NEA Fellows Celebrated in Events in Washington this Week
The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) announced this year’s NEA National Heritage Fellows, recipients of our nation’s highest honor in the folk and traditional arts. The NEA National Heritage Fellowships is the nation’s highest honor in folk and traditional arts. Each year since 1982, the program recognizes recipients’ artistic excellence, lifetime achievement, and contributions to our nation’s traditional arts heritage.
Read the list of 2023 NEA National Heritage Fellows.
Fellowship recipients are nominated by the public, often by members of their own communities, and then judged by a panel of experts in the folk and traditional arts. The panel’s recommendations are reviewed by the National Council on the Arts, which sends its recommendations to the chair of the NEA, who makes the final decision. Visit the National Endowment for the Arts website for more information.
2023 NEA National Heritage Fellowships Events
The following events are free and open to the public and will be available through a live webcast on the NEA National Heritage Fellowships page. Full details are available in the NEA newsroom.
Native Art Making in Place—Thursday, September 28, 2023, 3:00-4:30 p.m.
As part of a historic one-day gathering of National Heritage Fellowship honorees from 2020-2023, a special afternoon panel will feature a film screening and conversation about Native art-making and the land, co-presented with the National Museum of the American Indian. NEA National Heritage Fellows will share firsthand stories of place and belonging as understood through their life’s work as traditional and community-based artists.
National Heritage Fellowships Awards Ceremony—Friday, September 29, 2023, 5:30-6:30 p.m.
An awards ceremony will honor the 2023 National Heritage Fellows and recognize the 2020-2022 recipients. Hosted by the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, the ceremony will open with a performance by Irish flute player and 2021 NEA National Heritage Fellow Joanie Madden.
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