Film & Media Arts
The National Endowment for the Arts envisions a nation with a robust creative ecosystem that is responsive and adapting to the dynamic, diverse, and evolving nature of the media arts field. Projects supported by the Arts Endowment are intended to support and advance careers for independent film and media artists, media arts practitioners, and artists exploring traditional or expanded forms of storytelling and visual expression using film, cinema, audio, broadcast, new media, creative code, and related formats. In addition, projects supported by the Arts Endowment provide opportunities for the public to deepen appreciation for, and experience, historic or contemporary works in-person, online, or through television or radio broadcast, digital streaming, or any other emerging formats including virtual, augmented, and mixed reality.
Arts & Technology Field Scan
From 2019-2021, the Arts Endowment conducted an Arts & Technology Field Scan, a national research study launched in partnership with the Ford Foundation and the Knight Foundation. The project’s research plan focused on learning directly from the lived experiences of working artists engaging with technology through formal and informal arts settings, including those working in nonprofit, commercial, and community-based contexts spanning multiple sectors and artistic disciplines. Findings from this research are synthesized in a report, Tech as Art: Supporting Artists Who Use Technology as a Creative Medium, alongside ten commissioned essays written by practitioners as provocations to the broader arts and cultural field. The essays focus on the idea that an equitable, resilient, and thriving arts and cultural ecosystem includes deepened support for artistic practices focused on technology as a creative medium.
The result of this two-year investigation uncovered a robust creative ecosystem of tech-focused artists and practices, and provided insight into the ways:
- Artists created art works with digital technologies—by writing code, visualizing data, developing interactive experiences, and much more;
- Artists built community by developing shared open-source tools, establishing online forums for knowledge exchange, and founding organizations to facilitate the creativity of others; and
- Artists critiqued the influence of technologies on daily life through projects that questioned pervasive practices.
The field scan also uplifted best practices and recommendations, alongside challenges and opportunities, to strengthen the U.S. arts infrastructure serving tech-focused creative practices. For example, the report provides evidence of the ways tech-focused artists can bring specialized expertise in using digital technology to:
- Connect audiences across physical and virtual spaces;
- Contribute to accelerated action in addressing racial inequities and social injustices across the arts and technology and other sectors; and
- Engage local communities, address social issues, and bridge digital divides through their arts projects.
Short video profiles were developed to accompany the artist case studies in the report. They are part of an Arts & Technology Field Scan conducted by the National Endowment for the Arts, in partnership with the Ford Foundation and the Knight Foundation.
State arts agencies, regional arts organizations, and local arts councils are in a unique position within the creative ecosystem to cultivate infrastructure supporting the intersection of arts and technology. This two-page guide is intended for public arts funders interested in improving outreach and funding support for digital initiatives and technology-focused arts projects, cultivating regional infrastructure and cross-sector networks to advance arts and technology, and improving the capacity of arts organizations to support digital initiatives and emerging art forms that incorporate the use of creative code, computation, and data as an artistic medium.
Field Scan Report | Regional Trends Report | Essays | Case Study Videos | Launch Event Archive
Related Resources
Independent Film and Media Field Briefing 2022 | Download PDF
Commissioned by the NEA and produced in partnership with the Sundance Institute through a cooperative agreement, this briefing is Intended to educate policymakers and decisionmakers about the challenges and opportunities related to the U.S. infrastructure serving independent filmmakers and media artists. Topics were informed through conversations with members of IMAG and other independent film stakeholders representing a diverse cross-section of roles in the field, including producers, directors, distributors, exhibitors, funders, sales agents, and nonprofit artist support organizations.
Documentary Sustainability Summit 2017 | Access Event Archive
Hosted by the NEA in partnership with the International Documentary Association (IDA), this convening explored issues facing the documentary film community with a goal of articulating strategies and initiatives to promote a more equitable and sustainable ecosystem for independent documentary professionals. This convening archive includes a summit report, agenda, and additional resources.
Independent Film & Media Arts Field-Building Initiative | Learn more
The Independent Film & Media Arts Field-Building Initiative took place between 2019 and 2025 and focused on creating a space for knowledge exchange and relationship-building for individuals working in the film and media arts industry. The NEA partnered with Sundance Institute from 2019-2022, and with Bay Area Video Coalition (BAVC) from 2023-2025.