Grants for Individuals & Collectives: Stream 3 Winter 2023

Stream 3 of the Individuals & Collectives program is intended to support artistic projects that are materially ready for production and/​or presentation, or projects that involve individual and/​or collective creation leading directly to production and/​or presentation. Applicants may request up to $25,000 based on the anticipated costs of the project, including artist subsistence. 

In this round of applications, 66 artists or collectives were recommended for funding, for a total of $1,335,367.

Read on to learn about the successful applicants from the Winter 2023 intake and the exciting projects they are pursuing: 

• Adam Bentley (yegfilm) will travel to the Canadian Institute of Planners annual conference in Halifax, Nova Scotia to present a short documentary series about affordable housing in Edmonton. 
• AJA Louden will produce his first large-scale Afrofuturist textile works based on the figures of Mother and Daughter. 
• Alex Eskandarkhah will complete the production and post-production of the experimental short film Always Tomorrow.
• Alison Neuman will create a dance piece featuring three mainstream dancers and four integrated dancers, who will bring marginalized voices to the stage with collaboration from the 4B Harm Reduction Society. 
• Amanda Goldberg​’s project, in collaboration with Calla Wright, is a six-day intensive that will experiment with alternative methods of play development, with the goal of making Women’s Work production ready. 
• Amy Loewan will mentor, curate, and install a watercolour exhibition entitled Creating Beauty for a group of 10 emerging artists at the Art Gallery of Alberta. 
• Anna Kuelken will work with mentor Tiffany Traverse and Knowledge Keeper Audrey Logan to film and complete the post-production of Women Who Dig, a documentary film on Canadian women farmers challenging the global food system. 
• April Dean and Andrew Benson of Procrastination Press, a new Risograph studio in Edmonton, will complete their project Coming Up For Air: A Collective Response which will distribute messages of shared grief, hope, humor, and humanity from eight artists in a public art poster project. 
• Arcana Shanks’ multi-media installation artwork Crown of Fire will utilize original sculpture and sound components to visualize wildfire data from 2011, collected by the Government of Alberta. 
• Baby Jey will design, package, manufacture and publicly present a newly recorded album. 
• Ben Lof will complete and submit for publication a collection of linked short stories set in the Alberta Legislature Building during the NDP government of 2015 – 2019. 
• Brett Hansen will create his debut album with the goal of merging jazz/​instrumental music with contemporary influences of folk and rock. 
• Busyrawk will create a collaborative mural with Anishnaabe muralist Que Rock to be painted at Prince Charles Elementary’s gymnasium, which has 90% Indigenous student population. 
• Cedar T and the Indigenous Empowerment Collective, along with mentor Conrad Jones, will produce another Indigi-Hauz GAYLA showcase featuring drag, fashion, and Powwow to the heart of Downtown in collaboration with Edmonton’s PrideFest. 
• Celeigh Cardinal will create a music video for her single ​“Over Before It Began”. 
• Chakanaka Zinyemba of The Mbira Raissance Band will create an audio-visual album exploring the fusion of three musical traditions: contemporary mbira music with jazz and West African drum patterns. 
• Cheyenne Rain LeGrande ᑭᒥᐘᐣ​’s work Mullyanne Nimito tipiskâw will continue to explore her Nehiyaw femme identity, exploring ideas around Nehiyaw alien, protection, movement as healing, ancestral knowledge, reclamation of traditional practice and Nehiyaw fashion. 
• Christopher Twin will write and illustrate a graphic novel that deals with class disparities in a futuristic Edmonton. 
• Cikwes will create two music videos from songs off her new album kâkîsimo ᑳᑮᓯᒧᐤ. Her mentor Wayne T Jackson will serve as a Cree Language Editor. 
• Dana Wylie of the band Closer (with bandmates Harry Gregg, Jamie Cooper, and Kyle Mosiuk) will mix master and manufacture their debut full-length album of original music with the new roots/​rock/​soul band Closer. 
• Dayna Lea Hoffman, Katie Yoner and Jospehn McManus of Batrabbit Collective will tour their newly developed clown shown Rat Academy which follows the last wild rat left in Alberta, as he trains his protégé, a happy-go-lucky coddled lab rat, in the ways of the Edmonton street rat. 
• Duncan Douglas will create intricate Carnival Costumes that reflect Caribbean Heritage and culture for a ​‘Band’ (group) of up to 50 members to be presented at the Cariwest and Carifest Parades. 
• Marina Mair-Sánchez will produce and perform El Funeral, a multidisciplinary, bilingual, roaming found-space theatrical show, at Edmonton’s Found Festival 2023. 
• Elisabeth Belliveau will write and draw a new graphic novel titled After All.
• Ellie Heath will work with local engineers, artists and mentors Rhea March, Jess L‑Heureux, Adrianne Salmon on the production and release of her debut EP ​‘Let It All In’ including a PR campaign and music video release. 
• Emily Chu will conduct research and create three maps of Edmonton’s Chinatown, working with Chinatown historian Lan Chan-Marples. 
• Eric Doucet and his bandmates in Carter & The Capitals will work with a production team to shoot, edit, and tell a story through a fully conceptualized music video for Carter & The Capitals’ upcoming single, ​“Sad Inside”. 
• Fern will use her grant to continue offering in-studio artist residencies through Fern’s School of Craft into 2023 and 2024. 
• Giselle General will continue to work on the manuscript of her memoir that tells the story of a child who became an orphan at age 8, living in a rural mining village in the Philippines, until immigrating to Canada as a teenager. 
• Grady Wallace and Ivan Kulas of Rad Originals will produce a documentary that follows Grady, a local street artist, as he paints a mural across Jasper Ave’s 111 building. 
• Holly Frances will write, record, and produce the audio book version of her memoir Life Support.
• Jeff Dick of The Prairie States (along with bandmates Mika Nascimento, Mat Cardinal and Jay Der) will use the funding to market their upcoming EP — Trouble Is.
• Jeremiah McDade will work on a new recording project with The McDades to build off the momentum from their 2021 Juno nominated album The Empress.
• Jessy Arden and Amanda Goldberg will workshop and present the first stage adaptation of The Stepford Wives, written and created by Edmonton artists. 
• Jiani (嘉妮) /​Manna will write, edit, and publish a new book in both Mandarin and English featuring 30 unique stories exploring the nuances of immigrating to a new country. 
• Josh Languedoc will undertake the design, exploration, and rehearsal of a new semi-solo show with the help of Knowledge Keepers Christine Frederick and Arik Pipestream that will be workshopped at the 2023 Rubaboo Festival and performed at the 2024 Rubaboo Festival. 
• Josh Sahunta will release an album of 10 tracks, centering on themes of honesty, reality, and authenticity. 
• Kaden Forsberg (VOLARE TENORS) will record, market, and distribute their debut album with Velveteen Music Productions featuring the Edmonton Pops Orchestra. 
• Karim Gillani will undertake an original musical collaboration with Edmonton musicians to celebrate cultural diversity and sounds through soulful Sufi music of South and Central Asia. 
• KazMega will work with mentor Barrie Curtis to create an interview and song album/​audiobook/​podcast documenting late 1970’s Fort McMurray Caribbean labourers, and their pioneering of Hip Hop in Edmonton only months after its inception in NYC. 
• Kijo Gatama will première the work Hyena’s Trail, a partially bilingual poetic drama that reclaims a classic take on witch trials through Eastern African culture and mythology. The production includes Lebogang Disele as Director, Ameley Quaye as the dramaturg, Noreta Lewis as the musician, Mpoe Mogale as choreographer, and mentor Mukonzi Musyoki as the Kenyan dramaturg. 
• Kim McCollum​’s project Sampler: Weaving beyond the grid will involve the production of a body of work for exhibition at the Art Gallery of Grande Prairie in February 2024. 
• Kiona Callihoo Ligtvoet will produce a body of large-scale paintings to be exhibited that explore her personal histories to the land, and her relationships with her family. 
• Lese Skidmore will create a short documentary exploring Indigenous Ways of Knowing with Indigenous contemporary artists Lana Whiskeyjack and Erik Lee Christophersen. 
• Mary Whale will present the paper explaining the project ​“Between the Lines: Merging Portraits and Stories of Older Adults” at the CGNA (Canadian Gerontologic Nurses Association) conference in Niagara Falls. 
• Mitra Knight will work with director Nauzanin Knight on Trusted to Serve, a one-hour documentary that delves into the shocking revelation of the infiltration of white supremacist elements within the Canadian Armed Forces. 
• Mubarak Suleiman will participate in a two-day celebration of basketball culture featuring two locally produced films — The Upside and Coaching while Black — exploring themes of resilience, perseverance, and social justice through the lens of basketball. 
• Omar Mouallem will work on the postproduction of MAKING KAYFABE, a broadcast-length documentary about Edmonton’s thriving indie wrestling scene, slated to be released as part of CBC’s Absolutely Canadian series in the fall of 2023. 
• Onaolapo will complete the final development of the animated-book reading video of book two in Emilia’s Adventures series. This work includes 2D-animations production, video editing, sound mixing, sound mastering, and the final video colouring. 
• 0Stella’s upcoming nine-song album, a fusion of alt-rock and traditional Irish music, will showcase stories of Canadians she met during her cycling tours. 
• Penelope Moon Walker will work with Knowledge Keepers George Hunt Jr, Sara Child, and Dana Roberts to capture the language and stories of grassroots Kwakwaka’wakw cultural and language keepers in the Kwakwaka’wakw territory on Vancouver Island through painted portraits and landscapes. 
• Premee Mohamed will complete a near-future novel about a fatal disaster at a scientific research facility, narrated by a young journalist writing a book about the incident. 
• Rachel Gleddie will create a nine-track album titled Monsters in the folk genre, covering recording and production costs to bring this unique and emotive musical project to life. 
• Rafael Hoekman and Meran Currie-Roberts of Strings Attached Cello Duo will commission and produce a video of a new work for two cellos by Edmonton raised Indigenous cellist and composer Cris Derksen. 
• RIELL will work with mentor Vel Omazic to create the visual aspect of his 18 song album Hymns for the Bitter.
• Riwo will release Grown Child, a multi-genre album about the experiences of hope, love, truth, and faith expressed by the introspective mind of a young girl. 
• Robert Uchida will make a recording that journeys through 300 years of music history, from Bach to the present. 
• Ryan Leedu will produce his short film Secret Time featuring local actors Cassandra Paige and Etta-George House. 
• Sarah Snively will collaborate with Jennifer Manning to promote awareness about Usher Syndrome and to share the personal experiences of two people who have had it since birth. 
• Sean Croal and the New Standards collective will organize a weekly music series in which local artists perform their original music, followed by an open jam session where musicians in the community come together to create imaginative, improvised music. 
• Taghreed Saadeh will create a documentary film that tells a brief history of the Arab presence and contribution in building Canada which dates back more than a century. 
• Tai Amy Grauman will tour the production of Marie’s love letters at Lii Taab at Whiskeyjack Art House as well as surrounding Métis communities. 
• Tori Morrison and Elena Belyea will work with mentor Emma Tibaldo to workshop Tiny Bear Jaws’ production of I Don’t Even Miss You, written by Elena Belyea. Tori will be doing sound/​video design/​producing/​composing for the production. 
• Usha Gupta will create a new iteration of the concert program Khoj (The Search), a fusion of contemporary and traditional arts, featuring a full ensemble of 12 dancers and musicians. 
• Zachary Ayotte and collective members Christina Battle, Brennan Black, and April Dean will complete work on a publication titled Terraforming Earth, tentatively to be published with ArtSpeak Vancouver. 
• Zsofia Opra-Szabo will work on the pre-production for a stop-motion mixed shadow puppet animation feature film.