Minnesota visual arts organizations feel the impact of NEA and NEH grant cuts

The National Endowment for the Arts cancellation of grants promised to arts organizations across the country May 2 was another blow to the arts after the revocation of National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) grants earlier this year.

“It’s all incredibly disappointing and frustrating, for arts organizations large and small and the communities that they support and enrich,” Chicago Fire Arts Executive Director Victoria Lauing said. “We plan to submit an appeal, but with the news that so many NEA staffers are resigning, it’s hard to see the way forward at this moment.”

Chicago Fire Arts, Mizna and Public Art Saint Paul were among the smaller local arts organizations that lost their funding.

Public Art Saint Paul learned that its $35,000 grant to support the development of the Wakpa Triennial, a three-month arts festival inspired by the Dakota word for “river,” had been terminated. The festival launched in 2023.

“It certainly puts a dent in the festival’s budget,” Public Art Saint Paul President and Executive Director Mohannad Ghawanmeh said. “The grant accounted for tentatively 10% of the festival’s budget.”

The next Wakpa Triennial Art Festival is scheduled for summer 2026, and although the withdrawal of the promised funds aren’t enough to cancel it, the sudden withdrawal may impact the number of commissions and other related administrative costs.

Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center — a nonprofit specializing in art forms that use heat, such as blacksmithing, jewelry making, neon, metal casting and more — lost its $20,000 NEA grant to support artist residencies. The center, at E. 38th Street and Chicago Avenue, had planned to use the funds to support the studio residency artist track and launch the “Work of Public Art” track.

They’ll continue to move forward with the first round of residents for the 2025-26 studio residency track that starts in July, but its “Creative Exhibition” and “Work of Public Art” tracks now are on hold.

“NEA was our only source of funds designated specifically for residencies at Chicago Fire Arts,” Lauing said.

The rest of the $60,000 necessary for funding comes from its operating budget, so they will continue to seek other funding.

The iconic fist at George Floyd Square was produced at Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center.

Twin Cities-based Mizna, a woman-led contemporary arts organization that presents work by Arab and Southwest Asian and North African (SWANA) artists, received its $20,000 NEA grant and used the money for two issues of its 2025 biannual arts and literary journal, Mizna. On May 2, it received an email from the NEA saying its grant had been terminated. The organization had received NEA funds for the journal’s publication since 2019.

The cancellation of the NEA funding was “a chilling and confusing communication to receive ― a signal that the administration does not want to be associated with our work, and we still don’t quite know the extent of what it means,” Mizna Executive and Artistic Director Lana Barkawi said. “We are seeking legal counsel.”

The Hmong Cultural Center in St. Paul had received NEA grants for $10,000 for the past five years to support its programming to teach people how to play the qeej, a Hmong musical instrument. In late November, it didn’t receive the grant. Now that rejection comes as a relief.

“It would have been hard to have a grant committed and have the grant terminated after signing the contract,” said Mark E. Pfeifer, director of programs at the Hmong Cultural Center.

NEA is the latest federal agency to experience massive cuts. Last month, the University of Minnesota’s Goldstein Museum of Design learned it had lost a three-year grant, spanning 2024-27, of $249,918 from IMLS. The museum had planned to use the grant to digitize its collection, adding more than 6,000 images to its online database. The museum is appealing the termination.

The Walker Art Center received notice that its IMLS grant for $250,000 — intended to bolster its accessibility for people with disabilities — was revoked. The Walker has received more than $3 million in grants from federal agencies.

“We believe that cancellations of these funds take away what bring people together and weaken local programs that help communities thrive and basically go against the values of what hold us together as a community,” Walker Art Center Chief of Advancement Christopher Stevens said. “We think it’s a big mistake.”

The Minnesota Historical Society had been selected to receive its eighth National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP) award through the NEH for $300,000 to digitize more newspapers around the state. In early April, MNHS learned that this grant had been canceled.

Midwest Art Conservation Center Executive Director Colin Turner nearly missed the email from the NEH because it came from DOGE on April 2 and went to junk mail. He found it about five days later.

The organization had won an NEH grant for $300,000 to support its regional preservation field services program, which provides conservation education and services for smaller organizations in the Upper Midwest. The grant also would have covered stipends for two 12-week Native American Collections Care Fellows.

The Midwest Art Conservation Center has an annual operating budget of $2 million, and this grant was going to help a lot.

The grant loss means it won’t be possible to offer the fellowship program unless they’re able to secure other funds. The education and services will move forward but at a “significantly reduced scope,” he said. “It cuts down on our ability to travel and reach some of the more rural communities and tribal communities.”

Losing the grant wasn’t completely unexpected but still surprising.

“I don’t see how our programming fell outside of the executive order’s priorities,” he said. “It is truly unfortunate and I think people don’t realize how important this funding is for their communities.

“It is a blow to the region,” he added.

At the end of April, Anderson Center in Red Wing learned that its NEH grant for $149,445 had been terminated.

The center had planned to use it for the project “Mississippi Dialogues: A Community Collecting Initiative,” a community engagement project focused on local tribes who make their homes on the Mississippi River, including conversations about water, flooding and climate change.

They plan to move forward with the project using state and some private funding, but they are seeking additional funding. The project likely will take longer than anticipated. Because of the grant loss, they won’t be able to hire paid interns this summer.

It was the first NEH grant for this southeastern Minnesota organization that has an annual budget of around $750,000.

“I think the biggest thing for me is it’s just been such a waste of time,” said Anderson Center Executive and Artistic Director Stephanie L. Rogers. “These are not small applications.”

This reminds her of the not-so-distant past.

“Now it feels like I’m back in spring 2020 [when COVID began], spending all my time running around trying to figure out what’s real and what’s even happening,” she said. “I think that feeling of chaos and waste of time is probably something that people in many fields could relate to right now.”