Artists At Work Indianapolis
Artists At Work is a national workforce resilience program in the spirit of the Works Progress Administration that supports artists and their communities through artistic civic engagement. Since 2023, Herbert Simon Family Foundation has partnered with The Office performing arts + film and FreshGrass Foundation to bring this innovative program to Indianapolis.
For 2025-2026, four Indianapolis artists will join a national cohort of 24 creatives. Each artist will receive salaried employment benefits, and wrap-around support for 18 months. The 2025-2026 Indianapolis cohort includes Ash Robinson, Andre Parnell, Bryn Jackson, and Mariah Ivey. Elias Garza will serve as AAW program liaison. Learn more about the artists here.
Artist At Work participants will bring their skills and creative thinking to four local social-impact organizations, with community connections facilitated by Herbert Simon Family Foundation as a lead regional partner. These cross-sector partnerships will focus on serving and activating the local community through artistic and civic engagement projects.
Ash, Andre, Bryn, and Mariah will also take part in professional development workshops and networking events facilitated by Artists at Work. The goal of these workshops is to help artists build skills, such as fundraising, financial wellness and budgeting, public relations and marketing, and trauma-informed practice and self-care, to sustain their artistic careers.
In 2023-2024, five Indianapolis artists were part of the inaugural cohort of Artists at Work. These artists were Kaila Austin, Corey Ewing, Adrienne D. Jackson, Johnson Simon, and Jared Thompson. In February 2025, these artists were showcased at an event at the Cabaret; learn more here.
The application period for 2025-2026 has passed. To learn more about future iterations of Artists at Work in Indianapolis, contact the Herbert Simon Family Foundation team: HerbertSimonFamilyFoundation@cicf.org.