Nominations open for Master-Apprentice Artist Award Program 2024

The Master-Apprentice Artist Award provides direct support for master traditional artists living in Arizona to pass on art, culture, and heritage practices to apprentice learners. Donor Name: Southwest Folklife Alliance (SFA) State: Arizona County: All Counties Type of Grant: Awards and Prizes Deadline: 05/15/2024 Size of the Grant: $1000 to $10,000 Grant Duration: Grant Duration Not Mentioned Details: The goal of this award is to strengthen the transmission of community-based traditions throughout the Southwestern United States. This award supports a master artist or tradition bearer to work with a qualified apprentice to engage in a teaching-learning relationship that includes one-onone mentorship and hands-on experience. Funds can be used to help cover artist fees, offset costs of raw materials, and support any travel essential to the exchange. Traditional master artists and culture bearers receive $5,000; apprentices receive $500. Artists are first nominated by peers within their community, cultural institutions, apprentices, or by self-nomination. SFA determines which artists are invited to full application, based on their mastery of an art form, their ability to describe how that form has been recognized by their cultural community, and their ability to share traditional knowledge. Applicants include a wide variety of artists, including those working in traditions including, but not limited to:  Handcrafts: weavers, basket makers, jewelers, makers of masks, ritual objects, textiles  Occupational folklife: adobe makers, leather workers, ironworkers, foodways workers  Oral traditions: storytellers, poets  Performing arts: dancers, vocalists, musicians Eligibility Criteria Applicants (master artists and apprentices) must reside in Arizona. Apprentices should be at least 16 years of age (can be younger if they are an immediate family member of the Master Artist). The art form must be traditional in nature, as per SFA’s definition of traditional art.  Applicants must be United States citizens, lawful permanent residents, or have permission from the U.S. Department of Immigration to work in the U.S.  All applicants must have been full-time residents of Arizona for at least one full year before applying and must remain residents of Arizona for the award year.  Applicants must be at least 18 years of age.  Practitioners are generally part of the same cultural community, with a focus on informally taught traditions rather than formal instruction or institutional education. Apprentice Eligibility Should have at least an intermediate-level experience in the art form.  Must be at least 16 years of age unless they are a child or immediate family member of the applying artist.  Should demonstrate a high level of potential to become a master artist, and a commitment to the apprenticeship’s demands.  Priorities are given to masters and apprentices within the same cultural community, and to underrepresented traditional art forms with few remaining local practitioners.  Apprentices do not need to be named until the artist is invited to the full application process. For more information, visit SFA.