The Future Culture Creative Placemaking Grants support Staten Island artists creating new work in a community setting.
Four grants are awarded in the amount of $2,500.

This grant category is for Staten Island artists creating new work in a community setting that connects places and people using arts and culture on Staten Island’s North Shore. An essential element of this funding is community engagement. The project must engage a segment of the community through a public program and/or the inclusion of community involvement in the development and creative process of the project.

Projects must connect to at least one of the recommendations established by Future Culture: Connecting Staten Island’s Waterfront, a joint initiative created in 2016 by Design Trust for Public Space and Staten Island Arts. The project aims to shape and communicate a vision for culture along Staten Island’s rapidly developing North Shore waterfront that:

  • Supports and promotes unique cultural communities
  • Develops art and cultural activities that connect places and people
  • Strengthens the relationship between the cultural sector and owners and stewards of property

Through Future Culture, Staten Islanders have articulated a vision for how new development can build on the area’s rich culture to foster a vibrant and connected waterfront. The resulting Recommendations (published in March 2017) are meant to be utilized by the community as a resource to challenge public and private stakeholders to devise creative solutions to community challenges.

Read the Recommendations:
Recommendations (condensed)
Recommendations (full document)

All art and artistic cultural disciplines including, but not limited to music, dance, digital/new media, film/video/animation, folk arts, interdisciplinary events/festivals, public art, theatre, performing and visual arts are considered.

Each grant cycle, under-resourced disciplines are identified and then prioritized in the panel process. The list of disciplines will be announced closer to November.

The Future Culture Creative Placemaking grant is funded by the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency Statewide Community Regrant Program with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

Guidelines & Eligibility

NYSCA Future Culture Creative Placemaking Grant Guidelines

To be eligible for a NYSCA Future Culture Creative Placemaking grant, the applicant must meet ALL of the following criteria:

  • Proposals must focus on artistic or creative expression and cultural significance.
  • Clearly stated objectives – especially in regards to how the selected community is engaged.
  • Clear connection to the Future Culture recommendation/s that the project will explore or test.
  • Clear and realistic plan for implementation that highlights the impact on the engaged  community/communities.
  • Realistic budget for stated proposal.
  • Need and impact on the artistic discipline, geographic area, or local population: projects that address under-resourced communities or artistic disciplines will receive foremost attention.  Under-resourced communities have low or limited access to the means of cultural production as well as art programming/activities. Under-resourced disciplines are disciplines that have received low or limited funding from the arts council in the past.
  • Applicant’s artistic experience, skill, and exhibition/performance history.
  • The project should be accessible to any member of the community who wishes to partake in the experience. Venues should comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act standards. Virtual programs should provide captioning, subtitles, or ASL interpretation.

What is not eligible:

  • Organizations or Individuals who submit direct applications to the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) in the same fiscal year their SIA grant would be issued, regardless of their application’s status.
  • Programs that are essentially religious, recreational, rehabilitative, or therapeutic.
  • Universities, colleges, primary and secondary schools, school affiliates or components, in-school activities or programs that exclusively serve a student audience with no public component.
  • Any type of curriculum-based and instruction-based arts education programs taking place in K-12 classrooms.
  • Programs/activities that exclusively serve a select audience with no public component.
  • Operating expenses of privately-owned facilities (homes and studios).
  • Capital improvements, equipment purchases*, fundraising events, prizes, entertainment, reception or food expenses, any non-arts related expenses.
  • Applicants who fail to complete previous SI Arts grant projects and/or failure to complete final reporting.

*Virtual project exemption – equipment, software, subscriptions, and training needed to produce a virtual project. Individual items may not exceed $1,000. Examples: cameras, lighting equipment, subscriptions associated with virtual programming, and training to utilize these tools.

Application Information

Applications for the 2024 cycle are currently open. Deadline to apply is January 31, 2024.

All first-time applicants must attend an information session. The information session schedule can be found here.

Selection Criteria

The following is the criteria used to decide on funding:

Work Sample: Can they successfully create the project they propose from the work shown in the sample or have they demonstrated readiness for the proposed project through past work? Does it have artistic merit/cultural significance?

Connection to Recommendations & Community Outreach (Public Component): How does the project explore the Future Culture Recommendations? How does the project use public space and how will it be made available to the public? Which communities does it serve? Projects that provide meaningful community engagement will receive foremost attention.

Narrative: Does the narrative clearly articulate their project idea and aims? Does it show that the applicant has experience creating this kind of work, or that they can successfully do what they propose? Take into consideration their past work.

Budget: Are their numbers realistic? Do they have a realistic artist fee, materials fee, etc.? Does their adjusted budget allow for the proposal to be completed as stated? Artist fees, marketing and publicity expenses, direct administrative expenses, supplies and materials expenses are given priority. (Money can never be used for food/refreshments/purchasing equipment.)

Need Help

All first-time applicants must attend an application seminar. (In addition, applicants who have not received funding in the past 2 years should attend an application seminar.) Once available, the application seminar schedule is posted on the Grants Overview page.

During grants season, Grants Administrator Gena Mimozo also offers 1:1 grant support Monday through Friday from 3pm to 7pm for prospective applicants who already have a proposal in mind or who have multiple proposals in mind and need guidance/feedback.

If you are a first-time applicant, you must attend an application seminar before you request a consultation. If you have attended a seminar and would like a consult, please fill out this form.

If you have any additional questions, please contact Gena at gmimozo@statenislandarts.org, (718) 447-3329 x1003.