Cultural Coalition to Receive $10,000 Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts

Cultural Coalition is pleased to announce it has been approved by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to receive a Grants for Arts Projects award of $10,000. This grant will support our 12th Annual MIKIZTLI: Día de los Muertos Festival in October of 2023. This grant is one of 1,251 Grants for Arts Projects awards totaling nearly $28.8 million that were announced by the NEA as part of its first round of fiscal year 2023 grants.

“The National Endowment for the Arts is proud to support arts projects in communities nationwide,” said NEA Chair Maria Rosario Jackson, PhD. “Projects such as this one with Cultural Coalition strengthen arts and cultural ecosystems, provide equitable opportunities for arts participation and practice, and contribute to the health of our communities and our economy.”

Upon learning of this grant award, Cultural Coalition Executive Director Carmen Guerrero was excited to share the news with the rest of their staff and board of directors, remarking “This is a wonderful gift to have the support of such an important national arts organization such as the NEA recognize the work we are doing to uplift Chicano, Latinx, and Indigenous arts and artists in our community. We are making an impact providing free access to cultural festivals in traditionally underserved communities. And it means a lot, not only to us and our artists, but to those intergenerational families and young children that come see their culture celebrated!”

The 12th Annual MIKIZTLI: Día de Los Muertos Festival will take place at Steele Indian School Park in Phoenix, AZ during October of 2023. This festival celebrates one of the most important holidays in Mexican culture, El Día De Los Muertos/The Day of the Dead – a family and community holiday that welcomes the souls of our beloved departed for a brief celebratory reunion. The festival highlights this traditional practice with a festival that includes lively music, dance performances, food and a community altar. MIKIZTLI advances, preserves, and celebrates the multicultural forms of the diverse population of the Latino and Indigenous.

For more information on other projects included in the NEA’s grant announcement, visit arts.gov/news.