Artist Employment Program Toolkit

This toolkit is intended as a ‘how-to’ guide and resource for artists, organizations, communities, cities, counties, and states, who are interested in setting up a program to employ multiple artists in salaried positions with organizations or government agencies. It represents a synthesis of insights a working group of artist employment efforts from around the United States. This is the webpage version of this report. You can also access the PDF version. You can also find this report on Springboard for the Art’s Creative Exchange website.

Contents

1: Welcome

2: Background 

3: Getting Started

4: Access

5: Outreach

6: Application

7: Selection

8: Participant Support 

9: Documentation & Storytelling

10: Evaluation

11: Program Summaries

12: Acknowledgements

This Artist Employment Program toolkit is intended as a ‘how-to’ guide and resource for artists, organizations, communities, cities, counties, and states, who are interested in setting up a program to employ multiple artists in salaried positions with organizations or government agencies. It represents a synthesis of a working group of artist employment efforts from around the United States, including Creatives Rebuild New York, Artists At Work, Maniobra, Cross-sector Artists in Residence Lab, Seattle Hope Corps, KDA Creative Corps, Far South Border North, and 18th Street Arts.

There are many ways to structure and implement artist employment; the recommendations and resources here are drawn solely from this group’s experiences. This toolkit is neither definitive nor comprehensive, but we hope it offers a practical guide that helps new initiatives leverage prior and existing tools and processes.

What is Artist Employment?

Artists earn a living in a variety of ways. Many artists are compensated through a series of gigs and temporary jobs that are paid via independent contracts that necessitate a 1099 form. This is typically a fee-for-product model where value is determined by the artistic output; an individual or organization pays for a painting, a performance, a piece of writing. Some artists are employees with part-time jobs as well as full-time W2 employment.

When we describe ways to employ artists in this toolkit, we are specifically referring to programs that provide regular income over at least 12 months such that artists are participating in an ecosystem where they are in collaboration with an organization, government, or community. This could kick off with a 6-9 month pilot, but the design should envision a minimum of a year, with the goal of longer terms (2+ years) in order to see the long-term impacts. (For the purpose of this toolkit, when we reference “organization” throughout, we mean all three of these entities: organization, government, and/or community.) The focus is on compensating artists for their full scope of labor, not just their artistic output. The often ‘invisible’ (unpaid or underpaid) labor of artists includes research, conversations, prototyping, ideation, creative thinking, false starts, pivots, rehearsals, and skill-building.

We hope that these models can help further the recognition of artists as a workforce, and work toward a reality where they have the same benefits and protections as other workers. This includes financial stability that allows time for rest and physical wellbeing, and—where possible—access to health insurance, sick leave, paid time off, and unemployment benefits. Employment benefits and protections are regulated by local, state, and federal laws; it is critical to consider the government context (e.g., ERISA law) as part of program design. These considerations mean that there should be a separate budget for materials and equipment; these costs should not be expected to be primarily borne out of artists’ income.

The purpose of employing artists is typically two-fold: to support artists’ lives and livelihoods and to support the missions and visions of organizations, government agencies, or communities. This may include employing artists to support a particular issue or cross-sector goal where a dancer is employed at a county’s department of transportation, or a performing artist is working at a hospital to advance public health. It may also be when an artist is employed at a cultural and arts organization where a playwright is employed by a local theater or a teaching artist is employed by a symphony.

In the ideal scenario, these are not situations where artists are hired to execute a predetermined set of activities; rather the scope of work is co-created with the artist, and the labor emerges from mutuality and collaboration. When implemented well, artist employment can drive improvement in artistic well being, economic well being, personal well being, and social/communal well-being.

For more on this see:

Creative Placemaking Research

Blade of Grass: Municipal Artist Partnerships Guide

Why Have an Artist Employment Program?

The toolkit starts with the premise that there is interest and funding in place, and presents a menu of options with detailed resources for implementation. However, certain precepts underlie this work, including:

• Creative workers need to be well if communities are to be well.
• Supporting the creative workforce is crucial to a functioning creative economy which in turn is critical for driving the broader economy.
• Artists and cultural workers have a unique set of skills and expertise that can help strengthen organizations, further social causes, and nourish communities. They use their expertise to create the conditions for culture to thrive. They preserve culture and increase its visibility, draw communities together, and partner with local institutions. Their work includes grassroots organizing, enacting community care, repairing biased systems, acting as agents of social change, managing communication networks, and sharing localized cultural knowledge. Though often done by artists, this labor is rarely reflected in their wages or scopes of work.

What is the History of Artist Employment?

Frameworks that allow for stable Artist Employment have existed for thousands of years. In recent US history, artists have been employed by government programs such as the Works Progress Administration in the 1930s and the Comprehensive Education and Training Act of the 1970s. While the particular systems for employment have varied, the fundamental framework that values artists as a critical workforce has existed for centuries around the world. Unfortunately, in the contemporary US, the broader understanding that supporting artists’ lives and livelihoods is essential to a thriving society has diminished. The ‘gig economy’ has led to profound precarity, threatening artists’ fundamental humanity and their ability to contribute to their communities. Many private and publicly-funded artists employment efforts have launched in the last decade to address these issues, and several of those efforts are represented in the contributors to this toolkit.

There are several steps to take to lay the groundwork for an Artist Employment Program. The sections below are not meant to be followed in a rigid order; in fact many of these steps are iterative and interrelated.

Consider What Type of Employment Model Will Work Best for You

The working group that contributed to this toolkit used a variety of models to employ artists around the country. There are three primary models, with many variations within each.

Embedded Artist in an Organization: Nonprofit, Governmental Agency, or For-Profit

In this model, the organization directly employs the artist, and the artist becomes an employee of the organization. Here, artists can serve a variety of roles, depending on the needs of the organization and the skills of the artist. Roles range from teaching artists to artist organizers to artistic directors. Artists use their creative practice and transferable skills to support the work of the organization, agency or other entity.

Advantages: Organizations see and experience artists as workers and thus build the case for sustained, long-term artist employment, as the artist becomes essential to the mission and functioning of the organization.

Challenges: The employment structure may be overly prescriptive in terms of the artist’s output, there may not be strong expertise within organizations to understand how to work with artists, and organizations may exploit artists and their labor rather than commit to a mutually beneficial relationship.

Example: BronxNet hired 10 artists who, across disciplines, created and launched original programs and projects while also providing media arts engagement for youth and the Bronx community. More info here: https://www.creativesrebuildny.org/artist-employment-program/collaborations/view/bronx-community-cable-programming/

Intermediary Employing Artist to Work with Organizations

In this model, there is an intermediary organization that holds the employment for the artist, and works with the artist and a partner organization to design and support the artist’s scope of work with that partner organization or agency. Often the intermediary is the originator of the artist employment program and runs the outreach, selection, and support process for the artist and the partner organization.

Advantages: Strong support for both the organizations and the artists by the intermediary; the intermediary’s strong experience can nimbly support a situation where artists and organizations are new to each other and can smooth the path for working together. This model also allows artists to engage in a mutual discussion with the organization to define the scope of work and to agree on how the artist’s skills can best further the organizational or agency mission.

Challenges: Requires heavy reliance on the intermediary, may be overly prescriptive in terms of the artist’s output, and may be logistically challenging to share power and decision making across three entities.

Example: Artists at Work employed four artists to work with community partners MLK Jr. Family Services and two local cultural organizations, the Springfield Armory and Springfield City Library, Mason Square Branch in Springfield, Massachusetts. Public-facing programming and projects amplified and advanced MLK Jr. Family Service’s mission and existing services while activating the cultural partners’ space and resources in service of the Mason Square community. More information here: https://www.artists-at-work.org/springfield

Employment Intermediary

In this model, the employment intermediary holds employment for the artist, and the organization works with the artist in more of a client-consultant relationship. The main differences between this model and the model above are that the employment intermediary is not directly involved in creating or supporting the collaboration between the artist and the organization.

Advantages: Places significant control in the hands of the artist and disrupts traditional employment hierarchies. The artist works with the organization to create their scope of work, but they are not beholden to the organization in the way an employee might be.

Challenges: Can be more difficult for the organization to navigate. It also can be more alienating for the artist and the organization, who may not feel the same sense of commitment or connection with each other.

Example: Friends of Ganondagan collaborated with 10 artists who were directly employed by Tribeworks, an employment intermediary and worker cooperative that served as the employer of record for the artists, administering their payroll and health insurance. The ten artists worked on a variety of projects in Haudenosaunee communities across upstate New York and their individual scopes of work were with Friends of Ganondagan. More information here: https://www.creativesrebuildny.org/artist-employment-program/collaborations/view/friends-of-ganondagan/

Identify Your Capacity (Opportunities and Constraints)

As you begin the process of designing an artist employment program, another early step will be to identify your opportunities and constraints. Typically, your funding sources may come with specific requirements that will impact the particular target geographies, topic/issue areas that need to be addressed, reporting metrics, and populations that will be involved.

Another important constraint to consider is organizational and staff capacity: employing artists within an organization will require staff to manage and support the artist; the artists’ role within the organization may also require a new type of employee category or other adjustments within the organizational structure or culture.

In addition, for an artist employment program to be effective, you must identify that you have artists who are already working within their communities. Ideally several of these artists would be brought in to help design the program.

Finally, especially for publicly-funded artist employment programs where artists are embedded in government agencies, it’s critical to consider the authorizing environment: who is invested in the program goals and who has the power or authority to bring artists into organizations or agencies in a meaningful way.

Identify Stakeholders, Goals, and Impacts

Who is this program for, what do you hope to achieve, and what will success look like?

Identify Stakeholders

Beyond the artists themselves, stakeholders may include organizations, specific communities (these may be demographic and/or geographical and/or professional), funders, elected officials, among others.

Identify Outcomes and Goals

Building from both opportunities and constraints, a program should articulate the specific outcomes and broader goals the artist employment hopes to achieve. The goals may be tied to particular stakeholders.

Theory of Change

Often, artist employment programs operate within a broader effort to shift economic or social wellbeing. A ‘theory of change’ may help articulate how artist employment contributes to that effort.

Examples & Resources:

• CRNY Theory Of Change
• AEP Goals One-Pager

Define Key Parameters

Once you have established the model, stakeholders, goals, and impacts, the next step is to create the specific parameters of the artist employment program. This includes selecting a payment and benefit structure, defining how much artists will be paid, how long the employment will run, as well as plans for on-boarding and off-boarding with care.

Payment and Benefits Structures

In addition to determining who will hold employment for the artist, you will also need to choose how to structure payment and benefits for the artist. States also have different requirements and regulations around employment classification, so it is critical to review local employment laws.

W2 Employment The artist holds traditional hourly-wage or salaried employment with the organization, the arts intermediary, or a worker cooperative.

Advantages: Can provide access to employer-sponsored health insurance, unemployment benefits, and other worker protections.

Challenges: Artists may be unfamiliar with tax withholding, and they may be subject to traditional employment rules and hierarchy that conflict with their work style or personal expression. Smaller organizations or municipal agencies may not be able to administer payroll and benefits services.

Contract/1099 The artist is paid as a contractor for their services and is not considered an employee of the organization or agency that is paying them.

Advantages: Works well for small organizations that may not be able to administer payroll and benefits for the artist, and a majority of artists are familiar with this type of ‘gig’ employment.

Challenges: Provides little to no worker protections nor does it afford access to employer-sponsored health insurance. This structure may also mean less involvement or authority of the artist within the organization.

Fellowship In an academic fellowship model, funds are awarded to the artist as a direct grant from an academic institution.

Advantages: Typically involves a fair amount of independence and autonomy for the artist, and it can have a reduced tax burden for the artist. Fellowships also often carry professional prestige.

Challenges: Like contract work, fellowships do not offer worker protections or access to standard employee benefits.

Compensation Amount and Employment Duration

Building from funding constraints, an employment model, and payment structure, you will identify the rate or income the artist will receive as well as the duration of the artist’s employment.

Duration of Employment: The artist employment programs that contributed to this toolkit had cohorts that ran from nine months to two years. Collectively, the group agreed that if possible, artist employment should last for a minimum of two years, while acknowledging that funding and other constraints might require a shorter duration. To see the benefits of financial stability, strong relationships, and positive change within an ecosystem, a minimum of one year is required, and two+ years are recommended.

Example: CRNY funded 2 years of W2 employment at $65,000/year (commensurate with average household income in New York State) for two years, and provided 28% on top of this to employers to offset the cost of health insurance premiums and employers’ required contributions to payroll taxes, unemployment insurance, and worker’s compensation insurance.

Additional Structural Considerations

Within each of the formal structures described above, you will also need to determine how the employment relationships will work on a day-to-day basis. Who will directly supervise the artist’s work? Who will the artist go to if they need additional support or if they have a conflict with their manager? Who has the authority to give consequences to the artist as an employee?

Consider a Think Tank/Advisory Process

If you are planning to launch an artist employment program in a place with populations that are new to this way of working together, consider bringing local stakeholder voices into the shaping of the program via a Think Tank or Advisory Process. This process can help define details around key parameters, the application and selection process, and participant support.

Example: CRNY held a Think Tank process that involved artists, organizers, administrators, researchers, and workforce development practitioners who engaged in collective decision making with CRNY staff to determine eligibility, application processes, and implementation for CRNY’s programs. More info here: https://www.creativesrebuildny.org/storytelling/blog-archive/2021/08/31/creatives-rebuild-new-york-announces-think-tank-members/

Several members of the working group that contributed to this report placed an emphasis on making their artist employment programs accessible to as broad a range of participants as possible. This often meant expansive definitions of who qualified as an artist, a specific focus on including artists from historically marginalized communities, and artists from a broad range of disciplines.

There are two key principles that rise to the surface when considering access within an artist employment program:

Design for Access

Throughout each phase of the artist employment program ensure that your processes and procedures are designed to welcome folks who may have a diverse set of access needs. This can look like making sure events include visual description, captioning, sign language interpreters, language translators, and that speaking is slowed down to allow time for processing and translation. It can also mean offering materials in multiple languages, creating plain language versions of these materials, and—most importantly— involving participants with disabilities to choose their preferred access supports.

Resources: 

Access Access Series 

Linguistic Justice

Work Doesn’t Work for Everyone

A key finding of CRNY’s research into the impact of the Artist Employment Program on Deaf and disabled artists was that an employment framework can be especially tricky for Deaf and disabled artists. The assumption that worth is determined by productivity underlies many employment frameworks, and this assumption can make it challenging for Deaf and disabled artists to thrive within an ableist, capitalist system. Healthcare access can also be especially tricky for Deaf and disabled artists who need specialized care and may have to pay much more out-of-pocket for medical expenses when their salaries exceed the maximum to be eligible for public healthcare and disability benefits.

Resource: Deaf and Disabled Artist Employment: Research on Work

After establishing the basic parameters for the artist employment program, you’ll be ready to recruit and select artists and organizations for the program. We recommend the following overarching principles as you design your outreach plan:

Create a robust outreach strategy to reach and recruit artists and organizations who are aligned with your specific goals and target populations.

There is a common tendency to do outreach via networks that primarily include candidates who have established credibility and stature and know how to successfully navigate the grants landscape–often only those who are “plugged in” will find out about opportunities or believe that an opportunity may be “for them.” This leaves behind a large segment of the field who are doing critical work but simply have not had the time, training, or access to understand and apply for funding, or don’t trust traditional funding structures and/or organizations.

Center and prioritize local knowledge and voices in outreach efforts

Local artists, organizations, community organizers, and grassroots community leaders know who is effectively doing work on the ground and understand community needs. Bring these voices and perspectives into your outreach process.

There are multiple ways to structure the outreach effort, depending on the application and selection process:

Option 1: Open Call

In this model of outreach, application, and selection, there is a public announcement of the employment opportunity and open invitation for any eligible candidate to apply. The goal of the outreach is to cast as wide a net as possible and to ensure that the specific populations the program hopes to reach are aware of the opportunity and encouraged to apply.

Hire an Outreach Team: Bring in experts on the ground who are already connected in the communities you are trying to reach. 

Examples:

• CRNY hired artist organizers in each region of the state that they hoped to draw applicants from to center and maximize local expertise. These artists were already active and embedded in their regions—and could act as trusted messengers about the program.  CRNY outreach corps job description 
• Seattle Hope Corps hired consultants to help with outreach and application support. Hope Corps outreach contract template
• Kern Dance Association (as part of the California Creative Corps) hired a local marketing firm that specialized in grassroots political campaigns to get the word out about their opportunity.

Hold Regional Information Sessions: Host in-person or virtual information sessions for potential candidates to learn more about the opportunity and ask questions/receive support in the application process. These can be especially successful when held in partnership with trusted community-based organizations or as part of existing community gatherings.

Examples: 

• CRNY Information Sessions 
• Seattle Hope Corp Information Session
• 18th Street Arts Center California Creative Corps Project Info Session

Network through Local Arts Councils: Local arts councils often have newsletters, meetings, and posting boards that artists and local arts organizations are already paying attention to; partner with these arts councils to spread the word about the opportunity. 

Create Digital Outreach and Social Media Assets: Develop graphics, talking points, and brief blurbs to help promote the opportunity; consider how these resources will be made accessible to artists with disabilities and those who may be in areas with limited access to the Internet. These assets can be shared through your own channels and through partners.

Engage Local Press: Create a press release or alert for local media and reach out to reporters who cover arts and/or business news to pitch stories about the program to raise visibility to potential applicants.

Create an Overarching Outreach Plan: Centralize the various tactics into a single document or hub with links to assets and the timeline.

• Example: CRNY Outreach Hub

Option 2: Closed Selection

In this model of outreach, application, and selection, participants are identified and selected by the program administrators, often in conjunction with a selection committee. There is little or no application process, and the identification and recruitment of strong candidates relies on the deep knowledge and expertise of committees of advisors and/or peers.

Create an Advisory Committee Identify advisors who have deep knowledge of and credibility in the artistic communities you want to engage. This could include recognized/established artists and scholars as well as cross-sector community leaders, grassroots activists, and artists who are peers of and/or share affinity with the ideal candidates.

• Example: Maniobra’s Peer Review Committee – The Maniobra program uses a selection process based on an advisory group of individuals with experience in the artistic sector. This group is responsible for nominating candidates and discussing various aspects and variables to ensure a cohort that reflects the diversity of Puerto Rico’s cultural ecosystem, including variables such as race, gender, styles, location, age, etc. Nominees are invited to submit a proposal and are supported by mentors throughout the process. Although the program has a maximum duration of three years, it is renewed annually based on a proposal with a work plan for the new year.

Option 3: Invite to Apply

This model of outreach, application, and selection is a hybrid of the previous models; candidates are invited to apply via recommendations or nominations from an advisory group or peer network. This model prioritizes finding and recruiting candidates who are likely to be a strong fit for the program goals.

Create a Team of Nominators In addition to or instead of creating an advisory committee who recommends candidates to apply, identify a limited set of organizational partners and/or peer artists to nominate candidates to apply.

Limit Outreach to Smaller Networks Share the program opportunity more broadly but through a small set of targeted networks. This could look like specific partner organizations sending the opportunity out through their email newsletter or peer artists sharing the opportunity on their social media channels.

Depending on the goals and parameters of the program, different information will be required from candidates in the application process. In addition to making sure your application is aligned with your programmatic goals and selection criteria, we recommend two overarching principles in the application process:

Reduce Burden on Applicants

Especially if you have a process where the number of applicants will far exceed the number of participants, avoid lengthy or laborious application processes. Try to streamline the application as much as possible, and only ask for information that is required for selection. Several of the artist employment programs that contributed to this toolkit used a two-stage application process where the first stage required minimal effort from applicants and acted as a preliminary screen, and then only those candidates who advanced to the second stage were required to supply more detailed information.

Offer a Relational Process

Prioritize care and humane support during the application process. Especially for candidates who are new to navigating grant applications, having a warm, encouraging, and supportive process can be transformative. This can look like providing ample time for Q&A during information sessions, creating clear and transparent FAQs, forming a ‘help desk’ or team of navigators who can provide technical assistance on the application, offering opportunities for proposal draft review, and hiring local, trusted messengers who are trained to answer questions and discuss ideas with applicants.

The working group that contributed to this report utilized different application processes; the three main variations are:

Option 1: Open Call Application

In an Open Call application process, there is a public announcement of the employment opportunity and open invitation for any eligible candidate to apply. The guidelines and application are publicly available, and everyone who believes they are eligible is encouraged to apply.

Advantages: The open call process aims to maximize equity and transparency, as anyone can apply and the criteria are public. It allows programs to cast a wide net and invite artists and organizations that might not be well connected to existing resource or peer networks.

Challenges: Because anyone can submit an application in an open call process, there may be many applications whose candidates do not actually meet the criteria. An open call process can become competitive and feed the scarcity mindset that plagues much of the field. The selection process can be extremely laborious because the number of applicants can far exceed the number of participants who can be selected and supported.

Option 2: Closed Selection

In a closed selection process, participants are ‘tapped’ for the employment program, or invited to shape a proposal with support from an advisory or peer committee where the presumption is they will be funded as long as they go through the process.

Advantages: There is minimal labor involved for both applicants and the selection committee. Everyone who is tapped will receive funding, sometimes without needing to complete an application at all. There is no explicit competition and there is no ‘wasted’ labor on the part of applicants.

Challenges: The process for making yourself visible as a potential candidate is opaque, and there is a de facto bias toward individuals and organizations who may be well known or well connected in their fields.

Option 3: Invite to Apply

In this hybrid application process, candidates are invited to apply via recommendations or nominations from an advisory group or peer network. This typically allows for a broader applicant pool than a closed process does, but it still limits the pool to candidates who are likely a strong fit for the program.

Advantages: The ‘invite to apply’ application allows for a broader applicant pool but still lessens overall competition, reducing the number of people who get rejected after putting in time and effort on the application. It also reduces the burden on the selection committee.

Challenges: This model may still be biased toward artists and organizations who are already ‘plugged in’ to networks and have existing recognition in the field. There may also be a higher relational cost to rejecting candidates who have been specifically solicited/invited to apply.

Examples of application materials & guidelines:

• CRNY’s Questions for Potential AEP Applicants 
• CRNY AEP Guidelines & Application Questions
• CRNY Application FAQs
• CRNY HelpDesk Job Description
• Artists At Work Application Example (Los Angeles 2025)
• Seattle Hope Corps Application Preview
• Maniobra Application
• California Creative Corps KDA 2023 Grant Guidelines
• 18th Street Arts Center Application Process
• 18th Street Arts Center Application

The core of the selection process boils down to two key elements: the selection criteria and the selection/review committee. We recommend the following overarching principles:

Explicit and Consistent Criteria

The criteria should be explicitly aligned to the program goals and parameters, and a rubric for evaluating the applications should connect directly back to the criteria. For the most equitable approach, the selection criteria and rubric should be used consistently across applicants, and the criteria and rubric should be transparent and publicly available so applicants understand how they are being evaluated.

Critically Consider the Role of ‘Artistic Merit’

When selecting artists for employment, you are considering them for the work they will be doing with an organization, which may look different from their success or merit as an artist. Further, if you want to change how artists experience stability in their lives and livelihoods, you may need to change the criteria for how artists are selected for support.

Consistent Communication

Regardless of selection process model, consistent, regular, transparent, and unwavering communication on both public and applicant-pool-only platforms need to be baked into each step of the outreach, application, and selection processes.

‘Jury of Peers’ Reviewers/Selection Committee

The reviewers/selection panelists should share affinity with the artists or organizations that are applying, as well as potentially the communities they will be working within. Consider factors such as geographic representation, demographic characteristics, artistic discipline, subject matter experience/expertise, and connection to target communities when selecting reviewers.

Hallmarks of Successful Collaborations

While every artist employment program will have its own specific criteria, most successful collaborations share some consistent traits:

• The relationship between the artist and the collaborating organization or agency is critically important. In most successful collaborations, the artist and organization/agency have an existing relationship and have previously worked together in some capacity.
• The responsibilities and expectations of the artist and the organization/agency are explicit and mutually agreed-upon.
• A commitment to mutuality and iterative co-creation between the artist and organization/agency are often critical to a successful collaboration.

The working group utilized different selection processes:

Option 1: Open Call

The open call selection involved a multi-stage process. The first stage is typically an eligibility screen. Once ineligible applications are screened out, a ‘jury of peers’ selection committee evaluates applications based on the published criteria and rubrics. Following the first-stage reviews, programs engaged in either:

Interviews: Candidates engaged in an interview where all artists and at least one organizational representative met with a subset of reviewers to further discuss their plans for collaboration.

Training/Proposal Development: Programs worked closely with candidates who made it to the second round to create robust proposals, offering structured training and support, and paying candidates $500-$1,000 for their time in this phase.

Option 2: Closed Selection

Participants are identified and selected by the program administrators, often in conjunction with a selection committee. Essentially all candidates who were selected in the first round were guaranteed funding upon completion of their full proposals.

Option 3: Invite to Apply

Candidates are invited to apply via recommendations or nominations from an advisory group or peer network. Not everyone who is invited will be funded, but the competition is significantly reduced.

Examples of selection criteria/rubrics

• CRNY AEP Rubric Worksheet
• CRNY AEP Phase 2 Interview Questions & Rubric
• CRNY AEP Peer Reviewer Job Description
• Hope Corps Scoring Rubric
• Artists At Work Sample Application Review Form
• 18th Street Arts Center Round 1 Scoring Form
• 18th Street Arts Center Round 2 Scoring Form

Once you have selected your artist employment program participants, there are many ways to strengthen the collaborative work and enrich the experience for artists and employers through participant support initiatives. Different employment programs offer varying types and levels of support to participants, but some common principles emerge:

Offer onboarding support

The beginning of the employment relationship often involves paperwork and protocols. Many artists who have not been involved in formal employment situations will benefit from help in navigating these onboarding procedures, especially those who are beginning W2 employment for the first time. Employers also may need support in defining how the artists’ role fits within the larger organization.

Examples:

• AEP Shared Agreements
• Maniobra Onboarding Process
• Hope Corps contract template

Provide support navigating employment relationships and conflict

Disagreements and conflict are a natural and sometimes healthy part of collaboration. It is essential to provide a structure and process for addressing conflicts when they arise in the employment context. This should at minimum include an explicit protocol for navigating issues between artists and employers, and ideally could provide support from mediators and/or employment lawyers.

Examples:

• AEP Conflict FAQs
• AEP Conflict Management Protocol
• Mediation/employment law support: Untangled Resolutions and Mir Firm

Give responsive assistance as needed and be flexible in supporting changes

One of the hallmarks of effective artist employment is the ability of the artist and the employer to evolve the collaboration over time to best meet their shared goals. As challenges and questions arise, it’s incredibly helpful for employment program staff to provide answers and technical assistance as needed. As much as possible, it is also essential that the employment program supports changes in the specific scope or nature of the work.

Example: AEP check-in interview protocols and themes

Offer professional development resources

Throughout the duration of the employment, where possible, offer resources and support for artists and employers to deepen their practice and further their livelihoods. These opportunities are likely to have the best attendance/engagement if they are generated by the employees/artists and organizations themselves. This can look like trainings on fundraising, marketing, social media, employment and IP law, as well as content or discipline-specific workshops.

Examples:

• ArtTrain
• CRNY Newsletter Archive
• Artists At Work Milestones

Create cohorts and/or networking opportunities

One of the most powerful tools the participants in any artist employment program have is one another. Almost all artist employment programs endeavor to create some kind of cohort among the participants. Some create groups and require regular meetings separately for artists and employers; others offer a looser ‘community of practice’ model that offer voluntary professional development activities.

Examples: 

• The Space
• CRNY AEP Regional Gatherings

Provide offboarding support

At the end of most artist employment programs, many of the artists and employers will no longer work together in the same capacity; artists may face a financial and/or benefits cliff, and employers may face a dramatic reduction in organizational capacity. Artist employment programs can help participants prepare for the transition in a variety of ways, from offering fundraising guidance to help organizations keep artists on to providing access to coaching and career development resources for artists.

Examples

• AEP Exit Packet
• Maniobra Financial Training – As part of the Maniobra program’s support, a financial planning education initiative was designed for participants. The program consists of three two-hour workshops and individual mentoring hours to address participants’ needs. One of the initiative objectives is to provide adequate planning for the financial transition process at the end of the three-year period.

All of the members of the working group who contributed to this toolkit emphasized the importance of documenting the process and work involved in their programs. Three principles stand out:

Document what happened

Every artist employment effort has a unique origin story, set of goals, and process. A comprehensive narrative or accounting that describes each of the participants and the work that they did together is an essential way to capture the scope and breadth of the program.

Program participants (artists and organizations) are a key audience and stakeholder

It’s crucial to recognize that the participants in the program rely on the documentation of the program and their work as a way to further their own careers and missions. Ideally, participants should be brought in as the documentation plan is designed to ensure that it will meet their needs as they move on from the program.

Create a reference/resource for the field

The other main audience for documentation is the field of future artist employment programs and potential funders. Documentation should serve as a resource and a reference for both research and future work.

Examples:

• CRNY Digital Yearbook
• Panel discussion: Reflecting on the Hope Corps experience
• Artists At Work website 
• Artists At Work 2024 End-of-Year Snapshot
• 18th Street Art Center Interviews
• 18th Street Art Center Culture Maps

Storytelling

Storytelling is about creating compelling narratives around key themes of the work. Storytelling is typically not comprehensive–it intentionally selects specific examples to highlight a particular concept or type of impact. Storytelling work often highlights individual artists and organizations or agencies, and it is intended to showcase the benefits and impacts of the work. These narratives are intended to make the case for artist employment.

Examples:

• CRNY Social Media
• CRNY AEP Community Impact Videos
• Artists At Work YouTube Channel
• Hope Corps culminating exhibit
• Art Takes Work

Evaluation is connected to documentation in that the audience for this work is also primarily the program participants, others in the field of artist employment, and potential funders. However, where documentation is about capturing the process and work in a comprehensive way, evaluation is about analysis. Much of the design of the evaluation will connect back to the goals and parameters of the program: did it accomplish what it set out to do, and what are the metrics that illustrate this?

The core principles for evaluating an artist employment program include:

Analyze what worked and didn’t work in the program design

If you run the program again, what would you keep and what would you change? What pieces of the program design worked as intended, what elements proved more challenging than expected, and what was missing? This aspect of the evaluation focuses on how the program was executed and analyzes program implementation.

Example: CRNY AEP Process Evaluation

Identify program impacts on key stakeholders

In many ways, this is the heart of the evaluation work: what impact did the program have on the individuals, organizations, agencies, and communities it was intended to serve? Did the program further a particular mission or content goal? What kind of return did it provide on the program investment? What changed as a result of the program: what was expected and what was a surprise?

Include participants in evaluation design and pay them for this work where feasible

There is a long and unfortunate history of evaluation and research requiring tremendous labor on the part of participants/subjects without yielding any benefit to those participants. As much as possible, program participants should be seen as key stakeholders in the evaluation; including them in the design ensures that the evaluation answers their own questions about what is and isn’t working.

Include collection of quantitative and qualitative data and information

This should involve 1:1 interviews where participants can share experiences and perspectives—as well as traditional survey methods. Evaluation can also be based on panel conversations or on other types of artistic submissions; sometimes data can come in the form of poetry, imagery, and music.

Examples

• CRNY AEP Research Overview
• Artists At Work Supplemental Impact Report 2021-2023
• KDA Creative Corps Final Report Infographic

The contributors to this toolkit oversaw (and some continue to oversee) a diverse set of Artist Employment Programs that have helped support artists’ lives and livelihoods, and strengthen organizations and communities. Summaries of each program follow:

Creative Rebuild New York’s Artist Employment Program was a 2-year program, funded by private philanthropy, that supported W2 employment at $65,000/year plus benefits for 300 artists working in collaboration with over 100 community-based organizations across New York State. Community-based organizations received $25,000-$100,000 per year to support their collaborations with these artists. Artists and organizations applied jointly. 177 of the artists were employed via the worker cooperative and employment intermediary, Tribeworks, while the rest were directly employed by their collaborating institutions. 

Artists At Work (AAW) provides W2 salaried employment for artists to deepen their art practice and work collaboratively in response to local community needs across a range of cross-sector issues. As of spring 2025, AAW has provided 74 artists and culture workers across 11 states with an annual salary and health benefits, leveraging their creativity in partnership with over 80 cultural and community organizations. AAW receives a combination of public and private funding.

Maniobra is the leading cultural employment initiative in Puerto Rico. It is funded by private philanthropy, and it has employed over 60 artists with annual salaries of $48,000 plus benefits as well as an operational budget of $20,000 for executing projects for three years. The program also offers management services and professional development trainings. Artists are selected by invitation and are employed directly by Maniobra.

Cross-sector Artists in Residence Lab (CAIR Lab) has conducted research on artists working within municipal governments and has helped build several artist-in-residence in government programs. Some examples of artists working within municipal governments include NYC Government, City of St. Paul, City of Boston, City of Ottawa, as well as Washington and Minnesota State Departments of Transportation. Artists are typically contracted by city departments and embedded within their work to address specific challenges the departments are facing internally or externally (serving particular constituencies). Sometimes artists provide services such as programming and organizing as well. 

Seattle Hope Corps is an artist employment program that supports Seattle’s creative workforce by funding and incubating career advancement opportunities that contribute to the well-being of Seattle. It is funded by the city of Seattle’s Office of Arts & Culture (ARTS). Artists are hired on a contract basis (making a minimum of $32/hour) to work with community-based organizations to address one or more of the Hope Corps focus areas: public health (including gun violence), mental health and healing, food security, storytelling, social connection and belonging, arts education, climate and water justice, placemaking/keeping and belonging, transit corridors/connectivity, and Seattle is Thriving. Artists are invited to apply through an open-call process that was administered by selected partner organizations. 

The California Creative Corps was a state-funded $60 million artist employment program run by the California Arts Council (CAC) and administered by 14 regional and statewide organizations, aimed at providing work for artists and culture bearers in increasing public awareness and affecting behavior around four issue areas. The artists and communities selected for the program had to be high-need, as defined by being in the bottom 25% of the Healthy Places Index. The three initiatives below were administering organizations for the California Creative Corps.

KDA Creative Corps funded 13 organizations (who selected and hired artists) and 7 organizations (who selected organizations to work with) with $4.2M of support over 18 months in the Central Valley of California. Organizations could apply for up to $250,000, 80% of which had to be allocated toward paying for artists’ labor, and 20% toward project materials. Artists could apply for up to $150,000. Grantees managed their own employment, which was a mix of self-employment, contract/1099, and W2 salaries. The application process was an open call with individual artists, local arts agencies, and local arts orgs submitting letters of intent (LOIs). They received 142 LOIs, and 89 were advanced to a grant writing/training phase where they were supported in creating full applications. 90% of grantees were first-time grant recipients. 

Far South Border North used a combination of state funds from California Creative Corps and local private philanthropy to fund artist employment for 60 individual artists and 18 organizations alongside five social-sector organizations that acted as incubator hubs for work in San Diego and Imperial counties. Artists were provided a $35,000 unrestricted up front payment for a year’s worth of work developing a public messaging campaign to address climate/environment, health, civic engagement, or social action and then given an additional $9,000 to implement the campaign. The 18 organizations received $140,500, of which $105,000 had to go to funding employment for at least three artists (including one lead artist who had to make $35,000), $10,500 in unrestricted support for the organization, and $25,000 toward project materials. 

18th Street Arts directly hired 18 artists across the state of California for one fiscal year at a salary of $65,000 plus $50,000 for project funds to work with a community partner on an artistic collaboration and a cultural asset map of their community. They received 400 applications consisting of a resume and concept statement; 40 were moved forward to a month-long training program where they had to create a budget and detailed proposal for their work; artists were paid $1,000 to do this training and complete their proposal. Some artists came in as LLCs (contracted with them as a business) while others came in as W2 employees. All grantees were offered health insurance and 401k benefits.

This toolkit was authored by Bella Desai, Director of Strategic Initiatives, Artist Employment Program at Creatives Rebuild New York. It was edited by Erinrose Mager, CRNY’s Writer and Assistant Director of Media and Communications as well as Sarah Calderon, CRNY’s Executive Director. Key input for this toolkit came from Christopher Mulè, CRNY’s Director of Strategic Initiatives, Artist Employment Program and Kevin Gotkin, CRNY’s Artist-Organizer.

The structure and content for this toolkit came from a team of leaders who have run artist employment efforts around the US:

• Nadine Goellner, Artists At Work
• Alex Rose, Seattle Office of Arts & Culture (Seattle Hope Corps)
• Mallory Rukhsana Nezam, Cross-Sector Artists in Residence Lab (CAIR Lab)
• Javier Hernandez-Acosta, Maniobra
• Carol Zou, 18th Street Arts Center

We are grateful to the following individuals for sharing their insights and recommendations:

• Julie Baker, California for the Arts
• Michael Ano and Jan Williamson, 18th Street Arts Center
• Christine Jones, City of San Diego (Far South Border North)
• Andrea Hansen, Kern Dance Alliance (KDA Creative Corps)
• Danielle Brazell, California Arts Council
• Jun-Li Wang, Springboard for the Arts