Overview
In addition to Sharjah Art Foundation’s year-round open calls and grants, which support emerging and established artists working in contemporary art, below is a compiled list of reputable local, regional and international open calls, opportunities and residences for artists and art practitioners. Part of the Foundation’s commitment to supporting the community, this list is a reference tool that will be updated on a regular basis and includes grants, exhibitions and educational opportunities.
Opportunities for artists, curators, musicians, filmmakers, writers and academics
Open Call for Films
Deadline: 20 June 2021
The 15th Arabic and Mediterranean Film Festival of Catalonia
Catalonia
The 15th Arabic and Mediterranean Film Festival of Catalonia aims to fill a void in the Catalan cultural scene by giving voice to Arab and Mediterranean cinema. This year’s theme is Memory Maps: Reflections on the passage of time in our relationship with those physical or material spaces that we inhabit or that condition our lives and/or that human action has transformed. Be they natural or creative spaces, rural or urban.
Apply here.
Warehouse421 Artistic Research Grant
Deadline: 26 June 2021
Warehouse 421
Abu Dhabi
Warehouse421 announces its inaugural Artistic Research Grant, an annual programme that will support social inquiry in creative disciplines. Conceived prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the grant is open to local and regional early-to-mid-career creative practitioners.
The grant aims to support a dynamic space for artistic research focused on the arts, pushing for a stronger engagement between creative practitioners and their communities across the region. This objective remains firmly unchanged, as the current situation only highlights the importance of creative practitioners as an active part of a social fabric, of the crucial role of further and more complex inquiry into nodes of connection that facilitate the systems and structures essential for society to function.
Apply here.
Amman International Film Festival: Open Call to Submit Films
Deadline: 28 June 2021
Amman International Film Festival
Amman
Amman International Film Festival (AIFF) is aimed at debut achievements in film from all over the world, while also promoting Jordan’s up-and-coming pool of professionals in the audiovisual sector. The festival’s second edition will be held from 23–31 August 2021. With the main focus on emerging filmmakers, AIFF seeks works that manifest artistic boldness, strength of form and originality in the use of the medium of film.
Apply here.
Open Call to Submit Projects for Pitching Platforms
Deadline: 28 June 2021
Amman International Film Festival
Amman
As part of Amman International Film Festival, Amman Film Industry Days (AFID) is offering two pitching platforms for feature-length projects in development by Jordanian and resident Arab filmmakers in Jordan and for projects in post-production by all Arab filmmakers.
Up to 15 projects will be selected to pitch their film projects in a public presentation to industry professionals attending AFID, where the best projects will receive awards to help them advance in the materialisation of their films.
Apply here.
Call for Submissions: 17th Zurich Film Festival
Deadline: 30 June 2021
Zurich Film Festival
The 17th Zurich Film Festival will take place from 23 September to 3 October 2021. The festival is looking for cinematic discoveries from all over the world.
Submit your film here.
Call for Submissions: 2021 Arab Film Fest
Deadline: 30 June 2021
Mizna
Minnesota, United States
Mizna invites submissions for the 16th Twin Cities Arab Film Festival (23–26 September 2021) and their ongoing monthly series. All forms of film made by SWANA filmmakers or films relevant to the communities are welcome. If you are a student, low-income or an emerging filmmaker unable to upload your film due to submission fees, please email mizna@mizna.org for a fee waiver.
Apply here.
Submissions for Warehouse421 Curatorial Development Programme
Deadline: 3 July 2021
Warehouse421
Abu Dhabi
Warehouse421 and the Bombay Institute for Critical Analysis and Research (BICAR) invite curators from the MENASA to propose a group exhibition and publication on ‘Future Perfect: Catastrophe and the Contemporary’.
What is the ‘future perfect’? A perspective of the future on what the past (our present) will have been if we do not think, act, and create in the here and now of catastrophe. The future aspect of the tense is perfect because it offers a complete judgment of our present: we will have been nothing, not even remembered, if we do not painstakingly chip away at wealth disparity, privatisation, precarisation, corruption, environmental degradation, growing patriarchy, nationalism, racism, xenophobia, ethnic conflict and civil wars—just the latest accomplishments of capitalism and its political forms.
Apply here.
The Africa Institute Research Fellowship Programme
Deadline: 15 July 2021
The Africa Institute
Sharjah
The Africa Institute Research Fellowships Programme provides the opportunity for both junior and senior scholars of African and African diaspora studies to focus on a research project and participate in ongoing scholarly and intellectual activities during their term at the Institute. The inaugural cohort includes two senior fellows and two postdoctoral fellows, and will offer fellows the opportunity to interact with scholars and academics in their area of research with the aim of enriching their scholarly experiences and future projects.
Apply here.
Warehouse 421 Open Call for Artistic Development Programme
Deadline: 31 July 2021
Warehouse421
Abu Dhabi
Warehouse421 announces an open call for the Artistic Development programme, an exhibition process that emphasises the professional and creative development of participating creative practitioners. In the 2021/2022 edition, Warehouse421 will be collaborating with The Institute for Emerging Art. Conceived as a commissioning exhibition, participating artists are awarded with a AED 10,000 participation fee, and will be supported by experienced art educators, interlocutors, and/or curators towards producing a new body of work to be displayed in 2022.
Open to UAE-based early-mid career creative practitioners, this programme accepts project proposals that will grow to occupy Gallery 1 (~150 sqm) in Warehouse421. Successful applicants will go through a programme that focuses on conceptual development and the realisation and production of their projects in space. Each practitioner will select an interlocutor to sustain an ongoing dialogue through this process, supported by scheduled group-crits and discussion circles. With this support, each practitioner will develop their exhibition from the ideation stage all through to the installation of artworks, production of textual material and the public engagement programme. The three exhibitions will take place in 2022.
Apply here.
Warehouse421 Homebound Residency: DIGITAL COMMUNITIES
Deadline: 7 August 2021
Warehouse421
Abu Dhabi
Warehouse421 announces the second iteration of its Homebound Residency programme. DIGITAL COMMUNITIES will take place between October 2021 and April 2022. Applications will be received in English and Arabic from 16 May to 7 August 2021.
The Warehouse421 Homebound Residency programme seeks to support creative practitioners from within the region in producing new works and exploring the digital forms of community engagement within their practices while working remotely. This six-month programme offers its residents curatorial support and a production budget of up to AED 20,000 to be employed for any equipment or material required for the completion and realisation of their projects.
Apply here.
Henry Moore Foundation Grants and Fellowships
Deadline: 2 September 2021
Henry Moore Foundation
Leeds and Hertfordshire, England
The Henry Moore Foundation is offering up to £20,000 in grants and fellowships in the following categories within sculpture and art research: new projects and commissions, acquisitions and collections and research and development.
Apply here.
Call for Applications for Funding and Collaborations in 2022
Deadline: 10 September 2021
Phileas: A Fund for Contemporary Art
Vienna
Based in Vienna, Phileas is a philanthropic organisation that enables ambitious projects within the field of contemporary art. Its activities focus primarily on international exhibitions by Austrian and Austria-based artists. Phileas co-produces new works and their presentation in museum exhibitions and biennials as well as accompanying publications and symposia. Where possible, its support is extended to enable the acquisition of the works for public collections.
Apply here.
Call for Submissions: Aarhus Arab Film Festival
Deadline: 29 September 2021
Aarhus Arab Film Festival
Aarhus, Denmark
Aarhus Arab Film Festival’s goal is to show the vast diversity of the Arab world by providing an insight into Arabic films, cultures and thoughts through the organisation of an internationally-oriented film festival aimed at a Danish audience, with the best of the Arab film world.
The selected films will show that there is room for independent, innovative and provocative thoughts in the Arab world, and will provide an insight into a varied and rich culture through the decline of film art from a part of the world that we are very much in touch with, but know too little about.
Apply here.
Generator Co-operative Art Production Fund | Grant for artists
Deadline: No fixed application date
Experimenter
Kolkata
Generator is a co-operative art production fund created by Experimenter in collaboration with its artists and friends. The fund will award several production bursaries of varying amounts through the year towards the realisation of artists' projects. Open to all visual artists, irrespective of medium of practice. There are no limitations concerning age, region or provenance of the applicant.
Apply here.
Note
All the information shared here has been sourced from the aforementioned institutions’ online platforms.