Art Overview / Curators on the Cusp • Emily Hall Tremaine Exhibition Award • Emily Hall Tremaine Exhibition Research Grant
Applications are accepted on a triennial basis from any curator, or curatorial team, applying in partnership with an established 501c3 non-profit (grants cannot be issued to individual curators but can be distributed through fiscal agents).  Proposals should be to research a strong, thematic exhibition that puts the works of contemporary art and/or architecture in a new or unconventional aesthetic, historical, cultural, and/or social framework.  Applicants are encouraged to think expansively and challenge conventional thought through the exploration of critical ideas in the context of contemporary art. The grant provides $10,000 for research completed before May 2027.

What is NOT eligible?
  • Research on a single artist, retrospective, re-installation, and/or artist collective
  • Research that do not involve contemporary art (post 1950)
  • Research for an exhibition already scheduled to be realized
  • Research on an exhibition that would most likely take place outside of the United States

Timeline
Next application deadline: February 2028


Apply for both the Exhibition Award and Research Grant
You can apply for both the Exhibition Award and the Research Grant.  To do this, simply complete the full Exhibition Award proposal form and check the box near the end of the application that asks if this proposal should also be considered for the research grant.  Do not complete both proposal forms.

Review Criteria for the Jury
For each award cycle, established contemporary art curators are selected to serve as jury panelists to review the applications.  The criteria that the jury panel will use to determine the award recipients include:
  • Intellectual quality of the proposal's premise
  • Degree of innovation
  • Distinction from other major art exhibitions either planned or mounted within the last 15 years with a similar topic
  • Potential for both professional and public impact