EAA+ 2026

MMF and FICA are excited to announce the new cohort for the Emerging Artists Award (EAA+), bringing together a wide variety of practices, enquiries and endeavours. With two enriching cohorts in 2022 and 2024, the EAA platform has been reimagined as a collective forum that encourages, mentors, and supports 10 artists from India. EAA+ will offer each of the selected artists a financial grant, a residency, and parfroticipation in an exhibitory component, post the grant period. Across two cohorts, we have seen the potential that peer-led networks and conversations between artists can bolster - which have ranged from thinking about the time of the artist, the conditions that precede art-making, to reviewing new directions or junctures within artistic practices, or retrospecting on existing bodies of work, and hope to continue fostering communities and collectivities between artists, and between artists and art organisations in India in the coming year as well.

This year, we are thrilled to be supporting the stellar practices and pursuits of artists Anurag Singraur, Aravind Chedayan, Boris Colin Alphonse, Farhin Afza, Fileona Endoxa Dkhar, Kumar Misal, Sheshadev Sagria, Shiv Shankar, Stuti Bansal and Vanshika Babbar, through the aegis of EAA+.

Our esteemed jury consisted of curator and writer Arushi Vats, artists Gagan Singh and Mochu, Bhooma Padmanabhan (MMF representative), and Vidya Shivadas (Director, FICA).
We received over 470 applications this year, and the jury immensely appreciated the range and depth of the work being pursued.

This cohort brings together varied strengths, mediums, practices, and contexts from across the country, and the EAA+ platform looks forward to exploring the possibilities these connections may inspire, fostering exchanges among people and practices while recognising their shared, synergistic, and divergent elements.

We wish our grantees all the very best for their endeavours, and look forward to an exciting year ahead with them!