Grants & Artistic Support

1. Lower the Barrier to Entry: The Community Catalyst Grant opens up funding to individual artists, informal collectives, and unincorporated groups who were previously ineligible
2. Narrow the Focus to Community Ownership: The review process places its highest emphasis (40%) on community leadership, co-creation, and lived experience rather than institutional longevity or traditional "artistic excellence".
3. Simplify the Application and the Reporting: The new program significantly reduces administrative burden by streamlining application materials and offering multi-format final reporting options.

• Builders
• Artists
• Researchers
• Domestic workers
• Home health care workers
• App-based workers
• Disability rights advocates
• Policymakers
• Journalists

Supports the creation of work by Bay Area artists and access to the arts for Bay Area communities. Grantseekers must be located in or serving communities in Alameda, Contra Costa or San Francisco Counties. While Community Arts grants are awarded as general operating support, application materials must include information about an upcoming project. Applications must be submitted by 5:00pm on the application cycle due date. Late and/or incomplete applications will be considered in the following cycle, if eligible. $5,000, $10,000 or $15,000.

The Creative Catalyst Fellowship supports individual artists whose work engages the public on critical issues facing Asian American and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) and can serve as a catalyst for civic participation. Selected artists join a cohort convened for peer sharing and learning, with access to communications consultation and promotion of their final work.

Up to eight artists will each receive $30,000 to produce work with the potential to break through to broader audiences and spark conversation around this year’s theme: Belonging.

Belonging is a sense of community, home, agency, and the essential right for our communities to flourish. It is a counterweight to racism and violence, and it advances a vision of inclusion that recognizes the ways AAPI communities have shaped and contributed to this country.

Art speaks to us, feels our pain, paints our dreams, and opens our minds in profound new ways. Our goal is to give independent artists the resources and freedom to do their art, in a way that also lets us put that art to work in the world.

The Community Challenge Grants program recognizes our communities’ interdependence and collective strength and funds neighborhood beautification projects that foster resilience, safety, and belonging in San Francisco.

General Eligibility:

• The applicant organization must be a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization or the applicant may use a fiscal sponsor that meets this criteria
• The applicant or key project staff must have successfully completed projects of similar size and scope or work with a qualifying fiscal sponsor
• The project location must take place in the City and County of San Francisco with approval by the property owner(s)

Grant Request Range: $50,000 - $150,000

This year’s theme, TAKING ROOT, invites us to reflect on the conditions that our communities need to prosper. To take root is an active process of insisting on forging pathways and building strong foundations for sustainable futures. This not only means cultivating safe spaces to call home, but also building networks, relationships, and ecosystems that make this possible. The festival will explore how we can nurture these connections with each other and with the land. ⭐ Grants of $3,000-$5,000 will support artist-produced events taking place in San Francisco between May - June 13, 2027 ⭐ Grants of $1,000 for our showcase performance at our new APICC x KULARTS building in May or June 2027 ⭐ Link in bio to learn more about eligibility and how to apply! ⏰ SUBMIT BY October 23 AT 11:59PM ⏰

More info at https://www.nationalparksartsfoundation.org/allresidencies

Provides one-time grants of up to $5,000 for unexpected medical, dental, and mental health emergencies to artists in financial need who are creating in the visual arts, film/video/electronic/digital arts, and choreography.

$500 - $3,000. Provides urgent funding for visual and performing artists who:

• Have sudden, unanticipated opportunities to present their work to the public when there is insufficient time to seek other sources of funding
• Incur unexpected or unbudgeted expenses for projects close to completion with committed exhibition or performance dates.