ARTISTIC DISCIPLINES
We ask you to choose the primary category that best represents your project because it will allow us to group applicants by discipline for the purpose of evaluating our programs. We recognize these disciplines may feel narrow, but they are not meant to force you into a box. They are intended to enable us to organize grantees within a set of “high-level” disciplines, to help us analyze and evaluate the effectiveness and impact of our outreach and grantmaking. Should you feel constrained by these categories, the application provides an opportunity for you to talk more about the multi-disciplinary or hybrid nature of your work. On the application you have the option of choosing one primary category as well as a secondary category. Below is a list of categories and examples of disciplines that fall within them. If your disciplines are not on the list or you have questions about which to choose, please call the Leeway staff at 215.545.4078.
LITERARY ARTS
- Creative Nonfiction
- Creative Writing
- Playwriting
- Poetry
- Prose
- Short Stories
Leeway’s Grantmaking Program: Funding Women and Trans Artists Creating Social Change
The Leeway Foundation's grantmaking programs honor women and trans artists for their ability to create social change through their artistic and cultural work.
The Art and Change Grants and the Leeway Transformation Awards fund women and trans artists (including those identifying as transgender, transsexual, and/or genderqueer) living in the Delaware Valley region of Bucks, Camden, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery and Philadelphia Counties, who engage in art and social change work and have financial need.
Leeway supports the natural intersection of art and social change. We understand that art is not born in a vacuum. Art is created within a context. Who we are, where we live, how we relate to our communities, and how we view the world influence what we create, how we create, and why we create art for social change.
Art for social change is art with a vision and impacts people in many ways. It can: raise consciousness; alter how we think about ourselves, our society, or our culture; create a vision of a more just world; be a tool or strategy for organizing and movement-building; reclaim traditional cultural practices as a form of resistance or community building; challenge racism, classism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, ageism, ableism or other forms of oppression; and question mainstream culture and beliefs.
With the ideals of social change in mind, we created these programs to challenge the norms of traditional grantmaking. We seek to recognize women and trans artists whose work is often ignored, silenced, and marginalized because of what they create or who they are - such as people of color; immigrants; gay, lesbian, and bisexual people; poor and working-class people; and people who take risks with art form and content to share their social change vision.
2011 Application Deadlines
Please select a deadline that precedes the dates of your project. Leeway will not fund projects completed prior to the grant deadline.
March 15 • September 15
Drop-off or mail applications to:
Leeway Foundation
The Philadelphia Building
1315 Walnut Street, Suite 832
Philadelphia, PA 19107
These are not postmark deadlines; applications must be received by 5:00pm on the deadline date. If the deadline date falls on a weekend or holiday, the application must be received by 10:00am the following business day. We do not accept applications sent by email or fax.
Please note: Applications may be dropped off after hours on weekends and holidays through our mail slot.
Leeway’s Other Grantmaking Program
In addition to the Art and Change Grant, Leeway offers the Transformation Award, a $15,000 award to women and trans artists in the Delaware Valley who have created art for social change for five years or more. The Transformation Award Stage 1 deadline is May 15, 2011.
Contact Information
Phone: 215.545.4078
Email: info@leeway.org
Website: www.leeway.org
*We use the term “trans” in its most inclusive sense, as an umbrella term encompassing transsexual, transgender, genderqueer, and Two-Spirit people, and more generally, anyone whose gender identity or gender expression is nonconforming and/or different from their birth-assigned gender.
More information here.
This blog is no longer updated. Please instead visit Writers For Diversity for new opportunities for women/ LGBT writers and writers of color. Thank you.
