Seed Awards Eligibility Criteria & How to Apply

ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA

1. Eligible Candidates

You are eligible for a Prince Claus Seed Award if you meet the following criteria:

• You are living and working in countries on our Eligible Country list. Individuals applying for the call must both be from and living in of one of these countries;
• You are an artist or cultural practitioner with on average 1 – 5 years of professional artistic/cultural experience (study years not included);
• You are an individual artist or cultural practitioner. Collectives, groups and organisations are not eligible for the Prince Claus Seed Awards.
• It is your first time receiving a Prince Claus Seed Awards. Seed Awards are awarded on a one-time only basis; successful awardees from previous years are not eligible for another Prince Claus Seed Award;
• Your practice relates strongly to art and culture and is dedicated to addressing contextually relevant societal topics or issues. We do not accept applications from individuals whose work:

1. revolves around academic research;
2. is purely developmental (and not cultural);
3. is not societally engaged.

2. Eligible Expenses

The Prince Claus Seed Awards give each recipient €5.000 to invest in the development of their artistic and cultural practice/career. Activities and expenses directly aimed at the further development of artistic practices could, for example, include (but are not limited to): 

• Participation in residency programmes, festivals, workshops, etc.;
• The development of a personal project;
• An investment into (materials needed for) ongoing work.

Expenses that are NOT eligible for a Prince Claus Seed Award are:

• Tuition fees for participation in activities that focus on the academic sector or represent traditional approaches to research and education (e.g. school/university programmes, scholarships, or education firmly located within a traditional institution);

HOW TO APPLY

Creating your Application

1. Create an account on the Prince Claus Awards Platform and start a ‘New Submission’ for the Prince Claus Seed Awards;
2. Once you have started your submission, fill in all of the required fields and attachments. When filling the application in, you do not need to finish it in one sitting. You can save the application and complete it later up until the point of the deadline.
3. Once you have successfully submitted your application through the Prince Claus Awards Platform you will receive an email confirmation.

The deadline for applications is February 23, 2023 at 23:59hrs Amsterdam Time. If you experience intermittent access to the internet, or unstable connections, please keep this in mind when planning your submission. We encourage you not to wait until the last minute when submitting as our online system will close automatically at the time of the deadline and we cannot accept any applications after that point;

The Contents of the Application

Your application should contain:

• A completed application form, including the personal details of the applicant;
• A pitch that answers the question What drives you as an artist/author/cultural practitioner? This pitch can be submitted in video and audio formats, and should be a maximum of 3 minutes long (kindly note that in fairness to other applicants we will stop any pitches longer than 3 minutes after the 3 minute mark). If for any reason (such as accessibility or lack of resources) you are not able to provide a pitch in audio or video form, please get in touch with us at [email protected];
• A reference letter from a person or organisation that knows your work and/or has worked with you in the past (this should be signed and contain the contact details of the referee);
• An up-to-date C.V.;
• Supporting materials related to your work. This should include, but is not limited to: samples of your artistic/cultural work (videos, images, texts, portfolio), reviews and interviews.

Please note that at present we only accept applications in the English language. Supporting materials can be submitted in your language of preference and video pitches can be subtitled to English (software such as Otter, Subly, Jubler and Amara provide free transcript and subtitling tools).

TIMELINE

Assessment & Decision

The Prince Claus Fund commissions cultural experts from a variety of backgrounds and fields to assess the applications and advise us on the selection of the 100 Prince Claus Seed Award recipients;

We will be considering the following criteria when assessing your submission:

1. Originality:  innovative, and artistically interesting ideas;
2. Transformative: work that engages with pressing social/political issues;
3. Context-specific: work and ideas that are relevant for the local context;
4. Inclusion: ideas and work that aim at more inclusive societies, connecting people in ways that resist marginalisation, oppression and division;
5. Impactful: the Prince Claus Seed Award must benefit the professional development, engagement and impact of the individual’s artistic practice;
6. Potential to Amplify: Although the individual has received little to no funding/support/recognition so far, the award will likely give a significant boost to their career.

Contracts

Upon being granted a Seed Award, the Prince Claus Fund will draft a contract to be signed by each recipient. The Prince Claus Seed Awards recipient will receive the €5.000 after the contract has been signed. 

Kindly note that as part of the contract the selected applicants can indicate their ideal timeline for implementation/expenditure of the award. 

Announcement

• All applicants will be informed of the result of their application by August 2023;
• Successful applicants will be requested to submit extra materials related to their work for the purpose of the public announcement;
• Prince Claus Seed Award recipients will be publicly announced in October 2023.