Announcing the 2022 Media Artist + Activist Residencies
PHILADELPHIA – Leeway Foundation announces its 2022 Media Artist + Activist Residencies and $125,000 in funding to 5 media artists working in close collaboration with social justice/cultural organizations to document, reframe, and/or amplify the issues and campaigns of the organizations. This residency supports women, trans*, and gender nonconforming media artists as creative strategists, who will work embedded within their collaborative organizations for one year, with each residency providing $15,000 to the media artist and $10,000 to the organization.
This year’s cohort of recipients saw a focus in liberatory visions for the future addressing a collective understanding around topics such as shared power, access, and belonging. All recipients selected racial justice as of one their social change intents. Other intents include immigrant justice, cultural preservation, environmental and economic justice.
Leeway continues to recognize the longstanding impact and collective power of media artists in Greater Philadelphia as they visualize our past, current, and present through film, multimedia, interactive design, and more.
The Media Artist + Activist Residents are (in alphabetical order):
Anula Shetty and Norris Square Neighborhood Project
Li Sumpter and Theatre in the X
Michelle Angela Ortiz and Bella Vista Neighbors Association
Nadia Hironaka and Philadelphia Folklore Project
Ra Primus and Food Moxie
Media Artist + Activist Residency applications are evaluated by an independent peer review panel. The 2022 review panel consisted of Philadelphia-based researcher cultural producer, and community archaeologist, Malkia Okech (MAR ’21); activist, writer, public speaker on issues of digital rights, narrative power, Black liberation and collective grief, and founder of MediaJustice, Malkia Devich-Cyril, and an award-winning independent filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, and creative consultant, Paige Wood.
The Leeway Foundation Media Artist + Activist Residency was made possible by support from the Independence Public Media Foundation.
