Homefront reboot makes lockdown grants available for ACT artists

"And we were all shut in here, you know, this big trip from Germany for my son and his girlfriend - we're all shut in the house, just trying to breathe with this appalling, surreal world around us," Horwitz said.

"I suppose there was that sense of grief-stricken - just grief-stricken at the horror that was happening with climate change, the destruction of nature, and also the fear for your children that this is the world they're now going to live in.

"So I decided to use the fact we were all together to start doing drawings of my family, the different members of my family, in this surreal world."

But when the coronavirus reached Australia, Horwitz lost her usual work - and was ineligible for federal government support.

Horwitz received a special emergency arts funding grant from the ACT government's Homefront program, which supported 370 artists in two rounds last year.

"All these things we glorify in ancient civilisations and the history of the Earth, is so often the production of artists. That's how we count what a good civilisation is. If you don't support it on the grassroots level, you don't get all the stuff we glorify in the National Gallery," she said.

The charcoal drawings Horwitz produced with support from the grant were shown in what Canberra Times art critic Sasha Grishin described as a "deliberately confronting exhibition" last June.

Now, with Canberra again locked down, a new round of the Homefront funding will be made available, with up to $350,000 on offer to artists.

Grants up to $10,000 will be available for artists to increase their capability, development or to help promote their artistic practice.

Arts Minister Tara Cheyne said grants would become available as soon as possible, pending a streamlined assessment process.

"Homefront was specifically designed to support artists in response to the devastating impacts of COVID-19," Ms Cheyne said.

"Once again, we have designed a scheme that responds to the current situation and will importantly support local artists with the maintenance and development of their practice."

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Artist Mimi Fairall, who received a $2500 grant in last year's first Homefront round to develop a zine, said Homefront funding was a big boost in a tough year.

"It was just good for me, personally, to get by in a practical survival way as well as paying me as an artist for the work that I was doing," she said.

Fairall said social interaction was important for artists to develop their work, which made lockdown tough.

"I encourage any artist who's struggling or quite isolated at the moment, or had to shift their practice greatly because of lockdown, to apply," she said.

Grant applications open on Thursday and will close on September 23.

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