Project Grants for Tennessee Artists

James McAnally is the Executive + Artistic Director of Counterpublic, a civic exhibition that weaves contemporary art into the daily life of St. Louis for three months every three years. McAnally is additionally the co-founder and director of The Luminary, an expansive platform for art, thought, and action based in St. Louis, MO and serves as the executive editor and co-founder MARCH: a journal of art & strategy.

McAnally has presented exhibitions, texts and lectures at venues such as the Walker Art Center, Kadist Art Foundation, the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, Ballroom Marfa, The Contemporary, Baltimore, Art Institute of Chicago, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Gwangju Biennial, Carnegie Mellon and Moore College of Art and Design and has served as a Visual Arts panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts, Creative Capital, and Joan Mitchell Foundation.

McAnally’s writing has appeared in publications such as Art in America, Art Journal, Bomb Magazine, Hyperallergic, OEI, Terremoto, and many others, and his publications are in the collections of MoMA, Smithsonian Museum of American Art, LACMA, and Brooklyn Museum. McAnally is a recipient of the Creative Capital | Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant for Short-Form Writing.

Althea Murphy-Price began her studies in Fine Art at Spelman College before receiving her Master of Arts in Printmaking and Painting from Purdue University, and later studying at the Tyler School of Art, Temple University where she earned her Master of Fine Arts. Murphy-Price maintains an active exhibiting practice. She has exhibited in venues throughout the country and abroad such as the Weston Gallery, Cincinnati, OH; Howard Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD; Wellesley College, Boston, MA; Wade Wilson Art Gallery, Houston, TX; Indiana University Art Museum; The Print Center, Philadelphia, PA; The Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art, Charleston, SC; and the Knoxville Museum of Art, Knoxville, TN. International exhibits include the International Printmaking Exhibition, Jingdezhen China; the American Youth Printmaking Exhibition, Lui Haisu Art Museum, Shanghai, China; and Print Resonance, Musashino Art University, Tokyo, Japan. In addition to her exhibition record, she has been an artist-in-residence at the Frank Lloyd Wright School; University of Hawaii, Hilo; the Vermont Studio Center; and the Venice Printmaking Studio. Her writings and work have been featured in such publications as Art Papers, CAA Reviews, Contemporary Impressions Journal, Art in Print, Printmaking: A Complete Guide to Materials and Process, and Printmakers Today.

Thenjiwe Niki Nkosi (b. 1980, New York) was raised in New York, Harare and Johannesburg, where she now lives. She obtained her BA from Harvard University and her MFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York.

Nkosi divides her time between studio work, performance, and navigating the field of art as social practice. Her second solo exhibition, Landings, currently takes place in Cape Town. 

Group and collaborative exhibitions include How to Make a Country, FRAC Poitou-Charentes, Angoulême (2021); Mixed Company at the Norval Foundation, Cape Town, South Africa (2021);  FIVE, We Buy Gold, New York (2020); Don’t Ask Me Where I’m From, Aga Khan Museum, Toronto, (2020); That's What She Said, Constitution Hill, Johannesburg (2019); Lost Lover, Rampa, Porto, Portugal (2019); NIEPODLEGŁE, Women, Independence and National Discourse, Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw (2018); Five Propositions, Roberts Projects, Los Angeles (2018); Moving Stills – Affective Archives, Mumok Cinema, Vienna (2018);  Art/Afrique, le nouvel atelier, Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris (2017); Kabbo ka Muwala (The Girl’s Basket), National Gallery of Zimbabwe, Harare (2016); Transforming Provocations, The Flaherty NYC, New York (2016); The Film Will Always Be You, Tate Modern, London (2015); The Johannesburg Pavilion, Venice (2015); A Beautiful Rebellion, DUMBO, New York (2014); Disrupters: This is Disrupter X, Schokofabrik, Bayreuth, Germany (2014); The Space Between Us, Ifa Gallery, Berlin (2013); Spectacular, Frac des Pays de la Loire, Carquefou, France (2013); IF YOU DO IT RIGHT, Honolulu Performance Space, Nantes, France (2013); VAIVEM, SESC Pinheiros, São Paulo (2013); Making Way: Contemporary Art from China and South Africa, Standard Bank Gallery, Johannesburg (2013); Shoe Shop, Goethe-Institut & Shoe Shop Project Space, Johannesburg (2012); Gulbenkian Next Future Program, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon (2011); and (Re)constructions: Contemporary Art in South Africa, Museum of Contemporary Art, Niterói, Rio de Janeiro (2011).

Nkosi has taken part in residencies including the XXVIIes Ateliers Internationaux, FRAC des Pays de la Loire, France (2013); VAIVEM, São Paulo, Brazil (2013); Vanilla Facts, Berlin, Germany (2012); Cruces International, Montevideo, Uruguay (2011) and the Bag Factory Artist Residency (2009).

She has received grants from Pro-Helvetia (2019); Pala Lab (2018); National Arts Council of South Africa (2015; 2009); Virginia Wellington Cabot Foundation (2008) Goethe-Institut (2010), and fellowships including the School of Visual Arts Alumni Award Fellowship (2006); Pforzheimer Foundation Public Service Fellowship (2006); Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship (2002). Nkosi is the recipient of the Philippe Wamba Prize in African Studies (2004), and the Tollman Award for the Visual Arts (2019).

Elliot Perry is a noted collector of contemporary art, along with his wife Kimberly and daughter Morgan, and they’ve been collecting for 20+ years. Perry is a graduate of Memphis State University (now University of Memphis) where he played basketball for 4 years, is the school's 2nd leading scorer, and finished with a degree in marketing in 1991. He was drafted in the 1991 NBA Draft by the Los Angeles Clippers and went on to play 10 years in the association. Perry is now a minority shareholder of the Memphis Grizzlies as well as a radio broadcast commentator for the team. He is a dedicated advocate for education and mentoring in the Memphis community while serving on many boards that support those efforts, including as Chair of the Memphis Grizzlies Foundation Board, where he also serves as a mentor for the organization's mentoring program.