The John S. And James L. Knight Foundation named 25 winners of its Knight Arts Challenge in Detroit, with $1.46 million going to support community enrichment projects. The winners include everything from the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn to the Piet Oudolf Garden project on Belle Isle.
Karen Dybis, a friend of ours at Daily Detroit, won $5,000 for her Project SAVE: The Delray Neighborhood Preservation Plan. She joined us on the podcast (player above) to talk about that project and to highlight some of the other winners.
The new funding brings Knight’s investment in the arts in Detroit to $52 million since 2012.
Here’s a full list of the winners.
Arab American National Museum
Arab American Arts and Cultural Festival
$100,000
To celebrate Arab-American culture with a summer festival in East Dearborn featuring artists, makers, musicians and traditional food
CAN Art Handworks/Carlos Nielbock
Detroit Gallery of Metals
$100,000
To establish a gallery exploring the role of metals in Detroit and abroad – from iron elements of the Industrial Revolution to ornamental metalworks from the city’s historic architecture – in order to encourage interest in the metal arts that built the city and the world
Collective Sweat Detroit
Collective Sweat Detroit
$20,000
To advance the rigor and relevance of dance in Detroit through a choreographic residency program, and by expanding weekly classes for professional artists
Core City Beautification Fund/Prince Concepts
Public Art Commission
$50,000
To commission local artists to create two sculptural and light-based installations for a new public park in the Core City neighborhood
Cranbrook Art Museum
Material Detroit
$75,000
To bring together three Detroit curators and institutions – Taylor Renee Aldridge (ARTS.BLACK), Laura Mott (Cranbrook Art Museum), and Ryan Myers-Johnson (Sidewalk Festival) – in an epic public art, conversation and performance series focused on themes of material ingenuity, resourcefulness and resistance
Detroit Artists Market
Fly | Drown
$25,000
To commission performance artist Jennifer Harge to draw on personal, collective and ancestral memory to create an immersive exhibition centering on intimacy, domesticity and resilience through the creation of black space
Detroit Public Theatre
48Hours in Detroit
$38,000
To produce – in collaboration with Harlem9 “48Hours in Detroit” a festival of new 10-minute plays by native and current Detroit artists who will reimagine stories that speak to the rich history of the city
Detroit Writers’ Guild
The All Access Cafe of Detroit
$27,000
To create an all-access cafe at Detroit Public Library that brings together differently abled artists and audiences for literary readings and musical performances, where people can share conversation, connection and common ground through the arts
Karen Dybis
Project SAVE: The Delray Neighborhood Preservation Plan
$5,000
To create a record of the people, businesses and landmarks of the disappearing Delray neighborhood through a community-driven exhibition and online archive
Living Arts
Project:Dance
$40,000
To showcase the power of dance as a lens through which to explore celebration and resistance in Southwest Detroit with partners Motor City Street Dance Academy, Ballet Folklorico Moyocoyani Izel, and Compas, that will subsequently be filmed and projected onto buildings by artist Sacramento Knoxx
Mark Stryker
Jazz from Detroit
$24,000
To create a festival of salon-style interviews and performances, produced in partnership with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, that celebrates Detroit jazz musicians, and demonstrates that the city’s remarkable jazz heritage remains a living tradition
Marshalle Montgomery Favors
The Fearless Tribe of Fanatic Filmmakers
$25,000
To uplift the stories of Detroit’s black independent filmmakers and showcase their work by hosting screenings, panels and workshops in unconventional venues
Michael Khoury
Zombie Frequencies of the Palestinian Diaspora
$7,000
To explore the context for several waves of Palestinian emigration in recent years with a new performance work of sound and dance
Michelle Andonian
CORE 375
$75,000
To commemorate the closing of the I-375 freeway in Eastern Market with performances and installations that celebrate the history of the people and neighborhoods that preceded its construction
Michigan State University Community Music School-Detroit
Women of Jazz
$15,000
To share the rich legacy and contributions of women in jazz through public performances and a week-long symposium featuring bassist and scholar Marion Hayden, to empower and inform the next generation of young musicians
NKSK Events + Productions/Njia Kai
The Temple of John Coltrane
$9,000
To celebrate the legacy of pioneering musician and composer John Coltrane with a two-day event in a gallery setting featuring live performances of Coltrane’s work by professional and emerging Detroit musicians, dancers, spoken word and visual artists
Norwest Gallery of Art
Norwest Gallery of Art
$11,000
To provide affordable arts programming for people living in Detroit’s Northwest side by expanding offerings at this community-based gallery, including live performances, cinema, trainings and hands-on arts workshops
Oudolf Garden Detroit
Piet Oudolf Garden on Belle Isle
$250,000
To bring to life a transformative public garden on Belle Isle designed by Piet Oudolf, visionary designer of the High Line in New York City
ProjectArt
ProjectArt: Detroit
$200,000
To bring more art into community spaces by providing emerging visual artists with studios in public libraries, where they will offer classes, talks and exhibits, engage in public art projects, and mentor art students
Shara Nova
Body Vessel
$55,000
To present a theatrical musical event exploring friendship and experiences as women of different skin colors, with Shara Nova and Helga Davis wearing a sculptural dress for two created by Annica Cuppetelli
Signal-Return
Power (Up!) The Press Fest
$45,000
To grow and celebrate Detroit’s rich community of printmakers, bookbinders, poets and papermakers with a festival of print media in all its variety
The Hinterlands
The Hinterlands Present: Assemblage Contemporary Performance Series
$45,000
To advance the conversation around cutting-edge contemporary performance in Detroit by presenting a series of internationally-recognized theater and dance artists from across the U.S.
University of Michigan-Dearborn
Halal Metropolis: Exploring Muslim Visibility in Detroit
$195,000
To create a series of exhibitions by Osman Khan, Razi Jafri and Sally Howell that explore aspects of Muslim visibility in Metro Detroit, both reality-based as well as perceptions shaped by other factors, to support and deepen community connections
Wayne State University
Between Two Worlds: The Arab American Experience in Detroit
$29,000
To commission Farah Al Qasimi, internationally renowned fine art photographer, to explore the experience of Arab Americans in Detroit through a series of photographs created during her arts residency in the city
Vanessa Cronan
Digital Arts Programming at New Local Grocery Store
$4,000
To bring virtual reality and digital art into everyday spaces by presenting installations inside a new grocery store, including events where 3D printed musical instruments and edible desserts are produced