Eligibility 

• The applicant must be a working artist (or an individual artist applying on behalf of a collective) living or working in the City of San José.  
• Artists working in Visual Arts (including painting, sculpture, drawing, printmaking, photography, architecture, design, multimedia, installation, video art, performance art, new genres, craft/traditional arts, and socially engaged practices); Film/Moving Image (including experimental film, short film, animation, documentary film, and narrative film); Technology (including augmented reality/virtual reality, bio art, digital media, and internet art).  
• Artists in any phase of their artistic career can apply, including emerging, midcareer, and established artists.   
• The artist must be at least 18 years old.  
• The applicant cannot be enrolled as a full-time student at the time of the application or during the cohort period.  
• Artists should be reflective of or able to demonstrate strong, ongoing relationships with the Climate Art Program priority communities. 

Priority Communities 

The Climate Art Program is dedicated to ensuring that all San José residents, particularly artists and cultural workers, have access to a clean, affordable, and healthy environment. Using the California Healthy Places Index (HPI), the program prioritizes artists rooted in or connected to communities in areas facing the highest barriers to environmental safety such as Downtown, Alum Rock-East Foothills, Burbank-Buena, and Edenvale-Seven Trees. The program also focuses on empowering artists from communities disproportionately affected by environmental hazards and economic disparities, including Latinx/o/a, Asian, Black, Indigenous, Pacific Islander, LGBTQ+, people with disabilities, and women. 

Program Introduction 

The San José Climate Art Program is enlisting San José’s artists, creative producers, and culture-makers as active and effective agents in meeting the City’s ambitious climate goals. The City’s climate action plan includes targets to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions becoming carbon neutral by 2030. It’s also a community-wide initiative to reduce air pollution, save water, and improve quality of life.  

To help build momentum and community support around the City’s 2030 goal of carbon neutrality, we are inviting fifteen (15) San José artists to join an Environmental Resilient Artist Cohort and participate in a pilot program aimed to measure, assess and adapt artistic practices to be more resilient to climate effects and lower in greenhouse gas emissions. Artists will participate intensive workshop learning from experts from around the globe alongside locals in San José encompassing an art-centered approach to environmental resilience.   

The City of San José Climate Art Program and Environmental Resilient Artist Cohort is launching with the support of the Bay Area Creative Corps Program (BACC) administered by the San Francisco Foundation and funded by the California Arts Council (CAC). The collective goal of these programs is to use creativity to advance equity and well-being in key sectors and drive support for priority communities that are facing some of the highest barriers to environmental safety.   

Compensation  

The total honorarium amount is $5,000 USD for each artist to participate in the program. This is a non-benefited stipend that will be fiscally administered by Local Color and Works SJs of the Climate Art Program. The compensation will be distributed in multiple installments. The applicant must be willing and able to meet the requirements associated with receiving funds.