Past
Grantees

Graywolf Press, St. Paul, Minnesota, received a grant of $18,000 to continue its publishing support of emerging writers. Under the new direction of Artistic Director/Executive Fiona McCrae, Graywolf will intensify its efforts on behalf of talented emerging artists.

Media Program Coordinator JOHN GWINN received support to spend six weeks in Mexico City studying with several media arts groups, most notably the Independent Video Producers of Mexico, in order to further his knowledge as a media producer and program administrator. He will participate in production workshops and roundtable discussions, and assist with current narrative and documentary video productions by PIVAC members. He hopes to gain knowledge about coordinating and managing a coalition group of independent film and video makers, to explore the moral and social implications associated with the documentary form and how it functions in a social context, and to investigate neighborhood-based media literacy programs.

Writer PATRICIA HAMPL received subsidy to spend one month in Prague, in the Czech Republic, to significantly improve her Czech language skills. She will then work with the Czech translator of her literary work, beginning with Spillville, a prose meditation on Antonin Dvoraks 1983 summer in Spillville, Iowa. These experiences will help Hampl fulfill two goals. The first is to be a productive English half of a Czech/English translating team not only for her own work but as a conduit for more Czech literature into the United States. The second is to expand her contacts with Czech writers in an effort to know that literary culture better so that she might write about it more authoritatively for an American audience. She wants to contribute to a lively exchange between the Czech Republic and the United States.

Aaron Davis Hall, New York City, received $7,000 in support of the Fund for New Works. Jerome subsidy is earmarked for emerging artists' projects. The Fund for New Works provides commissioning and programmatic support for three to four works by emerging artists each year. The Hall's larger New Faces/New Voices/New Visions series programming responds aggressively to the lack of opportunities for the creation of new works by artists of color.

Karen Haselmann, Minneapolis, MN, $3,000 (Completion). Burning Desire. Finishing funds for a video documentary, which documents the creative collaboration of women - "fire junkies" - who involve themselves in all aspects of the foundry arts.

Corn Palace Productions, Minneapolis, Minnesota, received a two-year grant of $22,000 in support of its 1995-96 and 1996-97 seasons. This is an organization devoted to the development and presentation of theatrical works by composers, including new forms of opera; instrumental music with video, lighting and stage design; and choreographed music for musicians. Funding will support the work of no fewer than seven emerging composers over the two year span of time.

Acting as fiscal agent for an independent artist project, the Minnesota Composers Forum, St. Paul, Minnesota, received $3,000 to complete the production of a CD of chamber music by composer Steve Heitzeg.

Peter Herwitz received funding to produce Music for Several Voices, a film combining visual montage and superimpositions, spoken text, and sound effects into a richly patterned work using musical forms, particularly contrapuntal forms such as fugue and canon, as a model. The film begins with purely abstract imagery, evolving into more representational forms suggested by the abstract images. In the climactic section, images, sounds and spoken words function as different voices in a complex dialogue of gestures and rhythms addressing the similarity between a polyphonic composition and the development of a visual sound composition over time. Herwitz will explore musical and cinematic analogies as poetic possibilities.

Architect ALI HESHMATI received subsidy to spend four months in Tehran, Iran and Bukhara, Uzbekistan to study Persian Islamic architecture. Heshmati will focus on the minaret, a rather ambiguously symbolic, ceremonial, functional and monumental part of Islamic architecture. He will explore how the minaret affects the architecture and the culture around it, and how it is affected by its environment. The search will culminate in the making of a book which will contain accumulated artifacts: photos, sketches, diagrams and some thoughts.

KATHRYN HIGH received funding to produce The 23 Songs of the Chromosomes, a one-hour narrative video about popular cultures shift in attitude towards a belief in scientific determinism and gene dreams. High will work with both narrative and documentary elements, addressing the grandiose area of genetic values. Do new technologies replicate people in ways that disassociate them from their bodies, and their communities, or do they bring people together in new ways?

Illusion Theater, Minneapolis, Minnesota, received a two-year grant of $25,000 in support of the 1996 and 1997 Fresh Ink series and the employment of an Artistic Associate. Illusion is committed to creating work which illuminates the human condition by addressing the illusions, myths and realities of contemporary culture, and which uses the power of theater as a catalyst for personal and social change. Illusion has supported the creation of more than 150 new works in collaboration with playwrights, directors, composers, designers and human service professionals. The objective of the Fresh Ink series is to bring finished chamber pieces and works-in-progress before a live audience. Artists are encouraged to try new areas of expression, actors to begin the process of writing, and writers to direct their own works.

The Independent Sector, Washington, D.C., is a national membership organization which encourages the giving, volunteering and not-for-profit initiative in the United States. It acts as a meeting ground which brings grantmakers and grantseekers together to work on common concerns. It has extensive publication and education programs, a very active government relations program, a productive and comprehensive research department and an ongoing public campaign on giving and volunteering titled Give Five. The Jerome Foundation authorized a grant of $2,331 in general operating support of The Independent Sector's program and as the Foundation's membership fee.

INTAR, New York City, received $10,000 to support a developmental theater program for emerging playwrights. INTAR is a national arts center which promotes the contemporary Hispanic artist. Since inception, the organization has produced work by more than 150 playwrights and composers. The New Works Lab is dedicated to the support and development of new directors, writers, actors and other artists from the Latino theater community, with an emphasis on experimentation.

The INTAR Gallery, New York City, received $14,000 to support the participation of emerging artists in the 1995-96 exhibition program of the INTAR Gallery. Established in 1979, the INTAR Gallery is one of New York Citys primary alternative spaces, providing exposure to both emerging and established visual artists of Latino heritage.

Intermedia Arts Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, received a grant of $35,500 in support of the Art in Space program and artists' services in the 1994-95 program year. Art in Space evolved from the previously supported installation art commissioning program. Art in Space will continue to offer funds to individual artists for installation work; however, the definition of installation work will be greatly expanded and the program will become more flexible in terms of the application and award procedures. Installations will occur in Intermedia Arts Minnesota's new location in the Lyndale-Lake area of Minneapolis.

A grant of $15,000 was made to the Jewish Community Center of Greater Minneapolis in support of the development and mounting of an installation titled PASSAGES, focusing on the experience of immigration, and created by artists Franciska Rosenthal Louw and Beth Grossman. After showing at the Jewish Community Center Gallery, the installation will travel to the Ellis Island Immigration Museum of New York City.

Dawn Renee Jones, Minneapolis, MN, $5,000 (Production). Shiny Stockings. A 56-minute documentary videotape about the Dyerettes, six African-American female tap-dancers who performed on US and Canadian stages in the late 40s, 50s and early 60s.

Playwright and business consultant SYL JONES will spend approximately 12 days in Seattle, Chicago, Pittsburgh and West Virginia. Jones has been commissioned to write a play about the formation the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters. He will interview African-American Pullman car porters in the four areas.

Artist and educator GITA KAR received subsidy to spend five weeks in India to broaden the conceptual and creative scope of her work in traditional impermanent art through advanced study and work with master artists in the Mithila tradition and Sanskrit literary scholars. In addition to studying the art form, she wishes to develop further the relationship of mythology and philosophy to her own art work, which is an expression of her cultural identity.

John R. Killacky, Minneapolis, MN, $5,000 (Production). Stolen Shadows. A 10-minute stark black & white film lamentation on the ever accumulating loses from the AIDS pandemic, to be made in collaboration with Venus de Mars.