St. Botolph Club Foundation – Serving the Creative Community

The St. Botolph Club Foundation was established in 1967 to recognize and support artists (visual arts, music, literature) working in or associated with New England and is referred to as the Cultural Fund. In 2014 a second fund, The Heritage Fund, was added to the Foundation. Its focus is the preservation of the McKim, Mead and White clubhouse and the preservation of the club’s art collection. The Foundation’s Distinguished Artist Award and Emerging Artist Awards are presented annually.

Distinguished Artist Awards

Rhoda Rosenberg

2024 Distinguished Artist Award:

Rhoda’s work is a lens through which she views her own past.

Balla Kouyate

2023 Distinguished Artist Award: World International Music

Keeper of Traditions, Composer, Arranger, Innovator and Teacher.

Ann Beattie

2022 Distinguished Artist Award: Short Fiction

Ann Beattie’s nearly five-decade writing career has demonstrated an outstandingly prolific output and massive talent.

Emerging Artist Awards

Brianna Robinson

2019 Emerging Artist Award: Music

“The Award meant that I could travel to the Czech Republic with an incredible program called OpernFest Prague. I am very grateful to continue my passion for opera & performance.”

Jonathan Shin

2019 Emerging Artist Award: Music

“I was commissioned to compose an orchestral suite celebrating my country’s Bicentennial. Thanks to the grant, I was able to fly back to Singapore to do research about my nation.”

Ashleigh Gordon

2015 Emerging Artist Award: Music

“The award allowed me to meld some of my biggest passions: traveling, new music and culture. I was fortunate to further develop my craft with new artists and audiences in new territory.”

Steve Cowperthwaite

2013 Emerging Artist Award: Literature

“The Award enabled me to do things I couldn’t afford. I published a book of my poems! Your willingness to invest in a late bloomer has given me a new perspective on life.”

Clara Kim

2020 Emerging Artist Award: Music

“It is amazing to have my dream supported. It has meant absolutely everything to me to be encouraged to carry on, to be inspired to keep dreaming and creating.”

A. H. Jerriod Avant

2019 Emerging Artist Award: Literature

“The grant was timely and extremely instrumental in the progress of my writing. It carved out the time necessary to dedicate toward the careful shaping of what will become my first collection of poems.”

Destiny Palmer

2018 Emerging Artist Award: Visual

“To win this award is to be validated, to be heard and seen, in what I do as an artist. I’m grateful to have been given the stability to continue my growth in my paintings.”

Sam Okerstrom-Lang

2015 Emerging Artist Award: Visual

“Thanks to this award, I was able to take the time to build and establish my artist website, a critical asset to my portfolio and network.”

Whitney Scharer

2015 Emerging Artist Award: Literature

“The grant gave me the chance to fund time to work on my writing without feeling like there was something else I should be doing, which for a writer-by-night is a precious and rare feeling.”

Paul Harding

2013 Emerging Artist Award: Literature
2010 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction

“The grant was one of the very first signs from the world that the stakes were real and that I should double down and really get to it. It was an empowering moment at a pivotal point as a writer.”

Margery Mueller

2019 Emerging Artist Award: Visual

“One of the major recent moments for me was when I won the the 2019 St. Botolph Emerging Artist award & the Nellie Taft painting award. The award came in the mail the week of my 75th birthday.”

Zhidong Zheng

2020 Emerging Artist Award: Visual

“The Grant came in time within such turmoil of the pandemic. I was fresh out of graduate school & trying to navigate myself as a professional artist. The grant helped me get my feet on the ground.”