The Barbara and Carl Zydney Grant for Artists with Disabilities
The Barbara and Carl Zydney Grant for Artists with Disabilities program supported artists with a disability who experienced financial hardship due to the COVID-19 crisis.
About the Award
The Barbara and Carl Zydney Grant for Artists with Disabilities program distributed unrestricted cash grants of $1,000 to artists with a disability who had experienced financial hardship due to the COVID-19 crisis. The program was open to visual, media, music, performing, and literary artists who live in New York City (five boroughs).
About Barbara and Carl Zydney
Barbara and Carl Zydney were born and raised in New York City, and later retired there after raising their family on Long Island. In retirement, they were both patrons of the arts and volunteered as docents in museums. Carl inspired others through his kindness, generosity, and adventurous spirit—still bicycling in the Five Boro Bike Tour well into his 80s. Barbara bettered her community as a specialist dedicated to teaching children with visual disabilities within the public school system.
This grant enabled their legacy to live on by offering financial help to New York City artists with disabilities so they could make their work accessible to others. It combined three things that were important to the Zydneys: their love for New York, their passion for the arts, and Barbara’s dedication to working with individuals with disabilities. This grant was created in response to the devastation by the pandemic to New York City’s art scene, and was specifically geared towards people with disabilities who were disproportionately impacted by the pandemic.