Sometimes three is a crowd. Other times it is not enough. When FRONT International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art initially announced its Futures Fellowships, the commitment was that three Cleveland artists of Color would be selected as fellows, each winning significant support in the form of a $25,000 cash award, plus organized, art-related travel (both internationally and within the US), connections to the international art world, and an invitation to participate in the next (2025) FRONT Triennial.

Thursday at its opening press conference at the Cleveland Museum of Art, FRONT leadership announced not only its choices, but also that strong competition and a quandary in choosing the finalists led them – with additional support from the Cleveland Foundation – to announce not three, but four fellows. The FRONT 2022 Futures fellows are Amanda D. King, Antwoine Washington, Charmaine Spencer, and Erykah Townsend. All four have had important exhibitions and related projects in recent years, and all four have been featured in in-depth features and interviews recently in CAN Journal.

(Full disclosure: CAN publisher Michael Gill served on the first-round selection committee for the fellowships.)

The four fellows emerged from a field of more than eighty applicants.

FRONT Director of Artistic and Community Services Deidre McPherson introduced each of the Fellows with a short profile video, produced by McKinley Wiley.

When CAN Blog first announced the fellowships earlier this year, we noted that the memorable $25,000 cash portion of the Fellowship may be less important than the connections, travel, and invitation to be part of the FRONT 2025 planning team, and to participate as an exhibiting artist in the 2025 triennial.

As McPherson said at the time, “This is just about sharing access.”