Call for Applications: Seed Award Grant Program

Emerging artists and cultural practitioners bring a new wave of ideas, perspectives, and energy to the force of culture. They play a pivotal role in shaping new norms through free expression and creating safe spaces, fostering cooperation in times of community crises, and promoting just and fair ways of being. As such, emerging artists deserve the chance to experiment and build momentum in their work, and the Seed Award aims to support this journey.

The Seed Award is a trust-based grant, allowing recipients to determine the best way to utilize the support for their artistic and cultural development. This could include exploring new perspectives and nurturing connections, investing in materials, or simply taking time to experiment and focus on their work without financial pressures.

The Seed Award offers support to talented and engaged emerging artists and cultural practitioners who are committed to improving their contexts and societies through socially and politically engaged work. They are particularly interested in supporting those with a grounded and innovative art practice that is inclusive in its process, implementation, and reach.

Funding Information

• Each Seed Award recipient will receive a grant of €5,000 to invest in developing their artistic and cultural practice on their own terms.

Eligible Expenses 

• Examples of activities that contribute to your practice include and are therefore eligible are:
  • Participation in residency programmes, festivals, workshops, etc;
  • Time and space with reduced financial pressure for the development of a personal project;
  • Investment in materials needed for ongoing work;
  • Compensation for collaborators.

Ineligible Expenses 

• The Seed Award is not restricted to a pre-decided budget or plan, but it must be used for the development of your artistic or cultural practice. Examples of expenses that are not eligible are:
  • Tuition fees for participation in activities that focus on the academic sector or represent traditional approaches to research and education (e.g., school/university programmes, scholarships, or education firmly located within a traditional institution).

Eligibility Criteria

• With this open call they invite applications from artists and cultural practitioners who:
  • are an early-career artist or cultural practitioner, in the first 1 to 5 years of their professional artistic/cultural career.
  • are from, living in, and working in countries on their eligible countries list.
  • are practicing as an individual artist or cultural practitioner.
  • would receive an Award from the Prince Claus Fund for the first time.
  • have an artistic/cultural practice that is dedicated to addressing social/political topics that are relevant to your local context.
  • have an artistic or cultural practice embedded in the field of art and culture.
• Awardees from previous years are not eligible for another Prince Claus Seed Award. However, if you have applied in the past and not been granted the Award, you are welcome to apply again this year.

Ineligibility Criteria

• Applications from collectives, groups, and organisations are not eligible to apply.
• Applications from individuals whose work is largely embedded in academia or revolves around academic research, or is largely embedded in the field of development, are not accepted.

Selection Criteria

• Original: the work is innovative and artistically interesting in its form, content, and mode of presentation.
• Context-specific: the work engages with social/political issues pressing to the applicant’s local context in a thought-provoking, critical and affective manner.
• Inclusive: the work in its content and process engages diverse or minority groups and strengthen communities in ways that resist marginalisation, oppression, and division, and is linked to their local context with the aim of creating more inclusive societies.
• Transformative: the work (aims to) directly contributes to the enhancement of the applicant’s local context (e.g. initiates conversations, stirs debate, mobilises/builds communities, and disseminate critical perspectives, provide skills etc.)
• Impactful: the Award will influence and amplify the development of applicant’s practice. They aim to prioritise candidates who are active in their local context but have not (yet) been widely recognised in relation to the stage that they are at in their career.

Application Requirements

• To successfully complete an application, you will need to provide and submit the following:
  • A completed application form which includes your personal details as well as information about your practice.
  • A pitch that answers the question: What drives you as an artist/author/cultural practitioner? This pitch can be submitted either video or audio format and should be a maximum of 3 minutes long.
  • A reference letter from a person or organisation that knows your work and/or has worked with you in the past (this should be signed and contain the contact details of the referee).
  • An updated C.V.
  • Supporting materials that are relevant to practice, for example, samples of your artistic/cultural work (videos, images, texts, portfolio), reviews, and interviews.

For more information, visit Prince Claus Fund.