DC
Merge: Nation's Best Emerging Artists with Disabilities
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This call invites artists to consider the intersections and combinations of their creative process and disability identity. In art, the juxtaposition of ideas can blur distinctions or reveal something new. This year’s theme, Merge, explores uniting paths and asks what we can learn when it all comes together.
About the VSA Emerging Young Artists Program
Our programs for artists with disabilities shape the future of the arts. The VSA Emerging Young Artists Program, a Jean Kennedy Smith Arts and Disability Program, amplifies the voices of emerging artists with career development and professional empowerment. The competition seeks excellent work from emerging artists with disabilities residing in the United States.
Volkswagen Group of America is the VSA Emerging Young Artists Program Presenting Sponsor.
Eligibility
• Artist must be between the ages of 16 and 25 during the application window. Birthdates between April 28, 1995 and April 28, 2005 are eligible.
• Artist must reside in the United States for at least nine months of the year.
• Artist must have a disability as defined by the Americans with Disabilities Act (a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities.) This includes sensory, physical, cognitive, learning, socio-emotional disabilities and more. If selected, artists must be comfortable publicly identifying as an artist with a disability.
After the deadline, finalists will be contacted by email and asked to submit documents proving the above eligibility requirements prior to advancing to the final round. Eligibility documents include the following:
Proof of Disability (finalists only)
May include one of the following:
• a letter from a doctor or other healthcare professional
• a letter from a reputable disability association or organization, a professional counselor, or a representative of a college or university disability services office
• Individualized Education Program (IEP) documents
• a letter from the head of the IEP team
The document does not have to be recent but it must state the nature of the applicant’s disability or disabilities.
Proof of Age (finalists only)
Must be a copy of a government issued ID, such as a passport, birth certificate, or driver's license. To be eligible, the applicant must be born between April 28, 1996 and April 28, 2005.
Proof of US Residence (finalists only)
The applicant does not need to be US citizen, but must reside in the United States for at least 9 months of the year. Proof of US residency may include a lease or utility bill in the applicant's name, a student loan statement, a notarized affidavit of residency, a letter from a current employer, a letter from a teacher or professor, or another official document indicating current residency. International students must be residing in the US with a current student visa at the time of application.
Additional Requirements
• Submitted artwork must have been completed within the last 3 years, and after the onset of disability.
• Submitted artwork must be able to withstand handling, storage, and transportation for a year-long, national tour.
• 2-Dimensional artwork cannot exceed 60 inches in height or width.
• 3-Dimensional artwork cannot exceed 48 inches in any direction when packed for shipping.
• All art forms and media are eligible, except artwork containing perishable materials, such as food.
• Applicant must be the sole creator and owner of all artwork submitted. Group projects will not be considered.
• Work that suggests visual plagiarism, such as direct copy of another artists’ work, will not be considered.
• Winning artists must participate in the professional development activities (virtual or in-person) to receive their award.
• Previous Emerging Young Artist Program award winners are not eligible to apply.
Fifteen winning artists are selected by jury. Grand Prize is $20,000, First Prize is $10,000, Second Prize is $6,000, and the remaining Awards of Excellence are $2,000 each. For winning artists, one of the submitted artworks will be selected for a national exhibition. Artists attend professional development activities provided by the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.
Entry Fee:
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Merge: Nation's Best Emerging Young Artists with Disabilities
Category:
Theme:
Eligibility:
The VSA Emerging Young Artists Program amplifies the voices of visual artists with disabilities through career development and professional empowerment. The competition seeks excellent work from emerging artists with disabilities, ages 16-25, residing in the United States.
Fifteen winning artists are selected by jury. Grand Prize is $20,000, First Prize is $10,000, Second Prize is $6,000, and the remaining Awards of Excellence are $2,000 each. For winning artists, one of the submitted artworks will be selected for a national exhibition. Artists participate in professional development activities provided by the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.
Fifteen winning artists are selected by jury. Grand Prize is $20,000, First Prize is $10,000, Second Prize is $6,000, and the remaining Awards of Excellence are $2,000 each. For winning artists, one of the submitted artworks will be selected for a national exhibition. Artists participate in professional development activities provided by the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.
Entry Fee:
- No
VSA Playwright Discovery Competition
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The 2021 VSA Playwright Discovery Award Program is now accepting 2021 applications. High school students are invited to explore the disability experience through the art of writing for performance. Young writers with disabilities and collaborative groups that include students with disabilities are encouraged to submit short works written to be performed: plays, spoken word poetry (for single performer or a group), or music theater.
Writers must have a disability
U.S. writers must be grades 6-12 (or equivalents)
Non-U.S. writers age 11-18
Scripts may be for theater scripts, musicals, multimedia, video, film, or TV scripts, non-linear scripts or other writing for performance
Entries may be the work of an individual student or a collaboration by a group of up to five students
Writers are encouraged to craft short (10 minute) works from their own experiences/observations
A Jean Kennedy Smith Arts and Disability Program
Entry Fee:
- No
VSA International Young Soloists Competition
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Calling all musicians with disabilities, ages 14-25!
Each year outstanding young musicians with disabilities from around the world receive the VSA International Young Soloists Award, $2,000, and the opportunity to perform and participate in professional development and music coaching activities provided by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.
This program is open to soloists and ensembles of any instrument or genre!
Entry Fee:
- No
The 2019 Christenberry Scholarship
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The late William Christenberry was best known for his evocative photographs, collages, assemblages, paintings, drawings, and sculptures of his birthplace, Hale County, Alabama, and for his haunting vision of the American South. As a teacher and mentor to hundreds of students at the Corcoran College of Art and Design in Washington, DC he was a guiding force for aspiring artists.
To honor his legacy, Washington, DC’s Studio Gallery is offering The Christenberry Fellowship. Through it, local emerging artists gain their first entry to a professional gallery, where they can join a broad and diverse artistic community and display and market their work alongside that of established artists.
A grant underwriting this fellowship worth $1,000 annually was made possible by Jeff Mace. It enables the selected fellow to join the artist-run, cooperative for one year (with renewal possibility), without having to pay the normal fellowship member fee and to skip the normal jurying process for Studio Gallery membership.
The goal is to expose new artists to the greater Washington, DC art world and to increase their professional skills by displaying their works within a gallery setting. Local emerging artists learn to: create a cohesive body of work, refine it with a curator, optimize its exhibition design and lighting selections, and maximize its potential for purchase through marketing, promotion, and sales techniques. In addition, by joining an artist-run gallery, they meet and interact with a cross-section of working Washington artists for informal networking and mentoring.
