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AccessibilityArt in the Parks: Alliance for Flushing Meadows Corona Park Grant 2023 Application
Deadline: Sunday, January 22, 2023
Now in its fourth year, the Art in the Parks: Alliance for Flushing Meadows Corona Park Grant supports the creation of two (2) site-specific artworks by Queens-based artists for designated locations within Flushing Meadows Corona Park that would benefit from more cultural programming. The grant will help transform these sites into art destinations through a series of rotating exhibitions, with supporting events and programs. Generously funded by the Alliance, each grantee will receive an award of $10,000 to create their proposed artwork.
Location
This grant will help bring attention and visitors to areas outside of the “core” of the park (including the Unisphere perimeter). Artists are strongly encouraged to visit these areas of Flushing Meadows Corona Park before submitting a proposal.
Installations will be presented in Flushing Meadows Corona Park in the possible following locations:
- Meridian Road and Meadow Lake Road - West Entrance
- Roosevelt Avenue Entrance
- 111th Street at 49th Avenue Entrance
- 111th Street at 55th Avenue Entrance
- College Point Boulevard and 58th Road Entrance
- Corona Avenue and Horace Harding Expressway Entrance
- Lawns around Meadow Lake
Meridian Road and Meadow Lake Road
Additional locations may be considered. Please visit our Flushing Meadows Corona Park page to learn more about the park.
Timeline
- January 22, 2023: Proposal deadline
- Feburary 2023: Award recipients announced
- Summer/Fall 2023: Artworks installed in the park
Eligibility
This award is open to Queens-based artists only. Artists who are eligible will have specialized training in their field (not necessarily gained in an academic institution), who are at an early or mid-stage in their career, and who have created a modest independent body of work. Proposals for previously exhibited sculptures will not be accepted.
Application Procedure
Proposals will be subject to NYC Parks review and follow NYC Parks public art guidelines. Proposals must be submitted as a single PDF and include:
- Resume with current contact information
- One-page statement describing artist’s work in general
- Proposed sculpture - detailed description of no more than two written pages
- Representative renderings or images of proposed artwork
- List of materials, dimensions, and weight
- Installation recommendations
- Maintenance recommendations
- Proposed budget
- Names and contact information of two references who are familiar with the artist
- 5-6 images of previous work; each image should be labeled and succinctly described
All materials must be received by Sunday, January 22, 2023. Proposals should be emailed to NYC Parks Art & Antiquities at artandantiquities@parks.nyc.gov with “Alliance for Flushing Meadows Grant” in the subject line.
Award Details
Chosen recipients will be granted an award of $10,000 each. Artworks will be installed in the Summer or Fall 2023 and will be on view for up to one year. Grant recipients will be selected through an open application process and chosen by a committee of art professionals, as well as NYC Parks and community representatives. Proposals will be judged according to artistic and creative merit, response to the surrounding community, and suitability to the site. Priority will be given to proposals that respond directly to the park and its neighborhood.
Artworks cannot be attached to trees or lampposts. Handball courts and historic structures will not be considered for murals.
Grant recipients will be responsible for the costs related to fabrication, installation, insurance, maintenance, and de-installation of the artwork. At the end of the exhibition term, the artist is responsible for returning the park to its original condition.
NYC Parks will assist the awarded artists with logistics such as permitting and site specifications. Artists will be responsible for engineering documents if necessary. Grantees are encouraged to procure in-kind donations or additional funding if exhibition costs exceed the grant amount. Artists are encouraged to research partnership opportunities with community and cultural organizations.
Program Background
NYC Parks’ Art in the Parks program has consistently fostered the creation and installation of temporary public art in parks throughout the five boroughs. Since 1967, NYC Parks has collaborated with artists and arts organizations to produce over one thousand public artworks in New York City parks. For more information about the program, visit the Art in the Parks page.
The mission of the Alliance for Flushing Meadows Corona Park is to support NYC Parks to preserve, maintain, and improve Flushing Meadows Corona Park for the benefit and use of the surrounding communities and all New Yorkers. As stewards, we aspire to raise awareness and engage the community by caring for the natural environment, preserving our history, and providing exceptional amenities and programming. We are committed to making the park accessible for all to enjoy, now and for future generations. Partnering with NYC Parks and supporting local Queens artists is a natural extension of our mission.
Previous Award Winners
2021 Award Winners
Sherwin Banfield,Going Back to The Meadows, A Tribute to LL Cool J and Performance at FMCP
November 30, 2021 to November 23, 2022
Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens
Going Back to The Meadows is a sculptural sonic performance artwork dedicated to Queens hip-hop legend LL Cool J, his hometown of Queens, NY, and historical performances at Flushing Meadows Corona Park. The sculpture includes a traditionally sculpted portrait bust of LL Cool J sitting atop a mirror polished stainless steel radio design and steel pedestal frame. The pedestal design includes references to LL’s unique style and career accolades and Queens landmarks. The sculpture’s audio speakers are solar powered, highlighting the use of green technology.
Haksul Lee,The Giving Tree
November 30, 2021 to November 23, 2022
Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens
The Giving Tree brings awareness to the environmental concerns in the Queens community and elevates Flushing Meadows Corona Park as one that leads the future. This artificial tree will use wind power to generate electricity to light the park and provide a charging station for park visitors. It serves as a form of altruism to promote a higher level of collective consciousness and cooperation, which are necessary to ensure our collective well-being and even survival.
2020 Award Winners
Jeannine Han and Dan Riley, Another way it could go
October 20, 2020 to October 15, 2021
Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens
This work pays homage to the incredible universe of possibilities present at every moment. The reality we find ourselves in is just a glimpse or sliver of an epic landscape of decisions that constantly eludes us. This work illustrates a bit of this conundrum by constructing a living model from a computer simulation in which multiple dimensions of decisions have been overlaid. It is dedicated to the infinite histories taken and untaken that have led everywhere and nowhere. The embedded hand-laid mosaic refers directly to the location of the sculpture in Corona, Queens, and illustrates a hand placing a cube and “sprinkling some sauce all over,” as a local resident described.
Laura Lappi, 7 x 7 (HOPE)
September 12, 2020 to September 5, 2021
Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens
Finnish-born, Queens-based artist Laura Lappi’s 7 x 7 (Hope) explores issues of space in New York City and the cost of living and housing, and how that impacts many communities. With this sculpture, Lappi draws attention especially to immigrant communities and their living conditions in Queens. While Queens is New York City’s most culturally diverse borough welcoming immigrants from different backgrounds, its housing affordability is often out of a reach for many people. The sculpture consists of a black wooden house structure that measures seven feet long, five feet wide, and seven feet high, referring to the size of the average illegal basement room. Each wall has an embedded letter, creating a word H-O-P-E. Inside the structure, a light is making the sculpture visible and glowing during the night.
2019 Award Winners
Karl Orozco, Hospicio Cabañas (Playable Stage for Thunder Hawk)
June 30, 2019 to July 15, 2019
Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens
Hospicio Cabañas (Playable Stage for Thunder Hawk) by Karl Orozco is an interpretation of the oldest hospital complex and orphanage in the Americas located in Guadalajara, Mexico. Hospicio Cabañas was a playable stage in the arcade hit Super Street Fighter II and served as the home court for Thunder Hawk, the first Mexican video game character. Using colorful dried corn kernels, Orozco will create a pixelated mosaic of Thunder Hawk’s stage on a large column at the entrance on 111th Street. He will inject the character’s backstory with greater historical and cultural relevance that is lost in the video game’s culturally insensitive depiction. Instead, Orozco will draw inspiration from Danza de la Pluma (a traditional dance originating in Oaxaca, Mexico that reinterprets the Spanish conquest of the Zapotec people) and today’s elote vendors along the park.
Yvonne Shortt, with Joel Esquite, Mayuko Fujino, Pavilion Landing
June 10, 2019 to June 9, 2020
Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens
Yvonne Shortt’s Pavilion Landing tells the story of a group of intergalactic children whose spaceship has landed in the park, after a long journey seeking a ray of hope generated by the 1964-65 New York World's Fair. Shortt spent several days in the park working collaboratively with park visitors to build four 16”-tall sculptures of children out of clay. She then made molds from the clay forms, which were used to cast concrete sculptures placed at David Dinkins Circle. Their spacecraft, inspired by the Tent of Tomorrow’s iconic suspension roof, is fabricated in concrete and aluminum with a clear plastic top that enables visitors to see the ship’s control center with several children at the helm.
