2026 artist grant

The Arts Foundation for Tucson and Southern Arizona, with generous support from the City of Tucson, Pima County Department of Community & Workforce Development, the Mellon Foundation, the Arizona Commission on the Arts, and the Arizona Community Foundation, will accept proposals for funding from artists. These funds are intended to help support jobs in the arts sector by investing in Southern Arizona’s arts economy to 1) restore/create jobs, 2) Incentivize arts & civic engagement, and 3) foster viable compensation for creative work.

Now in its second year, the 2026 Artist Grant will support individual artists living and working in Tucson and Southern Arizona. The Arts Foundation developed the program in response to articulated community needs, with the working artist in mind. The program is open to individual artists who have identified a Client they want to work with.

The program is open to eligible applicants located within the Arts Foundation’s service area, which includes counties and Tribal Nations that reside between the southern edges of the Gila River to the US-Mexico international border. All complete and eligible applications will be part of a competitive peer-panel review process.

Only individual artists can apply directly through this program. The awarded funds will be made directly to the applicant, in exchange for the arts services provided to the Client identified in the proposal. Arts services are defined as services informed by the artist’s creative practice, in any discipline.