Calling all folk artists and folk arts professionals:  New York Folklore Society Mentoring and Professional Development monetary awards are there for you—all year round on a rolling deadline.  Come to Brooklyn Arts Council (55 Washington Street, Suite 218) and meet the NYC representative for NYFS, Eileen Condon on March 12th at 7pm.

The New York Folklore Society (www.nyfolklore.org) offers many forms of service to traditional artists in New York State, but one of the most immediately gratifying opportunities is its longstanding Mentoring and Professional Development awards program.  M&PD awards are the fast track for folk artists to get the funding to take their own artistic practices to the next level by working with a mentor.  Whatever genre of folk art you practice—textiles, dance, instrumental music, drumming, singing, farming—you name it, New York Folklore Society can support your passing this art form to a serious student, or learning more yourself from an esteemed elder / mentor in your tradition.  And since half of what runs the vehicle we call folk arts is administrative skill—artists practicing the best self-management strategies, and nonprofit arts workers building better business know-how—that half is covered as well.  Decide what you need to learn in folk arts or folk arts management—who will teach you?  What conference would benefit you the most?—then tell NYFS about it in a very concise grant application, and NYFS will help make it happen within a very short turnaround (typically 1 or 2 months from application date).

 Please contact your Folk Arts director, Christopher Mulé for more details (cmule@brooklynartscouncil.org).