The Bainbridge Island Museum of Art is now accepting applications for its 2026 BIMA Recognizes Achievement in the Visual Arts (or BRAVA) awards.
For the first time, the awards have also been expanded to be an annual occurrence due to a donor’s contribution, according to the organization’s press release.
The awards — which are directly inspired by BIMA founder Cynthia Sears — seek to honor contemporary artists, craftspeople, and makers across four categories: an emerging artist in the Puget Sound, a Native American and First Nations artist in the Salish Sea territories, artist book artists based in the United States, and a Puget Sound-area ceramics artist.
Selected by an independent jury committee, award winners will earn $15,000 of unrestricted funding plus promotional videos, publicity, and award-ceremony recognition.
“Like many facets of BIMA, the BRAVA Awards can seem like a surprising program to come from a museum. But from our end, it makes perfect sense to look for unusual ways to help artists directly at various points along their journey,” said BIMA Executive Director Sheila Hughes in the release. “These awards are one more way we can demonstrate our appreciation to the artists who enrich our world. In the words of one of our inspiring, inaugural BRAVA winners, Suquamish elder and master weaver Betty Pasco, ‘artists are endowed special gifts that can see beauty in a mud puddle and see the dew on the cedar branches outside my window, or music that stirs emotions in you to bring tears to your eyes.’ The BRAVA Awards support these very artists who inspire us every day — artists, we like to believe, that are within us all.”
Applications will close at 11:59 p.m. PST on May 18. For full details on eligibility, requirements, and the selection process, visit here.