THE BLACK SEED FUND - Request for Proposals

 

Announcing Request for Proposals for The Black Seed Fund

Deadline is Friday, November 13, 2020 at 5 PM

The Black Seed is a first-ever national strategic plan to create impact and thrivability for Black theater institutions, unprecedentedly led by a Black-led theater institution. Black theater institutions have been and will continue to be the guardians of the true American story with the burgeoning of historic Black theater institutions from the 60s and 70s and continuing to this era of racial injustice and unprecedented awareness. 

The Black Seed will be a force for systemic change in the arts and culture world: a 21st century ecosystem for institutional thrivability, collectively tackling racial injustices and inequalities, and creating profound, world-class relevant art and replicable institutional and national partnership models. The Black Seed is a synergistic solution to a long-standing problem of inequitable funding; we are greater - as a sector - than the sum of our individual parts. 

The Black Seed Fund will award up to 50 grants from one to three years from $30,000 to $300,000

 The Black Seed will support Black-led theater institutions who serve predominantly Black communities and who produce, present, and/or commission new works and classic works, readings, conversations, festivals, summits and conferences, and/or performance art, as well as Black-led institutions focused on Black audience development; all rooted in the full diversity, complexity, and intersectionality of the Black experience. 

The Black Seed’s national strategic initiative has a goal of $10 million to be comprised of private and public funders, as well as individual donors. 

FOR MORE INFORMATION & TO APPLY

 

Anchor Institution and National Advisory Committee The Billie Holiday Theatre, theater home to the largest African American community in the nation, collaborates with three Black-led theater institutions, The CRAFT Institute, Plowshares Theatre Company, and WACO Theatre Center. The Black Seed Cohort Black Theatre Commons, Black Theatre Network, Black Theatre United,The International Black Theatre Summit, Project1Voice, and We See You White American Theatre.  The Black Seed Lead Philanthropic Partner The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation The Black Seed Funder Cohort The New York Community Trust Ford Foundation Howard Gilman Foundation A special thank you to the Thought Partner Institutional Leaders who provided invaluable insight on this phase of The Black Seed process:The Ensemble Theatre in Houston, Frank Silvera Writers' Workshop in Brooklyn, The Hansberry Project in Seattle, KC Melting Pot in Kansas City, Leading ChangeMakers in NY and Walk Tall Girl Productions in Brooklyn.