Mission
Grit Fund awards money to collaborative, artist-led projects—up to $10,000. We accept proposals that use the visual arts to create collaborative public-facing projects.
Artists and cultural organizers create vital connections within our communities. But it can be difficult to find funding to create, collaborate, and make an impact. Grit Fund makes arts funding accessible for everyone. We focus on projects that bring artists and community members together to explore a sense of place and shared space.
Grit Fund eligibility requirements
- Collaborative projects led by visual and performing artists, cultural organizers, collectives, collaboratives, and/or artist-run spaces.
- You must be independent (or unincorporated). In other words, you can’t be registered as a business or organization.
- Only Baltimore City and Baltimore County based artists and organizers are eligible.
- Your project must take place in Baltimore City or County and be accessible to the general public.
We support all kinds of visual-arts-based projects at any stage of development. Innovative ideas are welcome. These are the types of projects we’ve supported in the past:
- Exhibitions
- Publications
- Public events
- Public art installations
- Film screenings
- Festivals
- Founding a new arts venue or collective
- The ongoing work of an existing arts venue or collective
Grit Fund Values…
Our values are a set of principles shared by all the projects we support. These are the values we look for when we review proposals:
Collaboration
Collaboration: the process of two or more people working together to make decisions. This means multiple people come together to share ideas, power, and authorship for the project.
Accessibility
Accessibility: the practice of prioritizing public access and valuing the participation and inclusion of disabled audiences. We’re looking for work that is developed with inclusive design principles.
Feasibility
The creative work achieves sustained resonance, impact, or value. The work is memorable and creates the potential for the audience’s consciousness, attitude, body, actions, etc. to be positively impacted.
Risk-taking
Risk-taking: subverting dominant values, narratives, or aesthetics through creative decision-making.
Cultural Integrity
Cultural integrity: a commitment to the ethical use of material with specific cultural origins and context. When we evaluate projects for cultural integrity, we ask questions like:
- What is the relationship between the backgrounds of the artists and organizers to the cultural context, topics, traditions, and community at the center of the work?
- How was the project or work of art conceived and developed?
- Does the work show an awareness and understanding of cultural values and forms (cultural competence)?
- How does the work involve stakeholders, and how might they experience the work?
History
Grit Fund was established in Baltimore in 2015 by The Contemporary (TC) with generous funding from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, as a part of the Regional Regranting Program—which “aims to support vibrant, under-the-radar artistic activity by partnering with leading cultural institutions in communities across the country.”
Since 2015, Baltimore’s artists have found support for their projects through Grit Fund. Ranging from out-of-school time programs that connect our youth to STEAM opportunities, and art-meets-journalism projects that communicate hidden stories of Black Baltimore, to community festivals that recapture and remind us of the strength of our city’s diversity, Grit Fund has been a dynamic, accessible, and much needed funding source in Baltimore City. Ever responsive to the community it serves, Grit Fund pivoted in 2020 to offering need-based support to artists.