The University of Michigan’s Arts Initiative has announced its fall 2025 recipients for the Arts Initiative Project Support grants, awarding funding to nine faculty-led projects across the university.

At a time when arts funding is shrinking across the country, the funding from this program supports efforts that expand access to the arts, encourage interdisciplinary collaboration, and engage campus and community audiences in creative learning experiences. According to the Look to Michigan website: “by reframing the role of the arts within the university, we deepen our mission.”

“Arts Initiative Project Support funding seeks to inspire faculty and staff to forge new collaborative connections across campus and beyond to bring the arts into new places and to expand the role of the arts and art making as fundamental tools in realizing the university’s research, teaching and service mission,” said Mark Clague, executive director of the Arts Initiative.

AIPS offers up to $10,000 in funding per project, with an additional $5,000 available for proposals that incorporate visiting artists. This cycle’s funded projects range from performances and exhibitions to community collaborations that connect the arts to areas such as social justice, climate awareness, human rights, and Indigenous reconciliation.

Grants awarded to LSA’s Residential College, UM-Flint, UM-Dearborn, the A. Alfred Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, School of Music, Theatre & Dance, LSA’s Film, Television and Media Department, and LSA’s Sweetland Center for Writing will support diverse initiatives designed to expand access to the arts in Detroit, encourage interdisciplinary collaboration, and engage campus communities in new creative learning experiences that strengthen Michigan’s arts ecosystem. 

Following are the summer 2025 recipients, along with the project lead:

Poetry Night in Ann Arbor

Scott Beal, adjunct lecturer, Sweetland Center for Writing, LSA

This project will revive the beloved Poetry Night in Ann Arbor tradition with a poetry variety show at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theater on Oct. 22. The event will feature original poetry recitations and creative work by U-M students and Ann Arbor Public Schools students, alongside one to three nationally prominent headliner poets, with a greater emphasis on poets from the U-M community.

Restaging Indigenous Justice: Mount Pleasant Indian Industrial Boarding School

Dawn Gilpin, lecturer IV in architecture and urban planning, Taubman College

Building on three years of collaborative research between the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan and U-M, this project synthesizes fieldwork LiDAR surveys, exhibition prototyping, and immersive storytelling, with an emphasis on healing the history of epistemicide at the Mount Pleasant Indian Industrial Boarding School. The initiative engages tribal communities, Indigenous artists, U-M students, and the public in Indigenous arts, language, and ceremony, advancing truth and reconciliation efforts.

Your Optimism Is Not Required

Jake Hooker, Program Head for the Drama Program and lecturer III, LSA Residential College

The Residential College’s Drama program will host Philadelphia’s Team Sunshine Performance for a performance and teaching residency this fall. The company will perform its piece “Your Optimism Is Not Required” in the Residential College courtyard, while engaging students and community members in classroom workshops.

Sharing Our Stories through Dance

Emma Davis, collegiate lecturer and lecturer II in theatre and dance, UM-Flint

This collaborative project connects three distinct dance communities through workshops and public performances: UM-Flint dance program students, Detroit Dance Collective dancers, and incarcerated youth participating in Youth Arts: Unlocked dance workshops. Together, they will create choreography that shares the experiences of incarcerated youth, fostering connection across diverse communities.

Arts Words in Detroit

Rose Gorman, program manager and adjunct lecturer, LSA Residential College

Entering its third year, this annual day trip connects the Residential College community to Detroit’s vibrant literary and artistic scene. The winter 2026 installment will feature special workshops with A Host of People, a Detroit-based ensemble theater company, introducing students to devised theatre and innovative public speaking techniques.

Postmarked from the Inside: Greeting Cards from Michigan Prisons

Vitalis Im, assistant professor of health and human services, UM-Dearborn

This traveling exhibition showcases greeting cards created by incarcerated artists in Michigan prisons, exploring the emotional and relational impacts of incarceration through art and personal narrative. Featuring handmade greeting cards, interviews, audio recordings, and community collaboration, the exhibition invites reflection on connection, care, and the lived experiences of system-impacted individuals and families across the state.

Seen/Unseen: Stories from Young People Living the Climate Crisis

Natalie Sampson, professor of health and human services UM-Dearborn

This interdisciplinary, arts-driven project amplifies youth perspectives on climate crisis through an open-access graphic-narrative book and companion website. Co-created by a mother-daughter team with global collaborators, the project fosters climate awareness through visual arts, youth co-authorship, community storytelling, public trainings, events, and downloadable resources.

Vladimir Kara-Murza Film Project

Carleen Hsu, lecturer III in film, television and media, LSA

Students will create a six- to 10-minute documentary film about Pulitzer Prize winner, former Russian political prisoner, human rights activist, and documentary filmmaker, Vladimir Kara-Murza. U-M students will film and work with Kara-Murza during his Nov. 3-5 campus visit to receive the 2025 Wallenberg Medal. The finished film will be screened with a discussion on authoritarianism and democratic values, connecting human rights activism with media production.

Dance City Festival 2025

Andrea Salazar, lecturer I, SMTD

This project will support 15 U-M Dance Department students’ participation in Detroit’s Dance City Festival in fall 2025, where Salazar was selected as a featured choreographer for the performance showcase, strengthening connections between university dance programs and Detroit’s professional dance community.