Warhol Foundation awards $60,000 to Iowa City's PS1 to be split into individual funding

The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts has announced the recipients for the Big Field Fund, which includes the Iowa City nonprofit artist collective Public Space One (PS1), a fund that awards $60,000 to selected artists and projects each year.

PS1 is the first Iowa-based organization to receive these national funds and was invited by the Warhol Foundation to apply. The Big Field Fund awards $60,000 to 36 art organizations across the United States and Puerto Rico.

"They had not selected an organization in Iowa to do this regional regranting and selected us. It's a huge honor and really exciting," said Kalmia Strong, the programming director for PS1.

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The funds will be reallocated to eastern Iowa artists within 80 miles of Iowa City, including Waterloo, Cedar Falls, Davenport, and Cedar Rapids artists and artists based in rural communities. PS1 is awarding 12 grants focusing on two areas of the creative process: Research/Development Grants and Project Grants.

"Research and Development Grants are for artists who are at the beginning of a project and probably won't be able to complete it within a year but need some funding to help them get into it," Strong said. "The Project Grants will allow them to realize and hopefully complete the project in the next year."

Recipients of the Research and Development Grants will be awarded $1,500 to 3,000, and the Project Grant recipients will receive $5,000 to 8,000.

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Strong emphasizes the importance of these grants.

"Iowa does not do very well nationally in terms of arts funding," Strong said. "These funds are an opportunity to let people or encourage people to start to think through and work on a project that they maybe never thought they would have the opportunity to fully realize because that's hard to get since funding and national awards are so competitive."

PS1 has been in Iowa City since 2002. It was initially started by a group of students looking for a place off of the University of Iowa campus to produce an original play production, and it has since grown into a network throughout Iowa City. PS1 hopes these funds will help spark similar initiatives mirroring the ethos upon which the organization was founded.

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"The Big Field Fund will target artist-led projects that manifest new and inventive models to support under-resourced creative communities, engage with vulnerable structures, systems, or ecologies, and/or fall outside the reach of typical funding sources," the Iowa City-based nonprofit said in a news release.

The grant application period opens on June 10 and will run through Aug. 1.

Jessica Rish is an entertainment, dining and business reporter for the Iowa City Press-Citizen. She can be reached at JRish@press-citizen.com or on X, formerly known as Twitter, @rishjessica_

This article originally appeared on Iowa City Press-Citizen: PS1 announces a $60,000 grant program for eastern Iowa artists