Mid Atlantic Arts, in conjunction with South Arts, is thrilled to partner with the National Association of Black Storytellers (NABS) as they announce the 2023-2024 Black Appalachian Storytellers Fellowship program!

NABS Black Appalachian Storytellers Fellowships will provide six (6) $5,000 awards to support experienced practitioners and culture bearers with opportunities to examine, research, develop, perform, and/or document the Black Appalachian storytelling tradition. One fellowship will be awarded in each of the six eligible states. Applications for the fellowships are due August 20, 2023.

Fellows will receive an additional $1,300 to apply toward travel and lodging to the “In the Tradition…” 41st Annual National Black Storytelling Festival and Conference, November 8-12, 2023, in Salt Lake City, UT. Fellows will perform at the “In Tradition…” Concert on Friday, November 9, 2023. Fellows will also receive membership to the National Association of Black Storytellers from September 2023 – December 2024. 

The Black Appalachian Storytellers Fellowships are intended to honor, celebrate, and support Black storytellers residing in the Appalachian counties (as designated by the Appalachian Regional Commission) of Kentucky, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. The goals of the fellowship program are to preserve and advance the understanding of Black Appalachian storytelling that embodies the history, heritage, and culture of African Americans, and to build bridges through intergenerational opportunities. 

The deadline to apply for the 2024 Delaware Division of the Arts Individual Artist Fellowship s rapidly approaching! Applications must be submitted by 11:59pm ET on Tuesday, August 1, 2023 to be eligible.

The Fellowships provide funding to Delaware creative artists to fulfill needs that will allow them to advance in their careers.

Disciplines offered for 2024 Fellowships are:



• Dance: Choreography
• Folk Arts: Music, Oral Literature, Visual Arts
• Jazz: Composition, Performance
• Literature: Creative Nonfiction, Fiction, Playwriting, Poetry
• Media Arts: Film/Video
• Music: Composition, Solo Recital, Contemporary Performance
• Visual Arts: Crafts, Interdisciplinary, Painting, Photography, Sculpture, Works on Paper
• 
  

All applications must be submitted online. Program guidelines and a link to the online application are available on the Delaware Division of the Arts website.

Questions about Delaware Fellowships? Please review the program guidelines and contact Roxanne Stanulis at Roxanne.Stanulis@delaware.gov.

ArtsCONNECT recently announced 45 grants supporting public engagements and community activities. The grants provide over $337,000 in support of tours by 14 performing artists representing a diverse range of music, dance, and performance ensembles and artists. You can find out more about the tours and the communities they will be visiting here.

ArtsCONNECT supports touring projects collaboratively developed by presenters working together in the mid-Atlantic region. The tours include performances as well as complementary engagement activities designed to create greater understanding or connections between artists, audiences, and communities.

The inaugural grantee cohort for Iber Exchange, a pilot program that fosters cultural exchange through international artistic programming in the mid-Atlantic region and Ibero-America region, has been announced and includes 19 communities across the region.

As part of Iber Exchange, artists from the countries represented in the Ibero-America region applied to enter the touring roster for the program through Ibermúsicas. Once the artists were selected, presenting organizations in the mid-Atlantic region submitted offer letters to join the artists’ tours. Iber Exchange provides grant support for visa fees and up to 50% of the artist fees to help lower barriers to presenting international music ensembles. This year, Iber Exchange will provide $49,920 to support public performances and engagement activities in Mid Atlantic Arts' partner states and jurisdictions, as well as visa costs for artists on the roster. The 2023-2024 selected artists are:

• The Alejandro Brittes Quartet, Brazil
• La Banda Morisca, Spain
• Caña Dulce y Caña Brava, Mexico

More information about the Iber Exchange and tours can be found here.

Image: Iber Exchange artist La Banda Morisca. Credit: Courtesy of the artist.

The 2023-2024 Mid Atlantic Tours roster artists will visit 55 communities across the region in the coming months! Mid Atlantic Tours brings the best of the performing arts to communities across the mid-Atlantic region. Presenters select from a curated roster of artists that changes annually but maintains a programmatic commitment to a diversity of performance genres, regional artist representation, and engaging with communities underserved by the arts.

Tours include:

• Calpulli Mexican Dance Company
• From China to Appalachia: Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer with Chao Tian
• DuPont Brass
• The Legendary Ingramettes
• Martha Redbone

Visit this link to find out where you can see them in your state and to learn more about the Mid Atlantic Tours program. The next Mid Atlantic Tours roster will be available this fall!

Congratulations to the 28 ensembles and solo performers who received USArtists International 2023 third round grants! They will perform at 35 festivals on five continents around the globe!

USArtists International supports in-person and virtual performances by American artists at engagements at international festivals and global presenting arts marketplaces outside of the United States. The program funds individuals and ensembles across all performing arts practices and disciplines.

The 2023-2024 USAI deadlines are:

• September 29, 2023 for projects taking place between January 15, 2024 and June 30, 2025.
• March 27, 2024 for projects taking place between July 1, 2024 and June 30, 2025

Guidelines will be available in early August 2023.

Image: Moriel Rothman-Zecher, Julie Weitz, and Ira Khonen Temple performing "Seven Beggars" in the streets of Krakow, Poland during the 32nd Jewish Culture Festival, June 28, 2023. This performance was funded by USAI 2023. Credit: Konrad Obidzinski

A reminder that our Executive Director Opportunity is closing Tuesday, August, 1, 2023. Our next Executive Director will have an equity-driven vision for the national arts funding ecosystem and for how the current system can more effectively invest in and support artists and organizations at the local, state, regional, and national levels through direct funding, programs, services, and partnerships. Interested candidates can find the full Opportunity Statement and application information here: https://www.creativeevolutions.com/MidAtlantic.

Welcome to Mackenzie Kwok, our new Communications and Social Media Manager. Mackenzie will work with External Affairs to share stories of Mid Atlantic grantees, keep the field informed of opportunities, and manage our social media channels. She can be reached at mkwok@midatlanticarts.org.

Mackenzie brings years of experience working for various organizations as a media, marketing and communications manager. Her most recent position was with Camino PR as an Account Manager and Media Specialist. Mackenzie is a graduate of University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is currently a Board Member at New York Folklore and has served as a panelist for New Jersey State Council on the Arts. Mackenzie lives in Brooklyn, NY.

And our newest team member, Ellie Dassler, will join us in August as the Program Director for Folk and Traditional Arts. In addition to overseeing the Central Appalachia Living Traditions and Folk and Traditional Arts Community Projects grants program, she will be responsible for all of our folk and traditional arts programming.

Originally from Hampton Roads, Virginia, Ellie holds an MA in Folk Studies from Western Kentucky University and a BA in Anthropology from the College of William & Mary in Virginia. Most recently, she served as the Assistant Director for Traditional Arts at South Arts, where she helped to facilitate its traditional arts programs, including the In These Mountains, Central Appalachian Folk Arts and Culture initiative. She has also worked and interned at the Kentucky Folklife Program, the Journal of American Folklore, the North Carolina Arts Council, and Long Island Traditions, and she was a 2017-2018 Fulbright English Teaching Assistant at the University of Aveiro in Portugal. Ellie is a passionate believer in the role that traditional arts and culture can play in building a more equitable world.

Opportunity Quick Links

• Huntington Arts Council invites applications for its Community Impact Micro Grants program. It funds nonprofit organizations or individual artists for arts and cultural projects and activities that enable Nassau, NY and Suffolk, NY communities to experience and engage with the performing, literary, media, and visual arts. Grants of $1,000 will be awarded. Deadline: July 28, 2023.

• The Boynes Artist Award program invites applications from artists of all career stages, experiences, and backgrounds in the following categories: Emerging Artist, Young Artist, and Professional Artist. Award money ranges from $500 to $2,000 across the different categories. Deadline: July 30, 2023.

• The Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts invites applications for its 2024 Artists-in-Residence program. Through the program, United States-based artists-in-residence receive a $1,250 monthly stipend and an additional $750 travel stipend. Disciplines invited to apply include but are not limited to the visual arts, media/new genre, performance, architecture, film/video, interdisciplinary arts, sound art and music composition, and choreography. Deadline: August 1, 2023.

• Northwest Film Forum invites applications for the Lynn Shelton “Of a Certain Age” grant program. A project-based award that provides $25,000 to an individual woman, non-binary, and/or transgender U.S. filmmaker, age 39 or older, who is working on their first narrative feature (65 minutes or over) as a director. This grant seeks to recognize a film director for their distinct vision, storytelling, and singularity. Deadline: August 1, 2023.

• The Robert David Lion Gardiner Foundation invites applications for educational and preservation projects conducted by historical societies, historians, anthropologists, academic institutions, museums, and similar organizations with the potential to promote appreciation of the heritage of Suffolk County, NY and/or preserve local historical collections and structures. Deadline: August 11, 2023.

Image: Alicia Olatuja performs at Frostburg State University with support from the Jazz Touring Network. Credit: Koda Murphy.