Annual Grants Program

At CultureWorks’ mission is to strengthen artists and arts and culture organizations to increase their impact. One important way that mission is accomplished is through an Annual Grants program.

For 2025, the Grants Program has been changed to be more user friendly and respectful of applicant’s time and energy.

There are three steps in the grant application process.

1.The first is submission of a Letter of Intent (LOI) accepted February 1st through 28th. After the LOI has been reviewed by a volunteer panel you will be notified if you are invited to apply or not.

If invited to apply to will go to step 2 and fill out a full application.
If not, you will be invited to attend the grants presentation as a spectator and encouraged to mingle with potential funders, artists and CultureWorks board members and make potentially beneficial connections.

2. If you are invited to apply for a grant, the second step is submission of a full proposal. The application will be open only to those invited via SMApply from April 1st through April 30th..

3. A Grants Presentation

The presentation of a 2-minute live, visual or audio recording describing: your project, the audience for your project (population your project will serve), and how, if awarded, the funding will impact you as an individual artist/your organization, and/or how the community served will be impacted - basically, why you or your organization should get this money.

This presentation will be a part of a live “Shark Tank” like event where you may be asked for more details about your project. The specific date and time will be announced and is anticipated to fall sometime in the second half of May.

Please review CultureWorks’s general grant guidelines (see below) to determine if your project or organization’s mission and proposal are both consistent with CultureWorks’s purpose as well as meet CultureWorks’s funding criteria.

2025 Grant Guidelines

Questions? Sign up for Office Hours with Mary Burruss, Advancement & Grant Program Strategist! If there are no times available, please email (mburruss@richmondcultureworks.org) or call (804-340-5280 ext. 1.) Mary directly. Click here to sign up.

Grant focus area

Cultural Equity

Cultural Equity funding supports projects or programming that reach underrepresented populations based on race, ethnicity, age, ability, sexual orientation, gender, socioeconomic status, geography, citizenship status, or religion. The Cultural Equity Grants Program is partially funded by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA).

Types of activity that may be eligible for this funding include:

Staff salary costs for organizations to support innovative ideas that engage underrepresented audiences in our community’s arts and culture.
Artist stipends for arts events that highlight and promote the art and culture of a particular community underrepresented in the region.
Facilities costs for arts programming that serves the communities listed above.

Grant focus area

Building Capabilities

Building Capabilities funding supports opportunities, which pertain to the recipient’s effectiveness, overall growth, and longevity as a nonprofit organization or an artist. Requests must be made for a particular initiative, not for general operating support.

Types of initiatives that may be eligible for this grant funding include: