The Emily Hall Tremaine Exhibition Award

The Tremaine Collection

The Tremaine art collection was widely considered to be one of the finest reflections of contemporary art in the nation until it was sold to create the asset base for the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation. It stood as a visual testament to the refined and courageous taste of its collectors, Burton and Emily Hall Tremaine.

Emily Hall Tremaine’s artistic vision helped her to collect works from artists who at the time were just starting to define contemporary art. Together, the Tremaines selected works that would be seminal for successive generations of artists and art collectors. The collection in its entirety, in the words of Robert Rosenblum, invoked ’new constellations of meaning and importance.’ It broke with tradition and convention yet conveyed a sense of spirituality and contemplation. Its complexity offered many layers of meaning and insight to the viewer.

Purpose and Goal of the Award

The Exhibition Award was created in 1998 to honor the talent and artistic vision of our founder, Emily Hall Tremaine, whose passion for art inspired, challenged and brought joy to those around her.

Applications will be accepted on a biennial basis from any curator applying in partnership with an established non-profit exhibition space. The Foundation invites potential candidates to develop those thematic concepts of which they have always dreamed, to rise above the conventional by the exploration and submission of ideas reflecting a unique vision.

We encourage applicants to think expansively, moving beyond existing priorities and opportunities. Through the award, the Foundation seeks to give life to those thematic shows that are sufficiently experimental, challenging and focused in their theses for which funding is not yet forthcoming. This award is intended to provide funding for exhibitions at the beginnning stage of their development and to provide the curator with the support needed to fully explore the concept and realize the exhibition.

Please note: The next Emily Hall Tremaine Exhibition Award round is in 2008. Guidelines will be available on the website during the fall of 2007. Please visit the website during that time for more details.

To be considered for this award, you must complete both parts of the application by the appropriate deadlines:

Part 1 – An Intent to Apply Form must be downloaded, completed and emailed to sklar@tremainefoundation.org or faxed to 203.639.5545 for arrival by 5 PM Eastern on Friday, March 7, 2008.

Part II – The complete application must arrive at the Foundation office by 5 PM Eastern on Friday, April 11, 2008.

If you do not have Adobe Acrobat Reader, you may download it by clicking here and then following the instructions on the Adobe website. 

	Curator in partnership with an established (10+ years), non-profit exhibition space
	Innovative contemporary art (post 1960) thematic exhibition concept at the beginning stage of development
	Funding requests up to $150,000 with a minimum request of $50,000
	Exhibition space must be located within the United States

Ineligible:

	Single artist exhibitions, retrospectives and artist collective exhibitions
	Exhibitions composed solely of works of graduate students/faculty at a university
	Non-profit exhibition space based outside of the United States
	Exhibitions with multiple large funding sources  (The Exhibition Award should be the sole or primary source of funding for the exhibition. Therefore, the Exhibition Award request should represent at least 66% of all funding secured or sought from outside of the partnering institution. )
	Previous awardees (Once a curator receives the award they must wait four years before they can reapply for the award.  The partner exhibiting institution is exempt from this restriction.  They may serve as a partner institution on an application submitted at the next Exhibition Award round.)