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ADVANCING THE ARTS ACROSS MARYLAND

Grants for Organizations

Grants for Organizations

Strengthening Maryland's Arts Infrastructure: Grants for Organizations

From large, internationally renowned institutions to local gems of the community, Maryland invests in organizations and programs that uplift, inspire and enrich our citizens through the boundless power of the arts. 

 

IN FISCAL YEAR 2019, THE MARYLAND STATE ARTS COUNCIL AWARDED GFO GRANTS TO 290 ARTS ORGANIZATIONS AND PROGRAMS ACROSS THE STATE TOTALING $14,644,298.

The Grants for Organizations (GFO) granting program provides unrestricted general operating support to nonprofit and tax-exempt organizations, as well as units of government, that produce or present ongoing arts programming that is open to the public.  GFO awardees educate children, uplift communities, stimulate business activity and support jobs. 

See past and current awardees lists here.

 

GFO Grant Guidelines

For information on the GFO Grant Program as well as a detailed walk through of the application, please refer to the FY20 GFO Grant Guidelines.

Other referenced documents can be found here:

Creative Conversations - Regional Fall Arts Institutes - Please consider joining us for an evening in your region to learn more about the GFO application and other partnerships. More information can be found here.

 

GFO Panel Dates

Please find here an estimated time for each organization's review. 
 
Times are subject to change and the provided schedule is an estimate based on the day's agenda. 
  • Folk & Traditional Arts - Monday, March 25, 2019 
  • Multi-Discipline - Tuesday, March 26, 2019
  • Theatre - Wednesday, March 27, 2019
  • Art Service - Thursday, March 28, 2019
  • Large Institutions - Monday, April 1, 2019
  • Music - Thursday, April 4, 2019
  • Visual Arts/Media - Tuesday, April 2, 2019
  • Literary Arts - Friday, April 5, 2019
FY21 Application information will be available in April 2019. 

Applications submitted after the deadline will not be considered for funding.

 

New Applicants  

If your organization is a NEW Applicant or if your organization DID NOT receive a Fiscal Year (FY) 2019 MSAC GFO Grant, your organization was required to complete the Intent to Apply form in order be eligible to apply for an MSAC FY2020 GFO Grant.

If your organization was deemed eligible, you will complete a Full Application for FY20.

To confirm eligibility and complete the "Intent to Apply" form, you must be able to answer "YES!" to all five sections in the chart below.

If you were not able to confirm all five, but are still interested in learning more about the growth of your arts organization, please let us know how we can help by connecting with GFO Program Staff.

The Intent to Apply form is available to complete in eGrant. 

Forms submitted after the deadline will not be considered.

 

Returning Applicants

The Maryland State Arts Council's BASIC ARTS OPERATING GRANTS and BASIC ARTS PROGRAM GRANTS have been restructured into a new CREATIVITY GRANT program. The CREATIVITY GRANT application includes answers to three questions, has a maximum request amount of $3,500, requires minimal economic data reporting, and has no deadline (applications will be reviewed monthly starting July 1). 

If your organization has consistently been applying for and receiving GFO grant awards, with no recent lapses in application submissions, you are asked to submit one of the following two applications: 

  1. FY20 Full Application 
  2. FY20 Request for Funding (RFF) 

 Guidelines for these applications can be found here.