MAP Fund
OVERVIEW: MAP Fund supports diverse performing artists who challenge long-standing social and cultural hierarchies in the United States.
IP TAKE: MAP Fund is “one of the nation’s longest-running private grantmakers for new performance pieces.” It typically makes a few hundred grants in a grant cycle. Grant seekers should expect a good deal of competition here, especially since this funder offers unrestricted funding. The MAP Fund likes to take grantmaking risks in the arts and “values radical inclusion,” evidenced both by its land acknowledgement and willingness to fund artists of any age or background. It also has an open-submission process, making it pretty accessible given its size. It is transparent and accessible, but has a small staff, so it will take some patience to make contact. Your work must feature a vein of inquiry that questions centers of power in the U.S. to qualify for a grant.
PROFILE: Founded in 1989, the MAP Fund — which was originally known as the Multi-Arts Production Fund and established by the Rockefeller Foundation — seeks to invest “in performing artists and their work as the critical foundation of imagining and co-creating a more equitable and vibrant society.” From 2001 to 2016, Creative Capital administered the fund. In 2008, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation became its primary funder. In 2010 the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation would also become a major financial backer. Finally, in 2016, the MAP Fund officially became an independent nonprofit, partnering with ArtsPool for administrative support.
The MAP Fund’s grantmaking prioritizes “artists that question, disrupt, complicate, and challenge inherited notions of social and cultural hierarchy across the current American landscape.”
Grants for Theater and Dance
The MAP Fund invests in performing artists and their work as the “critical foundation of imagining and co-creating a more equitable and vibrant society.”
In doing so, the fund makes grants for the performing arts, which includes both theater and dance, primarily through “transformational” seed grants of about $30,000, which includes $5,000 in unrestricted funds, and $25,000 for specific projects.
Each grant also includes a $1000 microgrant for artists to give to other creators within their communities.
Previous MAP grantees include Anna Deavere Smith, Bill T. Jones and Larissa FastHorse. Other theater artists and productions have included A Contemporary Theatre for Tale of the Heike, a partnership between playwrights Philip Kan Gotanda and Yussef El Guindi. In addition, Junebug Productions received an award for sponsoring Alleged Lesbian Activities by Last Call: New Orleans Dyke Bar History Project.
Unique to the performing arts grantmaking space, the MAP Fund has offered added support to grantees in the form of personalized coaching through its Scaffolding for Practicing Artists (SPA) program.
Recipients of this intimate couching primarily focuses on artists who don’t have “ongoing institutional relationships, leading them to primarily self-produce their work.”
SPA’s year-long coaching program culminates in two-day, facilitated, online gatherings of five to six artists each.
Participants receive a $1,000 stipend to use toward childcare or other costs associated with attending the SPA gathering, where participants are invited to speak about their work.
To learn more about the theater projects and productions backed by MAP grants, explore its grantees page.
Important Grant Details:
MAP grants typically range from $5,000 to $45,000. It gave out more than $2.8 million in a recent year.
Each two-year project grant of $30,000 includes $5,000 in unrestricted funds and $25,000 for the specific project.
Each grant also includes a $1000 microgrant for artists to give to other creators within their communities.
Many grantees receive personalized coaching through MAP’s Scaffolding for Practicing Artists (SPA) program. Jerome Hill Fellowship artists are automatically invited to be part of the coaching program.
The fund has an open submission policy. Deadline dates are subject to change, but often fall toward the end of September for grants disbursed the following year.
PEOPLE:
Search for staff contact info and bios in PeopleFinder (paid subscribers only).
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