The Council for the Arts at MIT provides funding for arts projects with a special interest in supporting projects that engage the MIT community. The Council’s Grants Committee considers proposals for projects in the fall and spring semesters. Applications for Undergraduate Mini-Grants are accepted on a rolling basis at any time.
Fall 2021 Grants Committee Funding Recipients
Anastasia Aizman, MIT Digital Humanities Lab, The Wanderverse Project
An “exquisite corpse” poetry treasure hunt game that invites the MIT community to explore spaces in the library they might not otherwise visit as they create poems called “wanderverses.”
Maryam Aljomairi & Kimball Kaiser, graduate students in Architecture, Reciprocal Engagement
A community-based design project and IAP workshop for the MIT community to build, invent, and experiment with structural frames composed of a two-part system of joints and standard wooden dowels.
Baptiste Blanc, postdoc in Mechanical Engineering, and Christopher Kelly, graduate student in Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Living Dots
A video projection “living painting” in which oscillating dots communicate with each other via chemical waves, animating a metaphor for union of self and other.
Jeana Choi & Lisa Yoo, graduate students in EECS, IAP Seminar Series: Achieving the Unthinkable: K-pop on the Global Stage
An IAP course that connects K-pop (Korean pop) artists and producers with the MIT community to explore the global impact of this immensely popular industry of Korean popular music.
James Heard, graduate student in Architecture, The Architects Collaborative 1945–1995: Tracing a Diffuse Architectural Authorship
An exhibition at Boston’s pinkcomma gallery and at MIT about The Architects Collaborative (TAC), a 20th-century architecture firm that was based in Cambridge.
Graduate students Jola Idowu (Architecture), Antonio Pacheco (HTC), Ardalan SadeghiKivi (Architecture), Meriam Soltan (HTC AKPIA), with faculty advisor Timothy Hyde, Thresholds 50: Before / After
A special 50th anniversary edition of Thresholds, the annual peer-reviewed journal for the MIT Department of Architecture.
Hiroshi Ishii, Media Lab Tangible Media Group, Sandscape
Restoration of SandScape, a tangible interface for designing and understanding landscapes through a variety of computational simulations using sand, for display in the new MIT Museum Collections Gallery.
Nataliya Kosmyna, research scientist in the Media Lab, NeuraFutures
An in-person and online exhibition, a series of talk-demo days, and an online interactive experience showcasing the science and fiction of brain sensing and its role in our future.
Kwan Queenie Li, graduate student in ACT, Labottega
A video production which explores old and new visual surveying techniques from life drawing to nanotechnology at the MIT.nano Lab, challenging the presumed binaries of art and science.
Karyn Nakamura, ’23, Interactive Projection Mapping on Simmons Hall
A projection mapping performance on MIT undergraduate dormitory Simmons Hall, featuring video content and effects that will be generated live in response to audience interaction.
MIT Imobilare & Thanh Nha Nguyen, graduate student in Mechanical Engineering, Breaking into Dance
A series of classes with a professional breakdance instructor to foster a community of breakdancers at MIT.
Ardalan SadeghiKivi, graduate student in Architecture, Entosis
A series of sculptures built to expose manifestations of “cannibalistic” computer programs.
Infinite, undergraduate student organization, Infinite Magazine Issue 9
An entirely student-run fashion collaborative focusing its ninth magazine issue on the theme of chaos.
Graduate students in Architecture Ramon Weber, Mohamed Ismail, Demi Fang, Eduardo Gascon Alvarez, with faculty advisor Caitlin Mueller, Pluma – Architectural Solar Sail
An architectural solar sail featuring photovoltaic membranes suspended in a lightweight cable system, which is designed to offset and surpass the energy used for the production of its parts.
Zhifei Xu & Thaddeus Lee, graduate students in Architecture, ScreenTime
A series of pop-up game projection installations across MIT’s campus that invite spontaneous interaction from passers-by.