MTI FALL 2025

MAKING FRIENDS with ARTIST GRANTS & FELLOWSHIPS

with SAYMOUKDA DUANGPHOUXAY VONGSAY

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AN A LA CARTE SERIES ON ARTIST GRANTS

Mellon Foundation playwright-in-residence Saymoukda Duangphouxay Vongsay is teaching a three-part, a la carte series on how to tackle artist grants and fellowships. This class is perfect for creatives who want to scale up their work without using their personal money to pay for collaborators, publication, or production. Expect to talk about money, budget, and business, and walk away with an action plan and with more confidence about your relationship with the grant world.

This series is designed for emerging and mid-career artists (16+) in the global majority. Artists should have confidence in their identity and in their artistic work, and they should be able ot articulate a few goals they want to achieve in the next one to three years.

Saymoukda will give an overview of several major state and regional granters, and she will facilitate a Q&A panel made up of grant officers. Participants will come out of this session with a better understanding of which types of grants may fit best for their project and their career journey.
During this session, you will learn the basics of how to apply for grants and fellowships. You’ll go over common application sections, learn what grants are asking for in a proposal overview, and look at work examples to understand how word choice and emphasis can better align your project with a funder’s mission.
This is a working day! Bring what you have or start from scratch. Saymoukda will help you generate or refine the language you use to describe your value and vision as an artist, your goals, and your project’s/your work’s impact.

While a number of the opportunities Saymoukda touches on are for multiple types of arts, this course will focus more on the performing arts (eg, playwrights, directors, actors, dancers, composers, lighting designers). Participants are welcome to pick and choose which session they attend or go to all three!

Note: Everyone coming Oct 18 or 19 will have to fill out a worksheet that Saymoukda will send out after the Oct 14 class.

GENERAL INFORMATION

DATES

Tue, Oct 14, from 7-9 pm - How to Find and Understand Artist Grants & Fellowships

Sat, Oct 18, from 1-3 pm - How to Apply to Artist Grants & Fellowships

Sun, Oct 19, from 1-3 pm - Craft Your Artist Statement, Project Purpose, & Budget

LOCATION

This MTI course will take place in person at the Mu Studio (755 Prior Ave. N, Suite 107, Saint Paul, MN 55104). All sessions will be held in person; there is currently no option for remote/Zoom participation.

TUITION

$25 per class. Payment is made when you register for the class. Send payment inquiries to info@theatermu.org.

ABOUT SAYMOUKDA DUANGPHOUXAY VONGSAY

SAYMOUKDA (she/her) is a Lao American playwright. CNN’s United Shades of America host W. Kamau Bell called her work “revolutionary.” Besides the impact she has made through her playwriting (with productions at Theater Mu, Mixed Blood Theatre, and soon at InterACT in Philadelphia), poetry, and children’s book, Saymoukda has also provided mentorship around grant applications. Her experience pulls from awards she has applied for and received from organizations including the Jerome Foundation, the Bush Foundation, the Kennedy Center REACH, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the McKnight Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation, the MAP Fund, and the Loft Literary Center. She also has experience on the other side of the table by working with organizations including United States Artists, the Science Museum of Minnesota, and the Knight Foundation, serving in roles such as a panelist for local and national grant programs, as an auditor of grant programs, and as a designer for now grant programs. | refugenius.net