Emergency Grants

Created in 1993 to further FCA's mission to encourage, sponsor, and promote work of a contemporary, experimental nature, Emergency Grants provide urgent funding for visual and performing artists who:

  • Have sudden, unanticipated opportunities to present their work to the public when there is insufficient time to seek other sources of funding
  • Incur unexpected or unbudgeted expenses for projects close to completion with committed exhibition or performance dates

Emergency Grants is the only active, multi-disciplinary program that offers immediate, project-based assistance of this kind to artists living and working anywhere in the United States, for projects occurring in the U.S. and abroad.

Each month FCA receives an average of 100 Emergency Grant applications and makes approximately 12-21 grants. Grants range in amount from $500 to $3,000, and the average grant is now $1,900.

We recommend that artists review all of our eligibility guidelines and FAQs before applying.

For information on current Emergency Grantees please follow FCA on Instagram and Facebook.

FCA has a small fund supported by the Trust for Mutual Understanding for unexpected or unbudgeted travel-related expenses for cultural exchange between the U.S. and the following countries:

Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan.

The 2023 Emergency Grants were supported in part by grants from:

The Amphion Foundation; Milton & Sally Avery Arts Foundation; The Aaron Copland Fund for Music; The Cowles Charitable Trust; Mertz Gilmore Foundation; The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation; Louisa Stude Sarofim/The Brown Foundation of Houston, Inc.; Trust for Mutual Understanding; as well as individual supporters. This program is also supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Emergency Grants

Ivy Baldwin, performance still from Emergency Grants-supported Quarry, at MANITOGA/The Russel Wright Design Center in Garrison, NY, 2019. Photo by Maria Baranova. 

Emergency Grants

Body Weather Laboratory, performance still from Emergency Grants-supported Façade of Time on the streets and canals of Venice, CA, 2019. Photo by Moses Hacmon.

Emergency Grants

Raafi Rivero, installation view of Emergency Grants-supported project Unarmed, at Leon Gallery in Denver, CO, 2021.