WaveMaker Grant Supports New Guidebook

We’re honored to share that Commissioner is the recipient of a 2024 WaveMaker Grant at Locust Projects, made possible by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts. With this support, we’re embarking on a creative writing project: a printed and interactive guidebook. Titled “Commissioner as Social Practice,” this initiative examines our program as an art project that challenges industry norms and contributes to a broader conversation on mutual support and alternative economies.

Commissioner disrupts traditional art collecting practices by exploring collaborative approaches that promote access in lieu of exclusivity. Here, membership is an organizing tool to crowdfund experiences and commission artists, bridging local connections that extend far beyond the program. 

As we enter our seventh season—a whole life cycle—we’ve been imagining and experimenting with different ways to support artists and collect art together. We’ve also encountered limitations, obstacles, and systems that are persistent and, unfortunately, not unique in the field.

”Commissioner as a Social Practice” is both a call-in and a share-out. The future of arts patronage is community-led.

About WaveMakers 

Locust Projects, Miami’s longest-running nonprofit alternative art space, makes art happen by supporting artists with opportunities and resources—like WaveMaker incubator grants. Since 2015, WaveMaker has awarded $630,000 to 127 of Miami’s visionary artists. Grantees receive up to $6,000 each in three categories: New Work / Projects, Long-Haul Projects, and Research & Development + Implementation. In the spirit of Locust Projects’ artist-driven mission, WaveMakers experiment and take risks, creating innovative work that is shared with the public in unconventional spaces.

WaveMaker Grants are made possible by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts' Regional Regranting Program, a network of 35 partner organizations across the country.

Recipients are selected through an open call process by a team of experienced local and national artists and arts professionals, eleven visionary artists and artist collectives are awarded up to $6,000 each to create innovative work that will be shared with the public across Miami in non-traditional venues and platforms.

The 2024 WaveMakers are: New Work / Projects: Iman Clark, Amy Gelb, Jillian Mayer, and Nadia Wolff; Long-Haul Projects: Dejha Carrington, Yanira Collado, Margo Hannah, Suanay Hernandez, and Season Five Artist Lee Pivnik; Research & Development + Implementation: Akia Dorsainvil and Christina Pettersson. 

The 2024 WaveMaker selection panel included: Katerina Llanes, creative producer/curator who organized the recent #MakingMiami projects; Karen McKinnon, former WaveMaker grantee (2023); Selene Preciado, Curator and Director of Programs, LACE, Warhol Foundation Regional Regranting partner in L.A.; and  Njeri Rutherford, Program Manager, CultureSource, Warhol Foundation Regional Regranting partner in Detroit.

A toast to sharing wide and deeply. 

Photo: Lina Kapur, captured by Dominique Claire-Marie at the Commissioner Montréal art trip in 2023