Grants, Guidance, and a Community Built for Artist Careers
We offer $1,000 grants for early-career artists, backed by real career support for everyone who applies.
Top 30 finalists get featured in our magazine for increased visibility and credibility. Top 20 get a free 1:1 career audit. And every single applicant, regardless of outcome, gets a career consultation.
We are not a lottery, we are building a community of artists with well-planned futures.
- $1,000
- unrestricted grants
- 30 artists
- featured in Dezine
- Global
- open worldwide
Why this prize exists
The Dezi Art Prize is an initiative by Dezi, a career platform for visual artists. We believe artists need more than funding; they need community and support. We focus on emerging talent because students and recent graduates are often overlooked by traditional grants. Our inaugural cohort will be part of changing the way art careers are made.
Timeline
July 15, 2026
Applications open
August 1, 2026
Early bird deadline
September 10, 2026
Applications close
October 10, 2026
Winners announced
within 60 days of the announcement
Career consultations
July 15, 2026
Applications open
August 1, 2026
Early bird deadline
September 10, 2026
Applications close
October 10, 2026
Winners announced
within 60 days of the announcement
Career consultations
What every applicant gets
This is a career-support system, not a lottery. You do not have to win to get real value out of applying.
2 winners
$1,000 unrestricted grant
2 winners each receive a $1,000 unrestricted cash grant, yours to use however you want, with no strings.
Top 20 applicants
A 1:1 career audit
The top 20 of those 30 featured artists also receive a free one-on-one career audit with the Dezi team, using our career navigation framework.
Top 30 applicants
A feature in Dezine
The top 30applicants are featured in Dezine, Dezi’s magazine for emerging and early-career artists, alongside a dedicated profile on the Dezi website and social media.
Every applicant
A career consultation
Every applicant is invited to a consultation with the Dezi team. Win or not, we’ll explore ways to support your career and feature your work. Applying is the start of a relationship, not just a single roll of the dice.
How your work is judged
An independent jury of arts professionals, curators, gallerists, and artists reviews every submission. Entries are scored equally on four criteria: quality of work, originality, bio/artist statement, and grant pitch. Scores are averaged to create a ranked list: the top two artists win, the top 20 receive a 1:1 career audit, and the top 30 are featured in Dezine, to increase visibility and credibility. Selection is based on artistic merit alone, and the jury’s decision is final.
Dr. Katerina Valdivia Bruch
Independent curator and arts writer based in Berlin, founder of ARTATAK.
Anahita Ghazvinizadeh
Cannes Cinefondation winner; filmmaker and assistant professor at SAIC.
Christopher Sullivan
Animator, filmmaker, and professor at SAIC; Guggenheim and Rockefeller fellow.
Yukti V. Agarwal
Head of Strategy and Growth for India Art Fair's Young Collectors' Programme and Founding Editor of Desi-gned Magazine.
Jessy Koeiman
Visual artist, curator, and educator based in Rotterdam; previously at Modern Art Oxford, Kunstinstituut Melly.
Do not contact the jury directly. Any applicant who contacts a juror will be disqualified from the prize.
Who can apply
We support emerging artists who show passion, strong work, and a clear vision, not just established careers (although they are welcome to apply).
Open worldwide
Artists anywhere in the world are welcome to apply, including international and non-US artists.
Age 18 or older
Open to artists who are 18 and older at the time of applying.
Visual artists
You work in one of the eligible mediums listed below. No degree, gallery representation, or exhibition history is required.
Eligible mediums
This art grant is open to painters, photographers, designers, illustrators, filmmakers, sculptors, animators, fashion designers, and fiber and material artists.
Nominees
Some artists are nominated and receive an application invitation from our founding team. We only ever email from our office domains ( @deziart.co or @dezi.work). We will never contact you from any other email service, please be aware of scams and do not click on links from emails that do not belong to our office domain. Nominations are sent as an invitation from the admin/founding team, not the jury.
How to apply
We are built by artists, for artists. We know applications can be tedious. So we made this the easiest grant application you will ever fill out.
Application fee: $30 (Early bird: $20). If the fee is a barrier, you can email us and we can try to work out a waiver. Given high demand and past scam attempts, they are not guaranteed. Email: info@deziart.co
Upload your work or portfolio
Share a portfolio link, or upload up to 5 images or video links.
Add your statements
A short artist statement with bio, and your pitch for what you would do with the grant.
Submit
Review, pay the fee, and send your application.
Upload your work or portfolio
Share a portfolio link, or upload up to 5 images or video links.
Add your statements
A short artist statement with bio, and your pitch for what you would do with the grant.
Submit
Review, pay the fee, and send your application.
Who is behind this
The Dezi Art Prize is an initiative of Dezi, a career support platform for visual artists launching in 2026. The prize reflects our founding belief that artists need both funding and infrastructure: supporting working artists is inseparable from building tools for them.
It is led by Nitya Mehrotra, a multidisciplinary creative whose practice bridges art, storytelling, and strategy, spanning animation and film, public art, gallery exhibition, and brand and marketing consulting. She is the founder of Stories by Strangers, an animated oral-history platform for survivors that she built into an international community, and has led marketing strategy for the literary-arts nonprofit Stomping Grounds. As a designer she led the design of the City of Chicago’s Track(ed) Changes CTA public-art project, covered by The New York Times, CBS, and Time Out Chicago; as a filmmaker she directed the festival-recognized documentary How I Survived Death; and as an artist she has exhibited at Woman Made Gallery and the RISD Museum. A graduate of RISD and SAIC, her honors include three Illinois College Press Association awards.
Selected work
FAQ
You retain full copyright to your work. The jury’s decision is final. US winners provide a W-9; non-US winners provide a W-8BEN. If the submission platform has issues near the deadline, email info@deziart.co to submit. Read the full terms and conditions.
Ready to apply?
Two winners each receive a $1,000 unrestricted grant, the top 30 are featured in Dezine, and every applicant is offered a career consultation. Deadline September 10, 2026.
Apply now
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