Resiliency Grants
$255,000 to 38 Organizations
Thanks to an American Rescue Plan grant from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) in 2022, the Arts Council awarded 38 small-budget nonprofit arts organizations (under $750k) with operational support funding for financial recovery, to boost staffing levels + create future sustainability. Grants ranged from $3,000 - $15,000 for a total of $255,000.
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Artist Corps Grants and Mentorship
$125,000 to 12 Artists
The Artist Corps program is for individual artists who are interested in creating projects and initiatives that directly impact the greater New Haven community. The Artist Corps is not just about receiving funding, it's about building non-cash resources (such as connecting people across networks, identifying pipeline opportunities, and meeting more residents through the arts) in order to create a solid foundation for artists to be operationally sound and successful in seeing their art at the forefront of the community. Therefore, selected artists gather + work together as a cohort with support from a team of facilitators.
Creative Sector Relief Fund
$335,380 to 436 people and projects
Launched in March 2020 in partnership with the City of New Haven's Department of Arts and Culture and Tourism, the initial intent of our Creative Sector Relief Fund was to quickly distribute financial assistance to low-income creatives and small-budget arts institutions most impacted by COVID-19.
The Fund was relaunched in 2021 with a new focus on economic and racial justice by supporting Black, Brown, and Indigenous artists with unrestricted $10k grants.
Arts Admins of Color Fund
$17,000 to 9 creative administrators
The Arts Administrators of Color Fund launched in 2021 thanks to support from the Avangrid Foundation helps to advance the careers of Black, Brown, Indigenous, Asian American, and Pacific Islander individuals working in the arts industry. Eligible arts administrators, which we define very broadly, can request funding for professional development activities.
Past Grants
From over a million dollars in Racial Equity and Creative Healing (REACH) Grants to the Cultural Vitality Fund, we have a track record of getting funds to vital community projects.
Take a look at some of our past grantmaking initiatives and how they have impacted our local communities.
Profile: Resiliency Grants
Photo credit: Liah Sinquefield
Ecoworks CT is a social enterprise niche recycler that reduces waste while supporting the arts. As Connecticut's only Creative Reuse Center, we provide low cost rescued art supplies, have a mini maker space with use of our tools, and generate micro-income for 30+ consignors by showcasing the work of creatives in our storfront gallery, the reBoutique. We teach creative reuse techniques throughout the greater New Haven area, paying stipends to teaching artists. We share surplus materials with other partner organizations, organize community crafting for causes and source materials for artists' specific projects at their request.
"I...love to be sustainable and use things that would have been thrown away, and show people how beautiful they can be", Nadine Nelson, Artist-in-Residence 2022-2023
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Donate Today to Support These Vital Grants
Credit Card - donation page
Paypal - paypal.me/artsnhv
Venmo - www.venmo.com/artnhv
CashApp = $ArtsCouncil
Zelle = winter@newhavenarts.org
Profile: Resiliency Grants
"The funds we secured from the Arts Council have truly had such a significant impage on our programming and opportunities for youth, trainess, and employees.
We were able to partner with RiseUp in October and pay 2 CT based artists to create a mural at one of our gardens in the South Hill. Members from our team joined with RiseUp, EMERGE Inc, and the neighborhood for a paint along day when the mural was complete and had so much fun."
Profile: Artist Corps
Mindi R. Englart is a New Haven-based artist, author, and educator. She is the founder and CEO of the Single Mothers Discount Card, LLC.
Project: Revising Your Narrative for Single Moms: Making Art to Heal the Past is a series of workshops for single moms designed to help them reflect on their past and transform the story they tell about it. Participants will have time, materials, & support to process--reduce, reuse, and recycle symbolic elements of--their past into tangible art that can inspire them into an empowered future.
Profile: Resiliency Grant
“The Arts Council’s Resiliency grant helps ARTE offer free arts programs, improve critical thinking, analytical skills, and cognitive development.
Activities that engage students in purposeful, supportive, and meaningful learning experiences that develop imaginations and support social-
emotional well-being. The pride and joy of our students speak volumes to their self-confidence, motivation, and success.”
---David Greco – Director
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Hannan Hameen; Master of Dance
"It actually goes to people who are giving their all in the community, actual blood, sweat and tears. Who are sacrificing so much of themselves to give so much, to help... It shows I see you, I hear you, and I am there for you."
Profile: Artist Corps
Ruby Gonzalez Hernandez is an indigenous Zapotec artist, educator, curator, and people-connecter born on Quinnipiac land. Ruby is interested in art based projects that center connecting artists directly with one another, and accessibility within the arts; in the past that includes projects such as Lunch Money Print, an international print exchange.
Project: Fair-Side is a seed rooted in the notion that art is for everyone. The implementation of this notion sprouts to financially compensate artists to have dedicated time to learn new skills in a 3 month period. Afterwards, artists will work together using the skills learned to host their own exhibition showcasing the work made during their time together.
Profile: Artist Corps
Tyler Goldchain is a multi-instrumentalist artist, composer, and producer from New Haven, CT. His work allows him to perform around the country, work with major artists and score film and theater productions.
Project: The Uplift Program is a series of educational interactive workshops that inform the participants, primarily teens and young adults, on the current best practices of personal finance and artistic development. Workshops and sessions will be held in collaboration with community partners from the Greater New Haven area.
Image of Tyler by Coral Ortiz.
Profile: Arts Admins of Color
"Arts Council’s Arts Admins of Color grant was a gift that we couldn’t be more thankful for. This specific grant was a seed sown for #ThaTeam Podcast to travel to Atlanta, GA for the Black Podcast Festival in 2022. This opportunity helped us to elevate our craft, network with other podcasters across the country and enjoy what we love to do.
It also allowed us to be able to take one of our podcast students with us on this journey so they can truly see where podcasting can take them in the long run. From this specific grant to the REACH grant, the Arts Council has made our shift from podcasters to youth educators/mentors what it is today and we couldn’t be more thankful."
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
"I needed help... we have so many great people...doing great things like Qommunity for queer people, and sometimes you just need a chance, you need someone to believe in it, you just need someone to slide some money your way to make sure that thing happens, and that idea gets off the ground... and here we are still doing great things."
Profile: Artist Corps
Alana Ladson is an artist from New Haven who loves to read, write, play video games, and draw. She creates both digital art and traditional paintings on canvas and paper. She has a passion for community building and artistry. Her experience is rooted in the arts, education, and advocacy – she loves working with youth, making art, and sharing what her students call “sage wisdom”. Alana particularly loves to draw women of color, nature, and mythical creatures. Additionally, she has a small business ‘Alana Ladson Art’ selling pins, stickers, and art prints.
Project: The Rooted Collective Fellowship is an exploratory artist collective that will bring a small group of BIPOC women and nonbinary folks together to create art and explore themselves and their practices.
Profile: Artsits Corps
Ashley LaRue, the founder of Qommunity, is a New Haven native and artrepreneur. Qommunity is a platform and incubator that celebrates art, cultivates healing projects, and encourages fellowship among and within the local queer community.
Project: Mend: A Wellness Festival & Exhibition is a curated creative healing project and accompanying wellness festival that serves to bring awareness to mental health and illness while reducing the stigma surrounding it.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Anika Stewart: Your Queer Plant Shop
"It helped me stay housed, it helped me keep my lights on, and it helped me invest in my art... This is so important because these are things that are not afforded to a lot of black creators."
Profile: Resiliency Grants
ArtSpace
Gabriel (Gabe) Sacco (He) is an interdisciplinary artist who performs for video, sound, images, and writing. Gabriel is from New Jersey and graduated from Fairfield University with a BA in International Studies and Politics. He lives in Shelton, CT, and holds an MFA in Visual Art from Rutgers Mason Gross School of The Arts. Gabriel is an educator, learner, and worker who develops ideas surrounding social responsibility and the role of usefulness in art making, anti-racist pedagogy, and generative and sustainable production models for artists. Cooking, sewing, and gardening influence Gabriel’s practice as an inheritance of the deceased.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Thabisa Rich
A mother, wife, singer-songwriter, founder of Rich Arts Collective, and creative entrepreneur, Thabisa has graced many stages in and out of New Haven. When off-stage, she is working with kids in various school settings and creating programs that will sow back into the community.
Profile: Artsits Corps
Nadine Nelson is a career educator, chef, artist, activist, and owner of Global Local Gourmet. As an expert in interactive culinary education and experiential event production, she uses food as a catalyst and platform to build community, revitalize the neighborhood, preserve our cultural heritage, and empower people to lead healthier, happier, connected, and more prosperous lives by creating educational and recreational programming around cuisine from seed to waste.
Project: S.O.U.L. (Sustainable, organic, unprocessed and local) Food Griots brings people together to cook, cultivate community, and inspire activism through the act of preparing food.
Profile: Artist Corps
Mitchell Rembert was born in Bridgeport and raised in New Haven. He is the son and apprentice of the late Winfred Rembert. Mitch has been practicing the leather art craft for the last 8 years and with a heavy heart he has taken on the mission of continuing his father's work telling their life experiences.
Project: Tribute to Winfred Rembert will be an art show in honor of well-known New Haven artist Winfred Rembert. Helping to preserve Winfred's legacy and uplift the community.
Profile: Arts Admins of Color
IfeMichelle Gardin
"The training I receive at the Amherst Writers Workshop Leadership Training will provide me with additional tools I want to enhance programming for the Elm City LITFest to conduct writing workshops for potential writers in the
greater New Haven Communities"
Throughout her life IfeMichelle has been committed to connecting her passion for culture and arts and enhancing the quality of life for her community and looks forward to further developing Cultural Awareness throughout the region. Ife created and founded the Elm City LITFest in 2020. Elm City LITFest is a celebration of LITerature, LITerary Artists and LITerary Arts of the African Diaspora. In 2022, Ife founded KulturallyLIT the mission is to enhance awareness of the Arts of the African Diaspora. KultuallyLIT produces DiasporaCON, a Elm City LITFest, LIT KWANZAA celebration, and the Diaspora Book Awards.
Profile: Reach Grant
Kulturally LIT is an organization created to enhance awareness of the significance of the Arts of the African Diaspora on societal culture. Their goal is to produce Kultural experiences that support and develop opportunities for access to cultural empowerment for Artists of the African Diaspora.
Read more about LIT Fest here.
Check out images from LIT Fest 2022 here.
KulturallyLIT/ Elm City LITFest was supported by a REACH grant of $42,000 in 2022.
Profile: Artist Corps
Jisu is a queer Korean American painter, poet, animator, web designer, and videographer in New Haven. She helped start an art and mental health collective in Connecticut called Places To Go and is one half of the duo Second Floor Hardware School with Kulimushi Barongozi, making a place for people who feel out of place.
Project: Second Floor Hardware School (2FHS) Folk Festival is a space to explore art that comes from the people, where anyone who walks by can get the chance to do magic for themselves. Welcoming people who might otherwise feel unwelcome or out of place in ‘art world’ spaces and instill in them the confidence that all they need are their own stories, their own intuitions and desires about what to create.
Profile: Reach Grant
Black Haven Founder and Creative Director
Salwa Abdussabur. Lucy Gellman Photo
Black Haven is a collective of creatives and admins who activate art justice through movement building events, initiatives and programming. We aim to be a creative playground for culture creators to be uplifted in their visions where they are provided partnerships and resource equity. Goal was to organize the second Black Haven Film Festival in September 2021 with the goal of sustaining as an ongoing annual event.
Read about Black Haven Film Festival here.
Black Haven was supported by the REACH with a grant of $44,000 in 2021.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund Grant
Matthew Abraham
Born and raised in New Haven, Matthew is an artist who paints imperfect pictures of an imperfect world. He feels this is his responsibility as an artist and will continue making art this way until those that believe we are ok in this world confront the fact that we are not.
Profile: Arts Admins of Color
Aaron Rogers The Breed Academy
"As an emerging Arts Administrator who is developing a new non profit organization, I am looking to grow in a number of different ways. I really want to learn more about the steps it takes to be successful at Executive leadership, Donor Cultivation, and Board Development. Because my non profit organization will be focused on
engaging young people from underrepresented communities throughout the city of New Haven in Music & Media production programs, I also would like to use the funding to invest in training for myself around arts education, community outreach and marketing."
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Puma Simone
I'm still here.
Profile: Artist Corps
Snowprah is a first generation Jamaican American. Born in Bridgeport and raised in the Hill, New Haven. Snow is gods formula to put a city on the map.
Project: Through Her Eyes: A Docu-Series. The history of the broken home within Black and Brown communities has been a never ending story for decades. This project is the visual documentary that will focus on the relationships between parents battling drug addiction and their children. It will start by having a true heart to heart conversation between both parties. Artistic expression will begin the healing process to mending their relationship and finding a way to heal together as one.
Profile: Artist Corps
Vanesa Suarez is a Peruvian-born immigrant and artist living on Quinnipiac Land, dedicated to the empowerment and liberation of women and girls. Vanesa uses art to create spaces where women and girls can recognize their power, beauty, greatness, and resiliency while also inspiring all of us to think more intentionally about the ways in which we are fighting against patriarchy.
Project: Reimagining Freedom for Women and Girls seeks to create communal spaces where women and girls can gather, be in the presence of each other and collectively find their power through art and storytelling.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Ruby Gonzalez Hernandez
Ruby Gonzalez Hernandez is an indigenous Zapotec artist born on Quinnipiac land. She uses photography for printmaking and other media to dissect and find language for oppression affecting BIPOC, religious exploitation, spiritual salvation, and redemption.
Profile: Reach Grant
Luis Luna- Movement Building Radio
Luis Luna, one of the co-producers on "Abolition Transmission," speaking at a recent launch event for the show at Possible Futures bookspace. Lucy Gellman Photos.
Read more about the event here.
Movement Building Radio shares the voices of community members involved in grassroots struggles. Mass incarceration and deportation has had a huge impact in our communities and the voices of those who are directly affected are silenced or ignored. This project aims to highlight these inequities and bring power back to our community members who are impacted by these systems.
Luis’s project Movement Building Radio was supported by the REACH with a grant of $22,500 in 2022.
Profile: Artist Corps
Rashmi Talpade is Wallingford based professional artist with a Fine Arts degree in painting and photography. A recipient of the 2006 artists fellowship award from the Connecticut Commission of the Arts, her award-winning collages are in the permanent collection of the New Britain Museum of Art and the Roopankar Museum of Modern Art in India. She has received numerous grants from the State of Connecticut and the National Endowment for the Arts to support these collaborative community art projects.
Project: We Art No Different - A Public Art project by the Public is a public art project with the Spanish Community of Wallingford (SCOW), a non-profit organization that serves Latino and Asian immigrants who comprise 16% of the town population. The goal is to create 3 large photocollages depicting stories of newly arrived immigrants in Wallingford.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Anika Stewart
Born and raised in New Haven county, Anika specializes in acrylic paints and has hosted and coordinated pop-up events and shows in New Haven since 2017. Her biggest focus as a young and upcoming artist is to give a platform to artists, especially of color, in our Yale-dominated art scene.
Profile: Artist Corps
JoAnne Wilcox actively works to implement strategies in New Haven that reinforce connection through art, design, and restorative practices.
Project: The Elevator Service will consist of workshops, circles, and communities of healing, that are built in order to provide the maintenance needed to elevate our relationships, connections, and even our conflicts, in order to address our hurting community. Using journey mapping, photo voice, and large scale community maps, to identify what we already have available to us, what is working, what is in the way of working, and who the helpers are.
Profile: Reach Grant
Everyone Deserves to Come Home to Flowers, a mural by artist Kwadwo Adae that now adorns the Hillside Family Shelter at the corner of Sylvan Avenue + Stevens Street. Made possible with a REACH grant of $22,000
Lucy Gellman Photos.
Read more about it here.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Dyme Ellis
Dyme Ellis is curator, organizer, and graphic designer of events that center LGBTQ+ and BIPOC artists and audiences. A producer of experimental hip hop music and raw poetry, they are also known as Indigaux, performer, and queer rap artist from the 203.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Ro Godwynn
Ro Godwynn is a singer-songwriter and multidisciplinary activist from New Haven. Godwynn seeks to create moments of healing through her music, keeping wellness of the self, the other, and the community at the forefront of their work.
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Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Clifford Schloss
Cliff Schloss is a New Haven-born teaching artist, multi-instrumentalist, and arts administrator living in Hamden. He can be found teaching music in the summers at Horizons summer program at Foote School, in the halls of Neighborhood Music School as a faculty member, or playing/attending shows.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Vanesa Suarez
Vanesa Suarez is a Peruvian-born immigrant, artist, and community organizer based in New Haven. Her advocacy focuses on supporting folx navigating the criminal and immigration system and womxn and girls facing gender-based violence and creating systems of support for survivors.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Lauren "Sun Queen" Pittman
Sun Queen is a native of and currently lives in New Haven. She is a Black, queer woman whose passion, love, and activism are born out of her journey of self-exploration. Sun Queen is a co-founder of Black Lives Matter New Haven, a poet, an artist, and an inspirational messenger.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
VerG
VerG is a mixed media artist who works mostly with ink, graphite, digital media, and performance. She finds inspiration for her art from reading mythology, science fiction, religious figures, and watching horror films. Her work tends to explore themes of death, horror, and love
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Tia Waters
Tia Waters a.k.a. Bubblicious has been a long-standing member of the New Haven community. She is a performing artist, a visual artist, an activist, and a proud trans woman of color. She strives to uplift and empower her community in any way she can.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Briana Williams
Briana Williams is most authentically a singer-songwriter and storyteller. Based in New Haven, she is a vulnerability enthusiast and lover of all living things. Compassion for humanity and passion for the arts as a tool for healing are the guiding forces behind her work as an artist and art administrator.
Profile: Creative Sector Relief Fund
Tonija Monet Young-Spencer
Tonija Monet Young-Spencer was born and raised in New Haven and is now a singer, songwriter, and producer. Her love for family and music is more important than anything else.
Profile: Resiliency Grant
Music Haven
The Resiliency Grant allowed Music Haven to not only sustain but to scale up operations in the aftermath of the pandemic as we returned to full-capacity, in-person programming.
Music Haven creates an inclusive community for young people to learn, play, and express themselves through tuition-free classical music lessons and ongoing mentoring with world-class musicians. At the heart of our model is the relationship between teacher and student, and the relationships between the young musicians, themselves — they learn not only from the members of the string quartet, but also from the foundations of chamber music: listening to each other, working as a team, communicating through music, and dedication and focus in service of creating something beautiful together. Through music, they build community, develop resilience and self-confidence, and experience collective struggle and success.
Profile: Resiliency Grant
ArtSpace
Steve Roberts uses his love of skateboarding and food to create social connection. A native a of New Haven, Connecticut, he began skateboarding at 13 years old. After graduating from James Hillhouse High School, he received a bachelor’s degree from Rhode Island College. A 4 year member of the men’s basketball team, he also began work as a community organizer at RIC. While in Providence, he began working in kitchens, where his passion and appreciation for food was nourished. After moving back to New Haven in 2016, he continued to work in restaurants around New Haven including Zinc and ROIA.
In 2017, he started the Push To Start Skate Program, which uses skateboarding to build community, provide opportunity, and foster civic engagement with the youth of New Haven. The program started in the parking lot behind Stetson Library but has expanded to the Scantlebury Skatepark. Steve, along with fellow New Haven resident, J. Joseph, helped coordinate the construction of the Scantlebury Skatepark as a part of their ongoing Skate Haven (formally Finding A Line:New Haven) project. The Skate Haven bowl, a community sourced, interactive art installation is the most recent FAL project.
Steve is looking forward to including skateboarders in New Haven’s plans for public space, and using skateboarding as a tool for common good and social change.
