Tag Archive: William and Flora Hewlett Foundation

  1. Inspired by Creative Work Fund Grants

    Leave a Comment

    With great enthusiasm we are amplifying the 30th year of Creative Work Fund grantmaking. This funder collaborative of the Walter & Elise Haas Fund and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation supports projects that show us how the making of art together is a necessary act. Through the 470 collaborations funded over the last three decades, we see that when artists and organizations are in partnership, they strengthen the Bay Area. This year, CWF granted $882,000 to 17 collaborations of artists and organizations making new work in the Bay: visual art, theater, music composition, dance, artistic activism, social practice, and more. 

    Read the full grant announcement and review the list of grantees here. 

    With projects rooted in the power of history, visibility, and imagination, artists are breaking new ground. Projects will activate public space, using art as an ecstatic form of community organizing, reminding us that the future begins out in the open. And they show how artists model collective care, transformative healing, and joy. 

    A Creative Wellspring Within

    Our recent blog on building trust and busting silos shared the story of how Team CWF, a subset of Walter & Elise Haas Fund staff, uses inclusive practices to design, manage, and engage with each other and with community to realize this unique grantmaking. CWF is a place for staff to have deep interaction with the arts, to work directly with artists, and to walk through the abundant garden of creative aspiration that applicants share with us: showing us what is inspiring, what is timely, and what is possible. When we share our work in progress with our colleagues, the grantmaking methods we’ve developed to serve artists and organizations inspires new approaches. We take inspiration from CWF grantseekers and grantees to 

    • Take risks. 
    • Believe in the power of artists to lead and transform communities. 
    • Tell the story about how collaborations allow us to achieve things none of us could achieve on our own. 

    Creative Next Steps Ahead

    Team CWF is taking the pulse of artists, organizations, and community members to understand what is most valuable about this program and spending the rest of the year designing future grantmaking. We’ll weave in celebrations for the 2024 cohort, and for CWF’s 30th year. Sign up to receive CWF announcements and opportunities to connect to the work of CWF grantees. 

  2. CWF Now Accepting Letters of Inquiry for Projects Featuring Literary and Traditional Artists

    Leave a Comment

    The Creative Work Fund (CWF) is now inviting letters of inquiry from literary or traditional artists and nonprofit organizations looking to produce collaborative projects. If you’re interested in applying for one of these highly competitive $10,000 to $40,000 grants, we encourage you to attend one of our informational seminars or webinars (details below).

    Letters of inquiry are due by December 2, 2016. Of those that apply, approximately 50 will be invited to submit detailed proposals. Awarded grants will be announced August 1, 2017.

    We see these grants as paying artists to practice their disciplines and hone their skills as collaborators. Through creative working partnerships, local artists and nonprofits can achieve excellence, connect with members of the public who are new to their work, and draw attention to communities’ needs.

    The Creative Work Fund is a program of the Walter & Elise Haas Fund that is supported by a generous grant from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. Since its inception in 1994, CWF has contributed more than $11 million to advance art-making by Northern California artists in a variety of disciplines. Grants are awarded to genuine, creative partnerships between artists and nonprofit organizations. Each year, CWF focuses on projects from different disciplines.

    Letters of inquiry for the December 2016 deadline must feature a lead artist with a strong track record as a literary artist or traditional artist and involve a collaboration between that artist and a nonprofit organization. The Creative Work Fund uses the following definitions in determining eligibility:

    • Literary artists write, publish, or perform poetry, spoken word poetry, fiction, or creative nonfiction. (Playwrights apply with performing artists, who will be invited in a future year.)
    • Traditional artists create in art forms learned as part of the cultural life of a group of people whose members have a common ethnic heritage, language, religion, occupation, or region. These expressions are deeply rooted in and reflect a community’s shared standards of beauty, values, or life experiences. Often they are learned orally or by emulation. Traditional artists may excel as individual artists, work as a group, or work collectively. They may produce works in a variety of forms — oral traditions, performances, crafts, multidisciplinary works, and others.

    The CWF grant program emphasizes the creation of new work — not distribution or productions of work already developed. To be eligible to apply, the principal collaborating artists and organizations must live or be and have been located in, for at least two years, the Northern California counties of Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Monterey, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Solano or Sonoma.

    Seminars and Webinars

    The CWF offers several optional seminars and webinars for potential applicants. While these are not required, they are highly recommended, especially if the applicant is not familiar with the Fund. To attend a seminar, you should reserve a space online.

    Webinars
    Webinars are produced in conjunction with The Foundation Center. Please sign up online.

    • Monday, September 12, 2016, noon – 1 p.m.
    • Tuesday, September 27, 2016, 6 – 7 p.m.
    • Tuesday, October 25, 2016, 6 – 7 p.m.
    • Monday, October 31, 2016, noon – 1 p.m.

Grant Portal | Access your account to manage your grants Arrow