Woman in African garb dancing in dance studio.

2020 National Heritage Fellow Naomi Diouf in the film celebrating the honorees, The Culture of America, available for viewing at arts.gov/honors/heritage. Photo courtesy of Hypothetical Films

A group of women on stage holding up signs in favor of women's suffrage.

StageOne Family Theatre’s production of Lawbreakers!, one of the grants awarded by the Arts Endowment in celebration of the women’s suffrage centennial. Photo courtesy of StageOne Family Theatre

Teenage girl on stage reciting poetry

Minnesota's state champion Isabella Callery (Anishinaabe) became the 2019 Poetry Out Loud National Champion. Photo by James Kegley

Woman on stage singing with bass player behind her.

Renée Fleming with bassist Jay Anderson perform in honor of NEA Jazz Master Maria Schneider at the 2019 NEA Jazz Masters Tribute Concert at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Photo by Shannon Finney

Two women in wheelchairs dancing on stage.

Regional arts organization New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project supported the first touring production of Descent by the art ensemble Kinetic Light. Photo by Robbie Sweeny

African-American women holding video camera.

The Alliance for Media Arts + Culture’s Arts2Work, an Arts Endowment grantee, is the first federally registered national apprenticeship program in media arts and creative technologies. Photo by Wide Angle Youth Media, with Sakinah Bowman

Woman squatting on stage in front of people dressed in colorful gowns.

A 2019 performance of The Taming of The Shrew by the Great Lakes Theater in Cleveland, Ohio, produced as part of Shakespeare in American Communities. Photo by Roger Mastroianni, courtesy of Great Lakes Theater

Colorful mural on side of building facing a parking lot.

How to Turn Anything into Something Else (2012) by the Miss Rockaway Armada on 207 North Broad Street, part of the Mural Arts Philadelphia program, supported by the Arts Endowment. Photo by Steve Weinik, courtesy of Mural Arts Philadelphia

Woman in flowing white dress dancing against side of cliff.

National Endowment for the Arts grantee BANDALOOP’s film Crossing. Photo by Braden Mayfield

Men and women in black holding poles on stage.

Veterans and civilians perform in A Long Journey Home, a production created for Arts Endowment grantee DIAVOLO | Architecture in Motion's Veterans Project. Photo by George Simian

Supporting the Arts in Your Community

The National Endowment for the Arts supports exemplary arts projects in communities nationwide through grantmaking, initiatives, partnerships, and events.
Photos of the 2020 National Heritage Fellows

Check out the archive of “The Culture of America: A Cross-Country Visit with the National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellows" event from March 4, 2021.

Image of COVID-19 virus

National Endowment for the Arts on COVID-19.

Three young men play guitars

Arts Endowment Supports the Arts with over $27.5 Million in Awards in First Round of FY2021 Funding

first page of NEA FAQs sheet

Check out our FAQs about how the FY21 Omnibus bill may affect your grant.

wood carving of a wrinkled face inside a log

Find out about the Creative Forces Healing Arts Network for military and veteran populations.

Cover of research report

New Report on Arts Strategies for Addressing Opioid Crisis.

Photos of Terri Lyne Carrington, Albert "Tootie" Heath, Henry Threadgill, and Phil Schaap

National Endowment for the Arts Announces 2021 NEA Jazz Masters.

collage of student faces

Meet the 2020 Musical Theater Songwriting Challenge Winners!

Grants

The National Endowment for the Arts awards grants to nonprofit organizations, creative writers and translators, state arts agencies, and regional arts organizations in support of arts projects across the country.
Go to the Grants section »

Impact

See the impact of the Arts Endowment on your state, and how the agency's work in research, accessibility, and other areas has had a major impact in the arts and culture of the country.
Go to the Impact section »

Featured Stories

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India Pinkney
Blog

Phenomenal Woman: Get to Know National Endowment for the Arts General Counsel India Pinkney

Portrait of a woman.
Podcast

Rhiannon Giddens

Singer, multi-instrumentalist, composer, and artistic director of Silkroad
A white bust of a woman with one giant blue eye
Magazine Article

Ebbs and Flows

An Exhibition of Sculptor Tasha Lewis in Nashville, Tennessee

Some Facts about the National Endowment for the Arts

The National Endowment for the Arts is an independent federal agency that funds, promotes, and strengthens the creative capacity of our communities by providing all Americans with diverse opportunities for arts participation.
40 Percent

Percentage of Arts Endowment funding is awarded directly to the states through their state and regional agencies, reaching millions more people in thousands of communities.

$9

Amount leveraged by private and other public funds for every $1 of direct Arts Endowment funding.

$500 Million

Direct grant-matching support for Arts Endowment projects each year.

Some Facts about the National Endowment for the Arts

The National Endowment for the Arts is an independent federal agency that funds, promotes, and strengthens the creative capacity of our communities by providing all Americans with diverse opportunities for arts participation.
Approximately 2,400 Grants

Recommended for grant awards annually.

42 Percent

Percentage of Arts Endowment grants take place in high-poverty neighborhoods.

35 Percent

Percentage of Arts Endowment grants reach low-income audiences or underserved populations.

Some Facts from the National Endowment for the Arts

These facts are based on the most recent data (2017) from the Arts and Cultural Production Satellite Account (ACPSA), which is produced jointly by the National Endowment for the Arts’ Office of Research & Analysis and the Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. Commerce Department. The ACPSA tracks the annual economic impact of arts and cultural production from 35 industries, both commercial and nonprofit.
$877.8 Billion

Amount the arts and cultural industries contribute to the U.S. economy.

4.5 Percent

Percentage of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product is accounted for by arts and cultural industries.

5 Million

Americans work in the arts and cultural industries.

Some Facts about the National Endowment for the Arts

The National Endowment for the Arts is an independent federal agency that funds, promotes, and strengthens the creative capacity of our communities by providing all Americans with diverse opportunities for arts participation.
48 Cents

The Arts Endowment’s annual cost to each American.

0.003 Percent

The Arts Endowment’s percentage of the federal budget.

$5.5 Billion

Amount awarded by the Arts Endowment since its beginning in 1965.

Some Facts about the National Endowment for the Arts

The National Endowment for the Arts is an independent federal agency that funds, promotes, and strengthens the creative capacity of our communities by providing all Americans with diverse opportunities for arts participation.
Around 45 Million Americans

Attend a live arts event supported by the Arts Endowment annually.

More than 40,000

Concerts, readings, and performances are supported annually.

More than 6,000

Exhibitions are supported annually as well.

Some Facts from the National Endowment for the Arts

These facts are based on the most recent data (2017) from the Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (SPPA), a national survey conducted in partnership with the U.S. Census Bureau that has allowed cultural policymakers, arts managers, scholars, and journalists to obtain reliable statistics about American patterns of arts engagement.
North Dakota

The state's residents attend live performing arts events at a higher rate than U.S. adults as a whole—with 62 percent for North Dakota residents versus 48.5 percent of U.S. adults.

Montana

Outperforms the national rate of attending art exhibits, with 33.5 percent of this state’s residents doing this activity versus 23 percent of Americans overall.

Oregon and Washington

Their literary reading rates (upwards of 60 percent) far exceed the U.S. as a whole (44 percent).