FRANKFORT, Ky. — The Kentucky Arts Council is accepting applications from literary artists for the $7,500 Al Smith Individual Artist Fellowship and the $1,000 Emerging Artist Award.

Literary arts include fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry and play/screenwriting. The deadline to apply is March 15.

The prestigious Al Smith Fellowship is named after the late Kentucky journalist Al Smith, who was also a former member of the Kentucky Arts Council’s board of directors. The fellowship is given to a professional, practicing Kentucky artist engaged in creating artwork of high quality, excellence and creativity.

The primary goal of the Al Smith Fellowship program is to directly support the advancement and continuation of Kentucky artists’ careers and creative work. The Al Smith Fellowship program seeks to provide public recognition and acknowledgment of Kentucky artists creating work of high artistic merit.

The Emerging Artist Award is given to artists in the first 10 years of their professional arts careers and recognizes those artists for excellence and creativity in their work. These artists possess some professional experience (i.e., exhibitions, sales, contracted/paid performances, publications/readings, etc.) but may not have established reputations as artists.

Age is not a factor in determining an artist’s status as emerging. Emerging artists are responsible for creating their own work, not interpreting the work of others or creating work under the supervision of an instructor or mentor.

For more information on the Al Smith Individual Artist Fellowship and Emerging Artist Award, visit the program pages on artscouncil.ky.gov or contact Tamara Coffey, the arts council’s arts program branch manager, at tamara.coffey@ky.gov or 502-892-3121.