CHICAGO: The Joyce Foundation has named the recipients of the 2020 Joyce Awards. The grants will support four collaborations between artists of color and arts and cultural organizations in Chicago, Cleveland, and the Twin Cities.
The recipients include Twelve Literary Arts, Cleveland; the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland; the Guthrie Theater, Minneapolis; and Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago. The organizations will each receive $50,000 to create projects that explore themes of heritage, history, and resilience.
“For 16 years, the Joyce Awards have celebrated diverse artistic talents and engaged communities throughout the Great Lakes region in vibrant conversations about the arts,” said Ellen Alberding, president of the Joyce Foundation, in a statement. “Each year, we are incredibly impressed by the caliber of submissions and are thrilled to help make the vision of these artists a reality.”
Twelve Literary Arts will commission music producer Terrel Wallace (a.k.a. “Tall Black Guy”) to create “The Land Claps Back,” a series of performances and programs featuring intergenerational poets, vocalists, and musicians. The series will culminate in a recording composed and produced by Wallace.
The Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland will commission artists M. Carmen Lane and Shaun Leonardo to produce “Recovering Cleveland’s Jazz Temple,” a yearlong series of programming that will pay homage to the historic African American music venue that was bombed in 1963.
The Guthrie Theater will commission artists Ty Defoe and Larissa FastHorse of Indigenous Direction to create a new theatre production that centers Twin Cities Native stories, specifically those of the Dakota and Anishinaabe-Ojibwe people.
The Hyde Park Art Center will commission visual artist Faheem Majeed to create a monumental artwork, exhibition, and programming to commemorate the legacy of the South Side Community Art Center.
