Interested in submitting a proposal to the 2025 Deborah J. Norden Fund travel grant? Watch this online information session featuring two past Norden Fund grantees who present the research activities supported by the grant, as well as discuss subsequent work on those projects and the award’s impact on their trajectory.

The talk opens with remarks from Linda Norden, a co-founder of the Fund, who has served as a juror since its inception in 1995. She is an independent curator and writer, involved in a small non-profit in L.A. and working on the development of a kunsthalle in the upper Hudson Valley. A moderated Q&A follows the presentations, including audience questions.

In 2025, the Norden Fund will award a grant of up to $7,500 to one individual or team. Submissions are due by 11:59 p.m. ET on Monday, February 24, 2025. For application instructions and eligibility requirements, please see the 2025 Call for Proposals. 

Speakers

Amanda Coen was a 2019 award recipient for her project Inhotim: Contemporary Ruralities. Her research considered the role of cultural institutions in rural development by looking at the Inhotim art center in the remote region of Brumadinho, Brazil.

Amanda Coen is a landscape architect, researcher, and educator. Currently based in Montevideo, Uruguay, Coen runs a small studio that works collaboratively with local and global organizations to shift regional approaches to conservation and land management. Coen leads a landscape design studio at the Universidad ORT Uruguay and is a doctoral candidate at the Facultad de Arquitectura, Diseño y Urbanismo, Udelar. Her research focuses on extractive land practices. 

Benedict Clouette and Marlisa Wise were 2012 award recipients for their project Forms of Aid: The Architecture of Humanitarian Space in Nairobi, Kenya. Their research focused on a “slum upgrading project” in the settlement of Kibera undertaken by the government of Kenya in cooperation with UN-Habitat, and situated that project in relation to other sites across the city

Benedict Clouette and Marlisa Wise are founding partners of Interval Projects, an architecture and urbanism practice based in New York City. Clouette and Wise are the authors of Forms of Aid: Architectures of Humanitarian Space, which expands on their 2013 Norden report to include case studies in Port-au-Prince and the West Bank in addition to Nairobi. Their work and writing has also appeared in the New York Times, Domus, Volume, San Rocco, and The Architect’s Newspaper.

Clouette is a doctoral candidate in architectural history and theory at Columbia University GSAPP. His research focuses on image cultures of twentieth century urban design and architecture, and the use of surveys and mapping techniques in large-scale projects. 

Wise is the director of architecture for the New York City Parks and Recreation Department.