Past
Grantees

A two-year grant of $74,000 was awarded to FRANKLIN FURNACE ARCHIVE, New York City, in support of the participation of emerging artists in the Fund for Performance Art and The Future of the Present. Franklin Furnace is committed to making the world safe for avant-garde art. The Fund for Performance Art sustains Franklin Furnaces connection with its rootsthe community of avant-garde artists, while fostering discourse and evolution of ideas that will impact the culture at large. It provides grants to competitively selected and emerging performance artists who are creating new work. In The Future of the Present, grants are awarded to emerging new media artists to support the creation of new work.

Anthony Gatto, Minneapolis, Minnesota, director of Headwaters Music, received funding to travel to the Netherlands to obtain counsel and gather information that will assist in the development of a strategic plan for a new performing arts venue. Gatto will investigate similar existing spaces to research the costs and benefits of a multifunction venue. This future Headwaters Music venue will be a musical foundry for creating new works by emerging and established composers. It will provide rehearsal space, technical support, and sound and audio engineering. In Amsterdam, Gatto will consult several new music composers, producers, musicians, and organizations.

Poet TED GENOWAYS will travel to Eagle and Fairbanks, Alaska, for ten days to conduct archival research and oral history interviews about Anna and Abe Malm for a collection of poems. The Malms were a Finnish couple who sought to make their fortune during the Alaska gold rush by opening a laundry service. While traveling in Alaska in 1996, Genoways heard a story about the couple and began writing sonnets about them.

ERIK GESCHKE, sculptor and professor, will spend one month in China as a visiting artist in the Sculpture Department at LuXun Academy of Fine Arts in Shenyang, where he expects to investigate ideas and make new work. Geschke will also visit the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing and pursue interactions with Chinese artists and educators. He hopes to build the foundations of an exchange program between the LuXun Academy and the University of Minnesotas Art Department as a result of this residency.

Filmmaker MELODY GILBERT will spend three weeks traveling to Milwaukee, North Carolina, New York, Holland, and Scotland to conduct research and interview people with apotemnophilia, an extreme form of body dysmorphia that causes individuals to become obsessed with amputating their limbs. Gilbert plans to produce a documentary. She will interview apotemnophiles, doctors familiar with the disorder, wannabes who pretend to have this condition, and devotees who are attracted to amputees.

BILLY GOLFUS, Minneapolis, MN, received support for Sex & the Single Gimp, a romantic comedy about a paraplegic who tries to learn to swing dance in his wheel chair in order to meet women.

Musician ERIC GRAHAM, Red Wing, will spend four weeks in San Rafael, California, attending the Ali Akbar Khan College of Music. Graham will study Hindustani music at the college. He will focus on melody and rhythm theories in order to transform his composition techniques and broaden his improvisation skills. Graham has spent years as an active jazz string bassist and composer who writes and plays a variety of musical styles. By studying Hindustani music, he hopes to push his musical ideas beyond the limits of traditional jazz.

Two grants of $10,000 each were made to GRANTMAKERS IN THE ARTS, Seattle, Washington, in support of programs and services and Jerome Foundations 2002 and 2003 organizational membership. Grantmakers in the Arts was established in 1985 as the national affinity organization for private, corporate, community, and family foundations that make arts and culture grants. The organization provides publications, research, information services, and meetings to strengthen the field of private sector arts grantmaking with the aim of promoting more meaningful support of arts and culture.

JONATHAN HAMILTON, Visual Arts Program Director, Interact Center for the Visual and Performing Arts, will spend six weeks in central Scotland expanding his knowledge of programs that serve artists with disabilities. Hamilton will observe model programs and create collaborative partnerships with several well-established arts organizations in Glasgow. He shares a personal and professional dedication with the organizations he will visit, all of which focus on creative strengths rather than disabilities. He will research programs at Project Ability, Trongate Studios, and ArtLink Central.

A grant was awarded to TANA HARGEST in support of New Negrotopia, an interactive new media project that will examine the theme of utopian space and the hegemony of race.

AARON DAVIS HALL, Harlem, New York, received $20,000 in support of the Fund for New Work, and specifically for commissions to emerging creative artists to develop new work. Aaron Davis Hall has provided over 22 years of service to Harlem as its principal center for the performing arts, responsible for the management and programming of a three-theater complex. Jerome dollars are directed to artists who are at the beginnings of creating work and have shown initial promise; artists who are under-recognized because their opportunities have been limited, particularly in major venues; and artists who are moving into new forms. Performances of works created via these commissions are often seen at Aaron Davis in such series as E-Moves.

AARON DAVIS HALL, New York City, received $20,000 in support of commissions to emerging artists from the Fund for New Work. The mission of Aaron Davis is to foster the creation and development of new works by performing artists of color; provide a forum for culturally diverse artists, community-based performing arts organizations, and regionally significant arts groups; present performances for the residents of Harlem at affordable prices; and institute educational initiatives for the metropolitan area's young people. The Fund for New Work assists artists in the conception, development, and presentation of new work. It augments the performing series NewFacesNewVoicesNewVisions, which presents artists at the vanguard of creating new trends and traditions in their field.

MARYA HART, pianist and arranger, will spend seven weeks in Germany and the United Kingdom to study Weimar-era musical traditions and contemporary performance styles, with a focus on the work of Hanns Eisler. Hart is employed at the Childrens Theatre Company and has recently been creating theater works around musical themes. She is currently working on political music of the 1930s and 40s. In Germany, Hart will build on her preliminary research to learn from the experience of others who have worked in the European tradition, obtain feedback from artists and scholars on her work, and generate ideas for new pieces. In England, Hart will attend cabaret performances that feature contemporary and historical political music.

Jerome Foundation Directors awarded a two-year grant of $37,000 to HARVESTWORKS, New York City, in support of the Artists in Residence Program. Now in its 19th year, this program subsidizes a creative period for competitively selected emerging artists who are exploring new directions in their work. The residency gives them access to sophisticated production and recording equipment, and the assistance of an expert engineer. Artists also receive stipends, tapes and production supplies. The mission of Harvestworks is to foster the creation of new work by artists who use technology in their creative process.

Media artist MIKE HAZARD will spend six days in New York being mentored by master filmmaker and teacher George Stoney. Hazard seeks to develop further his professional life as an artist in the schools. The two share an interest in video poetry and a desire to change the world through passionate media. Hazard will also explore the idea of producing a video documentary portrait of Stoney as a teacher, activist, and artist. Hazard will show his work at the Tisch School of the Arts.

HEADWATERS MUSIC, Minneapolis, Minnesota, received funding of $17,000 to commission emerging New York City and Minnesota composers to write works for the 2002 Festival Dancing In Your Head, a marathon performance of new music. Numerous eclectic ensembles present a wide range of musical styles and ideas in works by emerging and established composers. The Festival not only offers concert opportunities for new music, it provides strong publicity, impressive audience sizes, interaction among musical styles and cultural traditions, and the strengthening of a new music network in Minnesota.

IN THE HEART OF THE BEAST PUPPET AND MASK THEATRE, Minneapolis, Minnesota, received $18,000 in support of three productions by emerging puppet and mask artists. Duane Tougas and Masanari Kawahara are creating works for From the Inside Out. Tougas will create the Apartment Show, which moves from the exterior signs of an apartment building to an interior view of one tenants life and relationships. Kawahara is adapting a story about butchering a pig by Japanese writer Kenji Miyazawa. Elisha Whittington will create Queen Nanny, Queen Nanny!, based on the true story of an 18th century Jamaican woman who was a the leader of a group of revolutionary former slaves.

ALISON HEIMSTEAD, pyrotechnic and puppet artist, will travel to Vashon Island in Washington State for 27 days to participate in Islewilde!, an annual community arts event. Heimstead will collaborate with Festival Director Andrew Kim to create the opening ceremony. She will lend her pyrotechnic skills to the event and learn how other community-based art events are structured, while furthering her pyrotechnic development by working with established pyrotechnic artists.

HERE, New York City, received $20,000 to support the creation and production of new works by core artists. A multi-arts center with performance spaces, galleries and a caf, HERE supports the innovative work of artists at all levels in their careers. Jerome funding will be directed toward two works by Fernando Maneca, Just Like a Man: Personal Anecdotes, Confessions and Other Tall Tales and Today I am Feeling a Bit Less Cynical. The first is a solo hybrid performance piece exploring what it means to be a man. The second is an ensemble piece inspired by the existential writings of Franz Kafka and Fernando Pessoa. Kristin Marting is developing a new work, The Winds of Her Misfortune, inspired by the writing of Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Marting will collaborate with Todd Griffin to examine the role of first world imperialism in third world societies through her gestural vocabulary and his low-tech music.

Jerome Foundation Directors made a grant of $15,000 to the HIGHPOINT CENTER FOR PRINTMAKING, Minneapolis, Minnesota, in support of residencies for emerging printmakers, and professional support for those artists. The Center, founded by Carla McGrath and Cole Rogers, serves independent artists and provides educational programming for young people. Jerome funding will be used to initiate a residency program that will support four to five emerging printmakers from the Upper Midwest, the majority of those Minnesota residents. The program is designed to advance the work and level of recognition of print artists. It provides shop and equipment access, technical support, discounts on programs, assistance in creating portfolios of work made during the residencies, and a group exhibition.