Summary
Granting Priorities: Learning and Growing
Applications Open: Thursday, October 2nd, 2025 - Monday, November 17th, 2025
Funding Range: $4,000
Nan Yeomans was a prominent Kingston artist dedicated to supporting local and emerging artists in the visual arts. In her late twenties she enjoyed three summers at Queen’s University Summer School of Fine Arts, and subsequently she lived most of her adult life in Kingston. From then and for the rest of her 82 years she stayed busy with her art and her other responsibilities, but always found time to contribute to the community. She died in 2004, leaving all of her art and almost all of her estate to the Community Foundation for Kingston & Area.
It was Nan’s wish to fund a grant for promising young artists and artisans developing their talents in the greater Kingston area. The Nan Yeomans Fund, established at the Community Foundation for Kingston & Area with her bequest, now provides for an annual award in her name that is administered by the Kingston Arts Council.
This annual award of $4,000 is intended to help promising young artists and/or artisans in the visual arts to further their professional artistic growth. Applications are evaluated by a peer jury, which will select one applicant to receive the award, based on the artistic merit of the applicant’s work, previous accomplishments, and the eligibility of the proposal.
The Nan Yeomans Grant is made from the Nan Yeomans Fund held at the Community Foundation for Kingston & Area. The Kingston Arts Council administers the competition for this annual grant.
Geographic Area
Applicants must be living in the geographic area served by the Community Foundation, namely: City of Kingston, Loyalist Township and all four Frontenac Townships.
Specific Eligibility Criteria
- This award is open to all emerging artists and artisans between 17-40 years of age, in the early years of their professional careers. The Nan Yeomans Grant defines an ’emerging’ artist and artisan as one who has specialized training in their field (not necessarily gained in an academic institution), who is at an early stage in their career, and who has created a modest independent body of work.
- Only artists working in visual media may apply. This includes all disciplines and cross-disciplines of painting, printmaking, drawing, photography, sculpture, installation, pottery, weaving, spinning and sewing, glasswork, and metalwork, and also includes video and experimental film-making. Experimental sound work and performance art may be considered if the art practice in question has a visual component and/or speaks to a visual arts context.
- Eligible uses of the grant include: funding post-secondary studies in an arts program, enrollment in workshops, specialized skills training, mentorships and residencies, the purchase of equipment and/or materials, and travel costs only where such use of the grant will directly enable the applicant to work closely with other artists of similar or advanced skill level.
Application Process
Please visit the Nan Yeomans Award webpage on the Kingston Arts Council’s website to apply for the Nan Yeomans Grant for Artistic Development.
