The Southwest Folklife Alliance (SFA) 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: Award
Deadline (mm/dd/yyyy): 05/15/2022
Size of the Grant: $5,000
Details:
The goal of this award is to strengthen the transmission of community-based traditions throughout the Southwestern United States. The Master-Apprentice Artist supports a master artist or tradition bearer to work with a qualified apprentice (or group of apprentices) to engage in a teaching-learning relationship that includes one-on-one mentorship and hands-on experience. Our highest priority is to support apprentices to learn from master artists within their own cultural traditions.
They provide direct support for master traditional artists living in Arizona to pass on art, culture, and heritage practices to apprentice learners through the annual SFA Master-Apprentice Award. The award is made possible in part by the National Endowment for the Arts and Arizona Commission on the Arts.
Funds can be used to help cover artist fees, offset costs of raw materials, and support any travel essential to the exchange. Traditional artists & 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 then invites nominees to apply based on their mastery of artform, 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.
- 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 United States. Full-time residents of Arizona for a minimum of one full year, and at least 18 years of age. Recipients must remain residents of Arizona for the duration of the grant year.
- Practitioners are generally part of the same cultural community, with a focus on informally taught traditions rather than formal instruction or institutional education.
For more information, visit Master-Apprentice Award.
