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The Leeway Foundation announces $42,500 in support to 17 individual artists and cultural producers focused in community and cultural preservation for Spring 2020.
Today, the Leeway Foundation announced $42,500 in funding for 17 individual women, trans* and gender nonconforming artists and cultural producers in Greater Philadelphia, supporting their work to address a range of social change issues.
The spring cycle of grantees highlights a trend in cultural preservation and disability justice with grantees from Philadelphia, Bucks, and Delaware County. In the wake of COVID-19, it is imperative to continue to support artists and activists in the Greater Philadelphia region in a way that is flexible and supportive of individual needs. This round of grantees has the ability to use funds to support their work and to address immediate needs as a result of COVID-19.
Leeway's Art and Change Grant provides grants of up to $2,500 to fund art for social change projects by women and trans* artists and cultural producers living in Greater Philadelphia.
Full press release available here.
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For more information about the Art and Change Grant join Leeway for a Facebook Live Information Session on Wednesday, May 27 5pm-6pm. Program Director, Melissa Hamilton, will provide an overview of Leeway''s grants and awards.
Direct link HERE: bit.ly/InfoSessionMay27
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2020 ART AND CHANGE GRANTEES
Visit all grantee profiles at leeway.org/grantees
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Andrea will create the Museum of Black Joy, an ongoing visual journal of non-traumatic black life in Philadelphia and beyond. Begun on Jan 1, 2020, and continuing indefinitely, the project will move through several phases over the course of 2 years and be presented in ongoing exhibitions in traditional and non-traditional settings and, ultimately, presented in book form. Read more.
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Arielle will create Hollers/Breaks and Intercessions, a writing and performance gathering circle for elders in Black churches to come together to develop and embody prayers for black freedoms. Read more.
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For LGBTQ History Month, Briyana will produce and direct an accessible, family-friendly LGBTQ sketch comedy show written, performed, and crewed by an all-LGBTQ team with priority given to people of color, trans, and non-binary folks. Local mission-aligned LGBTQ businesses and organizations will vend and share resources at each performance. Read more.
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Cherry H. will produce a two-day video art festival, in conjunction with her video art label, Krissy Talking Pictures. Krissy Talking Pictures is an alternative to art institutions that showcases the work of queer artists in Philadelphia and creates space for video watching and sharing through monthly multimedia events. Dedicated to exploring video as an artistic medium and a tool for expression, the festival will feature screenings, live performances, and a video making workshop. Led by a queer Philadelphia video artist, the workshop will provide free access to technical knowledge. Read more.
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Daria will create "Come From A Coal Town", a research, recovery, singing, songwriting, and recording project that brings to light the details of her Slavic grandparents' lives in the Anthracite coalfields as immigrant poor. This project seeks to bring them back into existence in the collective consciousness through music and the creation of documentary and teaching materials. Read more.
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Debbie will create a short documentary film that gives a personal account of the 1978 confrontation between Move and Philadelphia officials. In this short film, the first two members of the Move 9 released after serving 40-years of their 30 to 100-year sentences, Debbie and Michael Davis Sr. also known as Debbie and Mike Africa share their truth about the MOVE legacy. Read more.
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Elena's Smile4Kime is a collaborative documentary portrait that explores friendship and intimacy through the lens of race, gender, and mental illness. Kime and Elena cook meals together, write each other letters, and show up for each other in moments of crisis. After Kime''s passing, their connection transforms into dreams, memories, and apparitions, which Elena experiences as she moves through the grieving. Read more.
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Erlina is the lead organizer and director of Nuestras Historias/ Our Stories, a multicultural children''s theatre festival in North Philadelphia. Five teams of two collaborators with Erlina as curator, will explore the folk tales and myths of North Philly's diasporas and perform original stories for the children of Norris Square Park and their adults. Read more.
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Jasmine has partnered with local high schools to spearhead an expanding youth program and culminating theater production for students of color who are at risk of failing. Participants will join year-long poetry, acting, and modeling clubs in which they explore historical figures and movements. The program ends with an annual student and staff written multi-disciplinary arts production entitled Stay Woke. Read more.
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Jennifer's project is an illustrated children''s book about Lewy Body Dementia (LBD). Grandpa & Lewy is a story of hope and empowerment that addresses some of the symptoms that LBD patients face and how a child might help a loved one dealing with the disease. It will be an ebook that is offered to the LBD Community for free. Read more.
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Julia in collaboration with Educators for Consent Culture (ECC) and other partners, will facilitate a series of virtual and in-person workshops exploring consent, boundaries, and what authentic yeses and nos feel like in our bodies through writing and art. In cooperation with participants, Julia will create a series of cut paper pieces to amplify the words and feelings they share and to inspire others to define and assert their own boundaries. Read more.
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Maria along with Larawan, will juxtapose historical, mythical, and personal images of stories from the Filipino oral tradition with freshly staged and studio photographs. From these photos she will create color-coded multi-narrative collaged prints, a process that both reveals and obscures multiple stories, highlighting and proposing alternatives to systemic representations of colonial narratives. Read more.
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Misty will create The Black Vernacular, a three-day mini-festival that celebrates traditional African American art including, gardening, quilting, assemblage (yard art), a bottle tree, healthy traditional foods, spirituals, and dramatic readings from the works of Zora Neale Hurston. There will be make-and-take hand sewing, activities, garden activities, performances, and visual art provided by local artists. Read more.
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Nava's project is a book of poetry about the experience of becoming suddenly and permanently disabled, the impact of capitalism on healing, and what it feels like to realize she was something the state despises in a new way. Read more.
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Rachelle's visual arts mapping project shows how Black people have resisted forced removal from their communities by preserving the traditional cultural practice of "posting up on the block". Black youth will take their own "Street View" images and layer them with historical photographs taken in the same spaces. The images will be added to a website that photomaps black Philadelphia. Read more.
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Sage will create non-binary Blk, a seven-part documentary series that will showcase seven black dark skin, non-binary individuals. This project will bring awareness to how unique non-binary experiences are and colorism that impacts how non-binary experiences are defined and valued. Read more.
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Sound Museum Collective's project will archive and exhibit research into radio technology and how it is embedded in queer histories. Through workshops, they will explore potential futures with radio technology to create art that investigates liminal spaces of sound and draws into the intersectionalities of their sonic and cultural identities. Read more.
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As the impact of COVID-19 is felt throughout our region, the necessity of immediate, no-strings-attached funds for individual artists has become clear-particularly for women, trans, and gender nonconforming artists and cultural producers. The Window of Opportunity (WOO) Relief Fund has distributed unrestricted grants, up to $1,000, to Leeway grant and award recipients experiencing financial hardship from loss of income and creative opportunities as a direct result of the COVID-19 crisis.
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