*** Emergency Aid for Creatives ***
For those affected by the California Fires, Hurricane Milton + Helene or are in General Distress. Funds for Writers, Craft Artists, Professional Dancers, Choreographers, Film Makers + More
Hey Writer Friends,
With all the folks that have been affected by recent fires, hurricanes or are in general distress, I wanted to do my part in sharing resources.
This list will live in the archives so folks can have access at all times
This list will be updated as I come across additional resources
As always, thank you for being here!
-K
*** US BASED ***
Disaster Emergency Financial Assistance
Assistance available to performing artists and entertainment industry workers.
This application is for those who have been impacted by the California Fires in the following ways:
Loss of home
Damage to home
Extended mandatory evacuation
The organization will work with California-based applicants who don’t have access to the required documents to fulfill their application.
Info + Submission: HERE
Blue Roof Artist Temporary Shelter
Offering a free temporary room for artists who have been displaced or affected by the fires. This offer includes:
Free access to wifi and communal spaces
Temporary housing for artists needing a place to stay while they rebuild their lives and practices
No costs for utilities or rent during this period
Info + Submissions: HERE
We Need Diverse Books
Providing emergency grants to diverse authors and illustrators, publishing workers, and educators who are experiencing dire financial need, whether due to loss of employment, natural disasters, medical emergencies, and more.
Compensation: 500- 1000
Info + Applications: HERE
must have at least one published or forthcoming book from a traditional publisher, or one short story published in a magazine, journal, or literary website.
​​Foundation for Contemporary Arts Emergency Grant
Urgent grants between $500–$3,000 for visual and performing artists who have sudden and unanticipated opportunities to exhibit or present with insufficient time to seek other sources of funding.
Info + Submissions: HERE
The Artists’ Fellowship
Provides one-time emergency aid to professional visual fine artists and their families in times of sickness, natural disaster, bereavement, or unexpected extreme hardship.
Media such as sculpture, painting, drawing, printmaking, illustration, art photography, fine art ceramics, mixed media, installations, and video art are considered
If you are unable to fill out an application online, contact the office by email at info@artistsfellowship.org
Info + Submissions: HERE
Writers Emergency Assistance Fund
WEAF offers grants to professional freelance writers who, because of illness, disability, natural disaster, or extraordinary professional crisis, are unable to work.
you must be an established nonfiction freelance writer with clips in national publications and/or more than one book with a traditional publisher.
Compensation: $25,000, which is meant to cover 4-6 months of living expenses, and the money is unrestricted—you can use it to cover living expenses and other project-related fees.
Info + Submissions: HERE
Authors League Fund
The Authors League Fund helps authors, graphic novelists, journalists, critics, essayists, poets, short story writers, dramatists, and librettists.
An emergency fund providing non-taxable charitable support. They help in times of urgent need, when a writer cannot afford to pay for necessities.
This fund has professional guidelines.
For example: They assist authors, including graphic novelists, with at least one book published by a traditional publisher. Authors with multiple titles are given priority.
Compensation: Based on Need
Professional Guidelines + Submissions: HERE
The Adolph & Esther Gottlieb Emergency Grant
Financial assistance to qualified painters, printmakers, and sculptors whose needs are the result of an unforeseen, catastrophic incident, and who lack the resources to meet that situation.
Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis.
Info + Applications: HERE
Dramatists Guild Foundation
Crisis Relief Grant
Designed to assist writers (playwrights, composers, lyricists, librettists)experiencing unexpected financial, personal, or medical crises. Financial assistance is available to support housing and utilities costs, medical bills, groceries, legal fees, and other essential expenses.
Compensation: Based on Need
Submissions open until Dec 12, 2025.
Info + Submissions: HERE
Dramatists Guild Foundation
Bridge Grants
One time need-based awards to support dramatists (playwrights, composers, lyricists, librettists) with non-emergency and essential daily life expenses including:
• Housing costs
• Utilities
• Groceries
• Accessibility support
• Transportation
• Dependent care
• Medications
• Holistic health care
• Mental health care
• Reproductive care
Compensation: 500 USD
Submissions open until Dec 12, 2025.
Info + Submissions: HERE
CERF+
Craft Artists Emergency Relief Grant
To qualify for an Emergency Relief Grant, applicants need to be craft artists who are 18 years of age or older. They must have been living and working in the U.S. or U.S. Territories for the past two years.
Additionally, they should not have received an Emergency Relief Grant in the previous year or exceeded the maximum lifetime limit of 4 grants.
Compensation: CERF+ offers $3,000 Emergency Relief Grants to craft artists who experienced a recent and substantially disruptive emergency or disaster.
Applications: HERE
Carnegie Fund for Authors
The applicant must be an American author who has published at least one full-length work — fiction or nonfiction — that has been published by a mainstream publisher.
A work may have been published in eBook format only, or in hardcover or softcover format, or in more than one format.
Please note - Applicants cannot have eligibility determined by a work that they paid to have published.
Compensation: Based on need
Registration: HERE
Max’s Kansas City Project (New York State)
A one-time grant of between $500 and $1000 to assist self-employed artists who have a steady work history, but who are experiencing a temporary financial set back.Â
Must be residents of New York State. (Exceptions are made in some cases if applicant was affiliated with Max’s Kansas City.)
Please Note: Applicants whose arrears are so serious that assistance will not allow them relief from their difficulties are not eligible for assistance.
Please be specific as to what bill the grant is needed for. Grants of financial assistance do not go to the applicant. Payment goes directly to creditor/third party.Â
Guidelines + Application Form: HERE
The Artists Fellowship
Provides one-time emergency aid to professional visual artists and their families in times of sickness, natural disaster, bereavement, or unexpected extreme hardship.
Compensation: Unlisted / Based on Need
Guidelines + Submissions: HERE
Clayton Memorial Medical Fund
The fund helps professional science fiction, fantasy, horror, and mystery writers living in the Pacific Northwest states of Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Alaska deal with the financial burden of medical expenses.
Compensation: Based on Need
Guidelines + Submissions: HERE
** UK BASED **
Society of Authors
The Authors’ Contingency Fund
Offers hardship grants to authors in financial difficulty.
Can be used for emergency relief to support you through a health crisis.
Or it could mean help with an unexpected expense, so the inconvenience of a broken boiler, laptop or washing machine doesn’t become a crisis.
Make up lost income if you find yourself unable to work
Help cover a shortfall if a project falls through
Ease the impact on your writing career of illness or a domestic situation
Help with one-off expenses, such as the cost of a new boiler or if your computer is on its last legs.
** open to all professional authors who are resident in the UK or British citizens – including all types of writers, illustrators, literary translators, scriptwriters, poets, journalists and others – whose author-related activities make up a substantial amount of their annual income **
Info + Submissions: HERE
Thank you so much for posting this because I’ve been struggling for so long