As the costs of cancer treatment continue to rise, the Rema Hort Mann Fund (RHMF) and the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation have partnered to launch the Artists Living with Cancer Grant, a $25,000 unrestricted grant designed to provide financial support to artists based in the New York City metro area undergoing cancer treatment. The conceptual artist Jacolby Satterwhite, a two-time cancer survivor currently undergoing treatment for the third time, is the inaugural recipient of the award.
Satterwhite is best-known for his striking immersive installations, performances and digital animations that draw on family archives, race, queer identity, sexuality and speculative fiction. His work is held in major collections including New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, Whitney Museum of American Art and Studio Museum in Harlem.
“I hope this grant creates a shift in the art world,” Satterwhite tells The Art Newspaper. “The art world can be very fickle and fleeting, but artists give their whole lives to their work. When serious illness interrupts that, there should be more space for care, dignity and support. This is my third stint, and it feels especially transformative, because it forced me to stop in a way I never had before. I had to step off the hamster wheel and become domestic, focused on healing and survival, and that meant losing access to parts of my artistic process. It made me understand even more deeply that my life and my practice are not separate.”
In addition to his cancer diagnosis, Satterwhite has been struggling with complications stemming from a childhood surgery that required three corrective surgeries and extended rehabilitation. He launched a GoFundMe campaign last year to support his recovery and return to making art with a goal of raising $350,000; the campaign has raised nearly $359,000 to date from more than 2,000 contributors.
“I didn’t fully understand the impact that my own vulnerability could have on other people,” Satterwhite says. “I think I carried a lot of shame around being sick. Something I had felt embarrassed by, or wanted to hide, has ended up becoming a point of connection and, I hope, a source of empowerment for others.”
Satterwhite will be presented the grant and honoured at the Rema Hort Mann Fund’s 30th-anniversary gala in October, when the two organisations also plan to open the first application cycle for the grant.
The RHMF has long supported both artists and cancer patients. In the past three decades, it has provided more than $9m in funding to over 650 artists and 2,300 cancer patients through its Emerging Artist Grants and Peter Hort Quality of Life Cancer Grants, respectively
The collaboration with the Rauschenberg Foundation is envisioned as the beginning of a long-term partnership. The organisations hope to expand the programme’s reach, increase the number of artists supported each year, and build a national model for how arts organisations can respond to the realities artists face while navigating cancer.
“We envision the grant growing into a sustainable programme that provides direct support to more visual artists each year, while building a broader network of care across the arts community,” says Elysia Borowy, the director of the RHMF. “We are actively fundraising to expand the programme and ensure its long-term impact.”
The grant is unrestricted, since recipients’ needs change from week to week—whether covering medical bills, rent, studio costs, transportation to appointments, caregiving or lost income while undergoing treatment. It acknowledges that “there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution, and that an artist’s health and creative practice are deeply intertwined”, Borowy says.
The Rauschenberg Foundation is known for prioritising emergency support for artists facing financial hardship. Robert Rauschenberg founded Change, Inc., in 1970, a nonprofit to help artists with unforeseen financial emergencies, including medical expenses. The organisation has remained active through the Rauschenberg Emergency Grants, which are administered by the New York Foundation for the Arts.
“Rauschenberg viewed supporting artists during times of difficulty as an essential part of a thriving cultural ecosystem,” says Courtney J. Martin, the director of the Rauschenberg Foundation. “By helping artists weather moments of acute personal need, these grants advance his conviction that sustaining artistic practice requires investing directly in the people who make it possible.”
Beyond the inaugural grant, the two organisations will also provide one-time grants of up to $10,000 to artists based in and around New York City who are presently undergoing cancer treatment.
