FOUNDERS GRANT

Art+Everywhere is honored to announce the following 2025 Founders Grant projects & recipient, personally selected by co-founders Deborah Read and Tracy Hayes.

Artists = Curators = Collectors

This collaborative project aims to build the soil of a solidarity arts ecosystem in Connecticut. With this seed funding we will build an artist/curator collective where artists co-curate group shows and build the tendrils of their own creative community, with all events taking place in non-traditional spaces. Furthermore, we are excited to experiment, learn, and share strategies for generating income for artists. A core focus of this project will be to use these shows as a jumping off point for designing and implementing business venture prototypes. For example, this may include invite-only studio visits or artist talks with collector-curious folks, fundraiser events “by artists, for artists,” or limited edition art prints. We plan to document and report back on these experiments so others can replicate them.

This project is a collaboration between artists/curators Peter Albano and Brooke Toczylowski.

Read complete proposal here.

Brooke Toczylowski

Brooke Toczylowski is an interdisciplinary artist working in painting, printmaking, installation, and performance. Her work explores our ecological, historical, and sociopolitical relationship to the land, with a focus on borders and belonging. Brooke has been awarded two Artist Respond grants from the Connecticut Office of the Arts and has shown work at the Kala Art Institute, Five Points Arts Gallery, Gallery RAG, and more. Toczylowski earned her BA in Studio Art and American Studies from Williams College and recently completed her MFA at Clark University; her thesis show was presented at MASS MoCA.

Peter Albano

Peter Albano is a Hartford based artist, curator, and gallerist. After receiving his BFA, Albano spent 18 months spelunking Hartford’s underground Park River and producing documentative/interpretive work mapping the riverway, under a project titled The Hog River Revival. Later, Albano became a resident muralist/sculpture artist at Wild Bill’s Nostalgia in Middletown, CT. In 2021, Albano founded The Arts Industry and Loading Dock Gallery in West Hartford, eventually becoming the Visual Arts Manager at Real Art Ways in Hartford. Albano is a recipient of a 2014 Hartford Arts Catalyze Placemaking Grant, 2016 Regional Initiative Grant from the Shoreline Arts Alliance, and 2023 Artist Fellowship Grant from the city of Hartford.