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Washington, DC—The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is pleased to announce the first round of recommended awards for fiscal year 2023, with more than $34 million in funding to support the arts nationwide. This is the first of the NEA’s two major grant announcements each fiscal year and includes grants to organizations through the NEA’s Grants for Arts Projects, Challenge America, and Research Awards categories. This announcement also includes grants to individuals for Literature Fellowships in creative writing (poetry) and translation. 

“Together, these grants show the NEA’s support nationwide for strengthening our arts and cultural ecosystems, providing equitable opportunities for arts participation and practice, and contributing to the health of our communities and our economy,” said NEA Chair Maria Rosario Jackson, PhD. “I encourage everyone to explore these projects and the ways they help provide inspiration, understanding, and opportunities for us to live more artful lives.”

The full list of recommended grants is available in a state-by-state listing and organized by grant category/discipline. Additional information about the projects can be found using the NEA’s Grant Search. 

As part of the application review process, the NEA worked with more than 340 expert reviewers with relevant knowledge and experience who reviewed the applications and rated them in accordance with published review criteria. Recommendations were presented to the National Council on the Arts. The council made its recommendations to the NEA Chair, who made the final decision on all grant awards. Learn more about the grant review process or volunteer to be a panelist.  

See below for more details on each of these funding categories and examples of recommended grants.

Grants for Arts Projects

Grants for Arts Projects is the agency’s largest grant program. For this round of funding, the NEA received 1,939 eligible applications and will award grants to 1,251 organizations for a total of nearly $28.8 million in funding. Grants range from $10,000 to $100,000 and require a cost share/match of at least one to one. 

This grant program covers a wide variety of projects in 15 artistic disciplines and fields, supporting public engagement with, and access to, various forms of art across the nation; the creation of excellent art; learning in the arts at all stages of life; and the integration of the arts into the fabric of community life. 
Examples include:

A grant to Capacitor Performance in San Francisco, California, of $20,000 to support the development and presentation of a performance piece with an interdisciplinary cohort of electrical engineering and dance students at Washington, DC’s Gallaudet University, the largest Deaf university in the U.S. As part of the project, participants will integrate responsive LED lighting into a sculpture that will be used as part of the performance.

A grant to Children’s Theatre of Cincinnati in Ohio of $15,000 to support the production of a play for young audiences about Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to the United States Congress, written by Brandi Langford-Sherrill and directed by Maddie Burgoon Jones. The play will tour to schools in the greater Cincinnati region and be made available for virtual streaming. Educational materials including study guides and podcasts will be made available to classroom teachers.

A grant to Parallel Studios (aka Currents New Media) in Santa Fe, New Mexico, of $25,000 to support the Currents New Media Festival, connecting public audiences with technology-focused media arts experiences such as immersive and interactive art installations, multimedia performances and concerts, virtual and augmented reality experiences, artist talks, and free youth education programming, as well as a paid internship program for high school and college students.

A grant to Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, of $35,000 to support Nasher Museum of Art’s exhibition Spirit in the Land that will bring together approximately 70 works by more than 29 contemporary artists exploring issues related to ecological awareness, demonstrating how the natural environment and cultural identity are intertwined. 

A grant to Juneau Arts and Humanities Council in Alaska of $60,000 to support the multidisciplinary Rock Aak'w Festival, a weekend-long, family-friendly, and inclusive festival presented by the council in partnership with the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska. The event will showcase and celebrate the shared experiences of performing arts of Indigenous people, including music, dance, and storytelling artists, and will include workshops and masterclasses to instruct teachers on bringing the Indigenous cultures into their classrooms.  

A grant to Nashville Symphony Association in Tennessee of $50,000 to support the symphony’s world premiere orchestral performance of The Jonah People: A Legacy of Struggle and Triumph by Hannibal Lokumbe, conducted by Giancarlo Guerrero. In four movements, the orchestra, chorus, vocal soloists, actors, jazz ensemble, and African drum and dance ensemble will consider the legacy of slavery in the United States, and also will celebrate the cultural contributions of Black Americans from the past to the present. Community engagement efforts will feature partnerships with the National Museum of African American Music, Fisk University (a historically Black university), Metro Nashville Public Schools, and Tennessee Performing Arts Center.

A grant to Smart Growth America in Washington, DC of $30,000 to support a national peer network for artists, transportation planners, designers, and engineers through the creation of the Transportation Artists-in-Residence (TAIR) network. They will partner with the Civic Artists in Residence (CAIR) Lab to create and manage the network and to serve as a resource for transportation agencies; further build and organize the growing field of artists-in-residence in government; and spread artist-in-residence programs to additional departments of transportation, transit agencies, and other transportation providers.

A grant to Trustees of Indiana University in Bloomington on behalf of Traditional Arts Indiana of $45,000 to support folk arts programs focused on serving older adults. Folk artists from selected senior communities in Central Indiana will be identified and documented, and encouraged to share their art in public programs. The information collected from the older artists will be used to create a guide for folk arts and aging to inspire others to stay active and engaged with their communities.

A grant to Washington State Arts Alliance Foundation in Seattle of $50,000 to support an emerging statewide arts education collective impact effort. The Arts for All (A4A) Coalition includes partners such as the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, the Washington State Arts Commission, Creative Advantage, and ArtsEd Washington and seeks to identify and address gaps in access to arts and cultural learning opportunities for students across the state. Project activities will include creating a logic model and strategic plan, launching an A4A website, creating a communications plan, collecting arts education data, convening stakeholders, and providing leadership development opportunities to youth.

The next Grants for Arts Projects application deadlines are Thursday, February 9 and Thursday, July 6, 2023. Visit arts.gov for guidelines and application resources. A webinar about this grant opportunity will take place on Wednesday, January 11, 2023, at 3:00 pm ET. 

Challenge America

Challenge America grants are awarded in all artistic disciplines to reach historically underserved communities that have rich and dynamic cultural identities. The NEA received 447 eligible applications and will award grants to 262 organizations for a total of $2,620,000 in funding. Grants are all $10,000 and require a cost share/match of at least one to one. Examples include:

A grant to Florida Children’s Museum in Lakeland, Florida, to support a mobile museum. A collection of hands-on exhibits will be transported and temporarily installed within migrant communities and will provide corresponding arts activities.

A grant to Neighborhoods Inc. in Lincoln, Nebraska, to support the development and creation of a piece of public art in Lincoln’s University Place neighborhood, serving low-income communities in this area. As part of this project, local artists will receive training about how to implement art projects in their community and outreach events will give residents the opportunity to provide input.

Challenge America may be a good entry point for organizations that are new to applying for federal funding. The next Challenge America application deadline is Thursday, April 27, 2023. Visit arts.gov for guidelines and application resources. A webinar about this grant opportunity will take place on Wednesday, March 1, 2023, at 3:00 pm ET. 

Research Awards

The NEA has four priority areas of research: 

• What are the measurable impacts of the arts on the following outcome areas?
  • Health and wellness for individuals
  • Cognition and learning
  • Economic growth and innovation
• In what ways do the arts contribute to the healing and revitalization of communities?
• What is the state of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility in the arts?
• How is the U.S. arts ecosystem adapting and responding to social, economic, and technological changes and challenges to the sector?

The NEA’s Research Awards cover two funding opportunities for research projects that engage with the NEA’s five-year research agenda and explore these questions.

The NEA will award 20 Research Grants in the Arts for a total of $1.075 million in funding. These grants support a broad range of arts-related studies, many of which strive to understand how factors related to diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility can improve the efficacy of arts management and cultural policies. 

For example, the NEA will award a grant of $50,000 to Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi, a Hispanic-serving institution, to conduct mixed-methods research and create a geographic mapping tool with the ability to inform recommendations about integrating diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility practices with creative economy strategies.

NEA Research Labs support transdisciplinary research teams grounded in the social and behavioral sciences, yielding empirical insights about the arts for the benefit of arts and non-arts sectors alike. The NEA will award grants to four organizations for a total of $525,000 in funding. 

One project examines the arts' role in the healing and revitalization of communities—Northeastern University will be awarded $150,000 to host an NEA Research Lab using participatory action research methods to evaluate whether and how community arts workshops in East Boston, Massachusetts, foster social cohesion and residents' sense of belonging. 

Additional information about the NEA’s research is available at arts.gov/impact/research, including working papers, publications, and presentations that have resulted from NEA Research Grants in the Arts funding, as well as information on all of the NEA Research Labs.

The next Research Awards application deadline is in Monday, March 27, 2023. Guidelines and application resources will be available soon at arts.gov. 

Literature Fellowships

Creative Writing Fellowships are for published creative writers and very competitive, with nearly 1,900 applications received this year. The NEA will award 36 Creative Writing Fellowships of $25,000 each for a total of $900,000. These FY 2023 fellowships are in poetry and enable the recipients to set aside time for writing, research, travel, and general career development. You can read more about this diverse group of poets in the Creative Writing Fellowships section of arts.gov.

Translation Fellowships support the translation of literary prose, poetry, and drama from writers around the world into English, broadening access to these writers and their stories. The NEA will award grants to 22 translators, ranging from $10,000 to $20,000 for a total of $300,000 to translate works from 10 languages and 16 countries. You can read more about these translators and their projects in the Translation Fellowships section of arts.gov.

The next deadline for Creative Writing Fellowships is Wednesday, March 8, 2023. In 2023, the NEA is accepting applications in prose. The next deadline for Translation Fellowships is Thursday, January 12, 2023.