Announcing the 2024 21c Cincinnati Artadia Awardee

21c Museum Hotels, a multi-venue contemporary art museum and award-winning hospitality company, and Artadia, a non-profit grantmaking organization and nationwide community of visual artists, curators, and patrons, are thrilled to announce Erika NJ Allen as the recipient of the 2024 21c Cincinnati Artadia Award.

Launched in Louisville, KY in 2021, the 21c Artadia Award is a long-term partnership that annually provides $15,000 in unrestricted funds to one artist living and working in the unique creative communities where 21c Museum Hotels are located. Previous 21c Artadia Award cycles have granted three artists with unrestricted awards – Kiah Celeste (2021 Louisville), Kathy Liao (2022 Kansas City), and André Leon Gray (2023 Research Triangle).

The 21c Artadia Award is designed to provide essential funding and recognition to artists at pivotal points in their careers, strengthen arts communities, and spur new levels of career achievement. In addition to the grant itself, the Award includes lifelong access to the Artadia Network, a support program nurturing strategic relationships and connecting Awardees with a community of fellow artists and a diverse cohort of professionals.

The 2024 21c Cincinnati application was open to artists working in any visual media, at any stage in their career, who have been living and working within Hamilton, Butler, and Warren counties in Ohio or Boone, Campbell, and Kenton counties in Kentucky for a minimum of two years. We received 80 applications, with 51.2% of the applicants identifying as Black, Native American or Alaskan Native, Latinx, Asian, Arab, biracial or multiracial; 67.6% as women, gender nonconforming, or nonbinary; and 56.6% as emerging artists.

The Award decision was reached after an extensive two-tiered jurying process. Alongside awardee Erika NJ Allen, this year’s finalists for the Award included Andrew Au and Trudy Gaba selected by jurors Jessica Hong, Senior Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Toledo Museum of Art, and Monique Long, Independent Curator.

“The strength and diversity of applications from the Cincinnati community exceeded 21c’s already high expectations, and we are thrilled to congratulate awardee Erika NJ Allen and finalists Andrew Au and Trudy Gaba, all of whom are pursuing dynamic material and conceptual practices,” said 21c Chief Curator and Museum Director Alice Gray Stites. “Allen’s personal and professional journey to becoming an inspiring, multi-media artist in Cincinnati is especially compelling, and we look forward to seeing what her future holds. 21c is grateful to jurors Jessica Hong and Monique Long for their thoughtful engagement in this year’s award selection.”

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About Artadia

Since its founding in 1999, Artadia has awarded over $6 million in unrestricted funds to over 400 artists nationally. Celebrating visual artists and their foundational role in shaping society, the Artadia Award benefits three artists annually in seven major US cities with high concentrations of creative workers—Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, New York City, and the San Francisco Bay Area.

Image, left to right: Erika NJ Allen, This is Not a Coup, 2022; Portrait of Awardee Erika NJ Allen (photo credit Tryst Red); Erika NJ Allen, Green Banana Wall, 2022.

About 21c Museum Hotels

21c Museum is a multi-venue museum located in eight cities. One of the largest contemporary art museums in the U.S., and North America’s only collecting museum dedicated solely to art of the 21st century, each property features exhibition space open free of charge to the public, combined with a boutique hotel and restaurant. It was founded in 2006 by Laura Lee Brown and Steve Wilson; philanthropists, preservationists, and collectors committed to expanding access to contemporary art as a means of catalyzing revitalization and civic connection. 21c presents a range of arts programming curated by Museum Director, Chief Curator Alice Gray Stites, including both solo and group exhibitions that reflect the global nature of art today, as well as site-specific, commissioned installations, and a variety of cultural events. The organization collaborates on arts initiatives with artists and organizations worldwide, including Speed Art Museum, North Carolina Museum of Art, Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, Artadia, Creative Capital Foundation, Creative Time, FotoFocus, For Freedoms, and others.