Spokane Arts Grant Awards (SAGA) funds multiple programs and projects three times every year through a competitive application process. Grant winners carry out arts related activities in the Spokane area during the twelve months following their award date. Awards can be for any amount up to $10,000.
SAGA defines the term “arts” by observing our community’s creative activity. We live in a region populated by many cultures, talented in varied crafts and trades, and curious about learning and engaging in technique, expression, and artistic community. SAGA has funded blacksmithing and glassblowing, cultural art forms such as canoe making, performance, exhibition, education, therapy, and individual artistic development. We have also funded arts-based businesses and new collaborations.
SAGA stands on the principle that creatives should be paid for the work they do and we educate both the broader community and the artistic sector that creative work has value.
2021 was SAGA’s fifth year serving the Spokane region. At the end of its fifth year, SAGA had funded 129 proposals providing a total of more than one half-million dollars to local artists, organizations, and businesses. Below we provide a complete list of each of our awardees since our first year of funding in 2017.
View just the most recent year’s winners here.
Since 2013, Columbia Fire & Iron (CFI), a 501(c)(3), has volunteered hundreds of hours teaching and demonstrating traditional and modern blacksmithing around the Spokane area, giving the community an affordable way to try blacksmithing for the first time and offering continuing education in the craft.
Founded in 1916, the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture is the largest cultural organization in the Inland Northwest, serving more than 100,000 visitors a year. It is one of Washington State’s five Smithsonian affiliates and are accredited by the Alliance of American Museums.
Quiero Flamenco was created to promote and encourage the growth of Flamenco in the Inland Northwest. Aire Flamenco was their presentation of Flamenco arts with live music and dance at The Bing Crosby Theater on February 23, 2019.
Stage Left Theater is founded on the belief that live theater provides a mechanism for interpersonal interaction and should be relevant to the daily lives of the audience and the players. We seek to broaden the involvement of the general population by engaging issues of topical value.
Power 2 The Poetry is a performing arts LLC specializing in spoken word poetry. The group promotes freedom of expression, and provide a platform for underrepresented demographics in the community. Power 2 The Poetry’s after school poetry program will offer a platform for students to learn how to find their voice.
Bill and Kathy Kostelec are fine art photographers specializing in black and white film. Their work has exhibited in numerous galleries and juried events in the eastern Washington area since 2007. SAGA supported their free, public exhibition of A Spokane Silver Celebration.
Counting Coup Media is a group of ambitious filmmakers who are focused on bringing a new kind of quality and style to the Native community. With over ten years of experience in video, photography, digital signage, animation and sound design, they can handle any project that hits their table.
In a significant collaboration between writer, Edward Bryan, and composer, William Berry, the classic tale of a man chasing a whale has been refashioned as a musical.
The mission of One Heart Native Arts & Film Festival is to share and showcase innovative, compelling, and empowering stories from Native perspectives through film, art, and music, celebrating the diversity and vitality of contemporary Native culture in our community today.
The Jundt Art Museum has a 23-year history of providing quality art exhibitions to the Gonzaga, Spokane, and Inland Northwest communities. The Museum is always free of charge.
Dr. Bartlett has nearly 30 years of university teaching and presentation experience in Eastern Washington. “Jumping Into Fire” is his feature length documentary that uncovers the hidden story of the first and only all African-American paratrooper unit in military history, the 555th Parachute Infantry Battalion.
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