NAVA - Visual Arts Fellowship

The National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA) launched two $20,000 fellowships supported by the Copyright Agency's Cultural Fund, aimed at assisting exceptional mid-career Australian visual and media arts, craft and design practitioners to undertake a self-directed program of professional development.

This Fellowship will address the ‘mid-career desert’ where there are fewer existing opportunities for visual arts, craft and design practitioners and wants to ensure that two outstanding mid-career artists or collaborative groups can explore the next major developmental step in their practice and seek opportunities to enhance their reputations, build professional relationships and consolidate their careers.

Contemporary Australian painter and NAVA board member, Michael Zavros says, “This is an exciting new initiative offered by NAVA. We have such a fascination with young and emerging art in Australia and a focus on what's new and what's next that mid-career can be a long slow burn where artists lose impetus and find their careers plateau.”

This support also ensues artists will be temporarily relieved of the need to generate income allowing them to concentrate on the longer-term expansion of new ideas, artistic processes and career directions.

“Mid-career artists also find it increasingly difficult to extend their practice and take necessary risks, to make time for skills development and experimentation. These fellowships will give outstanding developing artists support at a crucial time in their development,” Zavros continued.

The fellowships will be open to individual mid-career artists and groups and can be used toward a range of activities in 2017 which may include, but not limited to research, travel, skills development, residencies, mentorships, professional development and training, and the creation of new work and exhibition/project costs.

Criteria for Evaluation:

• demonstration of high quality work to date
•  comprehensive exhibition history which can include commercial galleries, public galleries, state institutions and biennales and festivals.
• practicing for more than 5 years
• published articles and reviews about the artist’s practice
• potential for the artist to develop new directions and ideas in their practice
• demonstration of the benefit of the fellowship to the applicant’s professional practice and development of work
• demonstration of the applicant’s capacity to undertake their proposed Fellowship Program. 

Eligibility:

•  Applicants must:
  - be the practitioner/s who will be the recipient/s of the Fellowship
  - identify as a mid-career artist, having practiced as a professional artist for at least 5-10 years
  - be an Australian citizen or permanent resident
  - not have any outstanding unacquitted grants from NAVA
• Collaborative group applications (groups are at least two people) must be submitted with the details of all group members involved in the project. The grant will be awarded to the applicants nominated on the form
• Grants are not retrospective. Funds will only be provided for projects taking place between January to December 2017
• Late or incomplete applications will not be assessed (except for artists living in remote areas, see conditions below)
• All other considerations being equal, NAVA members will be given priority. 

Professional status: 

Applicants must be practising professional visual or media arts, craft or design practitioner/s. Under NAVA’s definition, a professional practitioner will have some of the following professional characteristics: 

• has regular public exhibitions of artwork
• offers work for sale, or is selling work
• is eligible for or has been awarded a government grant
• is selected for public exhibition, awards, prizes
• has secured work or consultancies on the basis of professional expertise
• has had work acquired for public and/or private collections
• has their work critically reviewed or written about
• has given talks or workshops based on their practice
• is a member of a professional association on the basis of his/her status as a professional practitioner/s 

Applications close Saturday 8 October 2016. 

For more information visit https://visualarts.net.au/nava-grants/