciplinary work, and folk arts, must be available for public performances, and maintain a permanent residence in New England.

Next Deadline September 4, 2012
More information can be found on the NEFA site.

NEA Placemaking Grant and Webinars (Grant Deadline August 9)

National Endowment for the Arts: Art Works Design Grants. Funding typically ranges from $10,000 to $100,000.

The application deadline for all design projects is August 9, 2012. The earliest beginning date for the Arts Endowment's period of support is June 1, 2013.

The Art Works category provides support for projects that address the following outcomes:

• Creation: The creation of art that meets the highest standards of excellence
• Engagement: Public engagement with diverse and excellent art
• Learning: Lifelong learning in the arts 
• Livability: The strengthening of communities through the arts

Also from the Endowment: NEA, webinars on creative placemaking about current trends, challenges and policies in the field will take place at 4pm EST and feature panelists that served on the Our Town review panel.

July 24: Creative Placemaking through Design and Cultural Planning
July 31: Creative Placemaking through Arts Engagement

To join a webinar: http://www.arts.gov/national/ourtown/2012-discussion-webinars.html
Grant Guidelines: http://arts.gov/grants/apply/GAP13/DesignAW.html
How to Apply: http://www.arts.gov/grants/apply/GAP13/DesignAW2.html

Questions: Contact Jen Hughes, Design Specialist, hughesj@arts.gov or 202.682.5547

The Innovation Lab for the Performing Arts Grant

Round 7 of The Innovation Lab for the Performing Arts, designed and managed by EmcArts, with the generous support of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. The Lab is a 12-month program that helps performing arts organizations incubate and test innovative strategies to address major adaptive challenges.

The Round 7 Application deadline is Thursday, August 9, 2012.

Most arts institutions operate using constantly stretched resources and consequently struggle to implement truly new ideas. At the same time, however, the capacity of American arts organizations to innovate—to find new pathways to mission fulfillment that are discontinuous from previous practice and that result from shifts in underlying organizational assumptions—is and will be a leading indicator of sustained marketplace success and viability.

The Innovation Lab was designed to serve as a catalyst for the journey to these new pathways: to help arts organizations challenge core operating assumptions, engage in intense planning on a practical innovation project, create a sense of organization-wide investment in change, and test innovative strategies with grants that help organizations prototype new practices.

Click to download the Round 7 Request for Proposals and the Press Release! MORE INFO HERE.

For clarification about the Lab program as a whole, please contact Liz Dreyer (ldreyer@emcarts.org), preferably by e-mail, and she will answer your questions.

Grant Opportunity for Maine's Cultural Venues

Tourism Cares is offering nonprofit, tax-exempt public charities the opportunity to submit letters of inquiry for projects to conserve, preserve, or restore a site, and/or educate visitors. Funding requests may include brick-and-mortar capital improvement projects or educational programs that enhance interpretation of the site.

The site for which an organization is requesting funding must be a tourism-related site with actual visitation (not projected future visitation) and must be a cultural, historic, or natural site of exceptional significance, defined as "critical to the interpretation of the local area, or essential to the maintenance of the history or culture of local indigenous peoples."

Organization must be classified as a nonprofit 501(c)(3) public charity, or be a federally recognized American Indian or Alaska Native tribe. Up to six grants of up to $10,000 will be provided through this round of funding. Visit the Tourism Cares Web site for complete program guidelines, application procedures, and the letter of inquiry form.

innOvation Grant for Arts in Communities

As part of its effort to recognize the role artists play in revitalizing their communities, Ovation television network has partnered with Americans for the Arts to launch a national grant program, innOVATION.
 This year's program will award three grants of $25,000, two grants of $10,000, and one viewers' choice award of $15,000.

Inspired by the community-revitalization effort documented in the network's recent original series Motor City Rising, the innOVATION Grant Program is designed to highlight similar stories of arts-focused, neighborhood-renewal initiatives in the United States and provide support to model projects.

To be eligible, applicants must be Americans for the Arts organizational members and must be nominated by an elected community official (mayor, county executive, etc.). Applicants' community-revitalization programs must focus on the arts and have a demonstrated record of success. Only one submission per community will be accepted. Grant recipients will be selected based on their creative, economic, and social impact, as well as their ability to pool public, private, nonprofit, and community efforts to improve and enhance a specific region through arts and culture.

 For complete innOVATION grant program guidelines and application procedures, as well as information on becoming an Americans for the Arts organizational member, visit the Americans for the Arts web site.

ARTSIPELAGO is Awarded ArtPlace Grant

ArtPlace releases 47 grants supporting creative placemaking initiatives in 33 communities nationwide

ARTSIPELAGO, a comprehensive community revitalization strategy that bets on art as the centerpiece of a comeback in rural Eastern Maine, has been given a significant vote of support in the form of a $250,000 grant from ArtPlace.

The Tides Institute & Museum of Art in Eastport, Maine, the organizing force behind the program, will leverage related arts and cultural initiatives by linking and expanding them in transformative and revitalizing ways. The group hopes to sharpen the region’s image as a distinctive destination for both residents and travelers. This is the first ArtPlace award in the state of Maine and one of only two in New England this year.

ARTSIPELAGO transcends two countries and a multitude of islands, peninsulas, communities and cultures. The project involves the creation of a new arts and cultural passport, and year round guide to this international border region — featuring artist studios, cultural centers, ferries, films, and festivals to local foods, lighthouses, music, parks, theater and more. In addition, arts performances, workshops and demonstrations will be integrated throughout downtowns during the region’s festivals. Funding will also support the establishment of a downtown regional StudioWorks facility linking artist residencies, students, and communities.

ArtPlace is a new national collaboration of 11 major national and regional foundations, six of the nation’s largest banks, and eight federal agencies, including the National Endowment for the Arts, to accelerate creative placemaking across the U.S. To date, ArtPlace has raised almost $50 million to work alongside federal and local governments to transform communities with strategic investments in the arts.

"Across the country, cities and towns are using the arts to help shape their social, physical, and economic characters," said NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman. "The arts are a part of everyday life, and I am thrilled to see yet another example of an arts organization working with city, state, and federal offices to help strengthen and revitalize their communities through the arts. It is wonderful that ArtPlace and its funders have recognized this work and invested in it so generously."

A complete list of this year’s ArtPlace awards can be found at artplaceamerica.org.