Creative Capital Distributes $2.45 Million in Funding to Support 55 Artists
**Celebrating Risk-Taking Visionaries: The Creative Capital Foundation’s 2025 Awardees**
The Creative Capital Foundation, renowned for supporting groundbreaking and innovative artists, has announced the recipients of its highly anticipated 2025 grant awards. This year, the foundation has allocated $2.45 million to support 55 artists and collectives spanning diverse disciplines across 49 unique projects. Each awardee will receive $50,000 in unrestricted funding, accompanied by multi-year professional development opportunities and platforms for community building.
### A Legacy of Fostering Innovation
Founded in 1999, Creative Capital champions artists who are trailblazers in their fields and whose work tackles social and cultural issues while challenging the boundaries of traditional art forms. The foundation’s mission is rooted in empowering “risk-taking, underinvested artists” working across disciplines such as visual arts, performing arts, architecture, literature, film, and technology. This year’s cohort exemplifies this ethos, with grantees creating projects that address environmental changes, migration crises, historical reckoning, and identity exploration.
Prominent past recipients of Creative Capital grants include visionaries such as Harmony Holiday, Rashaad Newsome, Morehshin Allahyari, Susan Chen, and Ilana Savdie. These alumni have consistently pushed the boundaries of their mediums and inspired contemporary artistic discourse.
### A Diverse and Dynamic Selection
The 2025 awardees were chosen from an impressive pool of over 5,600 applicants. The foundation emphasized diversity and representation, with the following demographic breakdown:
– 75% of recipients self-identify as artists of color.
– 56% identify as women.
– 18% identify as gender non-conforming, transgender, or nonbinary.
– 11% are artists with disabilities.
The recipients range in age from 29 to 72 and represent 18 states in the United States, as well as international locations such as Berlin, Germany, and Demorestville, Canada. Spanning cities, identities, and experiences, these artists are united by their bold ideas and innovative approaches.
### Interdisciplinary Excellence: The Categories
This year, the awarded projects span a remarkable range of categories:
**1. Visual Arts (14 grants)**
Projects in this category include socially-engaged art, ecological installations, and explorations of memory and identity. Notable awardees include Kathy Aoki’s “Koons Ruins Atlas” and Jared Owens’ “Remembering Attica: The Optics of Uprising.”
**2. Performing Arts (15 grants)**
Awardees in this category are creating groundbreaking works in music, theater, dance, and opera. Projects such as “ANIMAL [the underground]” by Ash Fure and Rashaad Newsome’s multimedia performance “I Come As One, But Stand As One Thousand” promise to captivate and challenge audiences.
**3. Film and Moving Image (12 grants)**
Filmmakers and animators exploring themes like migration, loss, and resilience include Lori Felker’s “Patient” and Clyde Petersen’s “Our Forbidden Country.”
**4. Technology (3 grants)**
Grantees such as Morehshin Allahyari are utilizing digital media to address contemporary issues like environmental conservation and cultural preservation.
**5. Literature (5 grants)**
Awardees in this category, including Harmony Holiday and Thi Bui, are redefining storytelling through innovative forms like graphic novels, poetry, and socially-engaged nonfiction.
### Visionary Projects That Inspire Change
The proposals for 2025 are daring, creative, and deeply rooted in today’s most pressing issues. Some standout projects include:
– **Landscape Opera**: A journey that narrates ancestral environmental stories through art and soundscapes in the canyons of southern Colorado.
– **Migration and Forensics in South Texas**: An experimental documentary that examines the intersection of human migration and forensic science.
– **Historical Reckoning in Louisiana**: A transformative project that reimagines the grounds of a former plantation as a site of reflection and confrontation with history.
Angela Mattox, Director of Artist Initiatives at Creative Capital, noted, “These 55 visionary artist proposals are boldly pushing form and ideas forward, giving us new lenses through which to view our world.”
### Supporting Artists, Changing the World
Creative Capital’s support goes beyond financial assistance. Recipients gain access to professional development workshops, peer-to-peer mentoring, and strategic resources that empower them to bring their projects to life. The foundation’s holistic approach recognizes the multifaceted challenges artists face and ensures they have the tools to succeed.
Furthermore, Creative Capital’s commitment to socially-engaged art highlights its belief that art is not just a form of expression, but also a means to inspire change and promote equity.
### The Bigger Picture
The Creative Capital 2025 grant awards underscore the critical role of artists in addressing societal issues, questioning norms, and fostering dialogue. By engaging with diverse communities and addressing topics like sustainability, historical