Description
Toronto Arts Council's Black Arts Program is open to Black artists, collectives and organizations working in any discipline.
Applicants to the Black Arts program are advised to contact the Outreach and Access Program Manager prior to completing an application form in order to confirm eligibility.
Project Grants - next deadline October 7th, 2021
The Black Arts Projects Program supports arts projects by Black artists, Black artist collectives, and Black-led, Black-focused and Black-serving organizations.1 For the purpose of this program, “Black” refers to African descendant people across the diaspora including but not limited to African Canadian, Afro-Caribbean, Afro-Latinx, East African, West African, Southern and Central African, Afro-Arab, Afro-Indigenous, etc. This funding program is intended to support the development, continuation, and flourishing of Black arts communities.
What does this program support?
The Black Arts Projects Program provides support to individual artists, artist collectives of 2 or more Black artists working on a non-profit basis and incorporated non-profit Toronto Black arts organizations.
TAC recognizes the need to respond to barriers that Black arts communities face due to anti-Black racism. The program is designed to increase access to, awareness of, and participation in Toronto Arts Council funding by Black artists, while amplifying the work of Black artists in the city and creating avenues for sustainable art practice.
This program is multidisciplinary and recognizes a diversity of art practice, including new and emerging art forms, culturally relevant art practices, and multi/ interdisciplinary arts projects. Applicants can apply for projects that engage one or multiple arts disciplines. Applicants may apply in one of two categories described below:
1. Creation & Development: Supports full creation, partial creation, or completion of work-in-progress of an arts-based project at any stage and in any arts discipline. Project activities may include artistic creation in one or more stages of a project, including an arts education project (i.e., workshop(s)). This may also include OR solely focus on the beginning stage of research and development. The research and development stage may include testing an idea, developing processes, building scope, building collaborative relationships, gathering and organizing information, accessing, archiving or documenting knowledge. Applicants must clearly state in what stage is their project and for what part(s) of the project they are seeking funding.
- Open to individual artists and artist collectives
- Maximum grant in this category is $10,000
- Maximum grant in this category including a mentorship component is $15,000
- Expenses can include:
- Artistic, production and administrative fees and costs, including venue, publicity, marketing and outreach;
- Fees paid to collaborators, mentors and creative resources;
- Studio costs, materials and production elements that are essential to creation;
- Rental of space or software to conduct research interviews; accessing support materials, i.e., archives;
- Visiting sites of significance.
2. Presentation: supports exhibition, presentation, and dissemination of work by Black artists in any arts discipline
- Open to individual artists, artist collectives and arts organizations with existing work to share (this component does not fund creation of works meant for presentation);
- Activities may include a series or one-off exhibition, festival, or presentation in one or more arts disciplines and/ dissemination of existing work;
- This component does not fund workshops and conferences;
- Maximum grant in this category is $15,000;
- Maximum grant in this category including a mentorship component is $20,000;
- Expenses can include:
- Artistic, presentation, exhibition and administrative fees and costs, including installation, rehearsal, venue, and production;
- Dissemination costs including publicity, marketing and outreach;
- Fees paid to collaborators and mentors.
TAC may fund up to 100% of the requested amount. If the requested amount is below the total project budget, applicants must indicate other revenue sources, which may include donated goods and services.
Additional resources for project grant recipients include:
- i. Mentorship – mentorship for project grant recipients interested in connecting with artists that can support them in building or acquiring skill sets to develop their art practice. A mentorship option will be available in each project grant category and applicants will be asked to indicate which mentor(s) they would like to work with and provide rationale for the mentorship. An additional budget of up to $5000 is available as compensation for mentors and mentees.
Grant recipients will also receive information about additional supports such as Arts Career Development workshops and Black Futures Studios Co-Creation Lab as they become available:
- ii. Arts Career Development - drop-in workshops focused on growing and establishing art practice. Project grant recipients may request and select sessions that are of benefit to them.
- iii. Black Futures Studios Co-Creation Lab - access to a multidisciplinary co-creation lab for artists to collaborate, meet, and exchange ideas. This space will provide open multidisciplinary studio spaces to create and collaborate on work. ***access to a physical space for this component is subject to COVID-19 guidelines on public indoor gatherings. Registration may be required to accommodate capacity limitations due to COVID-19.***
Learn more here: https://torontoartscouncil.org/grant-programs/discover-tac-grants/tac-grants/art-discipline-funding/black-arts/project-grants
Annual Operating - next deadline October 7th, 2021
The Black Arts Annual Operating Program is a new funding initiative created to support non-profit Toronto Black arts organizations seeking support with operating expenses. Qualifying organizations will be:
- Black-led: majority of leadership at all levels identify as Black
- Black-focused: primary goal of the organization is to meaningfully support and engage Black communities
- Black-serving: a significant portion of program activities prioritize serving Black communities. For the purpose of this program, “Black” refers to African descendant people across the diaspora including but not limited to African Canadian, Afro-Caribbean, Afro-Latinx, East African, West African, Southern and Central African, Afro-Arab, Afro-Indigenous, etc.
What does this program support?
TAC recognizes the need to respond to barriers that Black arts communities face due to anti-Black racism. The program seeks to address these barriers by providing pathways to sustainable support to Toronto’s Black-led arts organizations serving Black artists. This program also seeks to encourage the development and sustainability of Black arts communities by increasing availability of dedicated resources and support provided to Black artists and communities through Black arts organizations. This funding program is intended to support the development, continuation, and flourishing of Black arts organizations.
Who can apply?
To be eligible for this Annual Operating funding, an applicant must:
- be a non-profit professional arts organization;
- be Black-led, Black-focused, and Black-serving
- have professional artistic leadership and pay appropriate professional fees to artists;
- be located in the City of Toronto and have a significant portion of its activities occurring within the City;
- have a recent history of sustained arts activity of at least two years;
- have a viable administrative structure;
- demonstrate a range of revenue sources on an annual basis, which may include earned, government and private sector revenues;
- provide unaudited financial statements or internally prepared including a balance sheet, statement of income and expenses (if audited financial statements or review engagement is unavailable)
- be governed by a majority Black-led Board of Directors or other body responsible for the organization.
Please note: organizations are not required to exclusively support Black artists to be eligible, rather must have a consistent history of meaningful engagement of Black artists and a focus on Black artists in a significant component of their planned programming
Please consult with the Outreach and Access Program Manager to discuss your organization’s eligibility.
Frequently Asked Questions can be accessed here.
- Schools, tuition-funded training programs and curriculum-based programs are not eligible to apply to this program.
- Organizations must conduct their activities on an annual, ongoing basis either throughout the year or on a seasonal basis. Organizations, whose level of activity varies from season to season, in keeping with their mandate, must describe their production cycle.
- Organizations may receive only one grant per calendar year through the Black Arts program and may not apply to other TAC operating programs. However, organizations who receive a Black Arts Operating grant below $20,000 may still apply to otherdiscipline programs as well as strategic initiatives programs that TAC offers. In this case, the organization may receive up to one project grant in each funding stream and two project grants total per calendar year. Organizations receiving a Black Arts Operating grant above $20,000 can only apply to grants in the strategic initiatives programs. In this case, the organization may receive up to one project grant in addition to their operating grant per calendar year.
Learn more here: https://torontoartscouncil.org/grant-programs/discover-tac-grants/tac-grants/art-discipline-funding/black-arts/annual-operating
