How to Fund a Comic Book (or Any Other Creative Enterprise), Pt 2: Grants and Awards

Last post I looked at option (1): treating your project as a hobby. On the one hand, this gives you security, but it also takes its toll on your energies and family life, plus it makes progress slow. So, a far more preferable option - if you can make it work - is...

Option (2): Find funding. There are various forms of funding. You may be lucky enough to have extensive savings, independent wealth (a trust fund or a rich, supportive family), a patron who recognises the value of your work, etc, but most of us aren't in this position. Besides, if you are in this position, then you don't really need to be reading this! You could work hard to save up to take a sabbatical from work, or take out a bank loan, but again, this presumes that you are in a position to do so. Even if your employer lets you take time off, it might take you years to save up enough money to support yourself over 6 months or a year (and comic book and other creative projects can take much longer than that). Bank loans are also chancy: you need to be in a secure financial position to be able to pay it back, because you don't want to assume that your project will be financially successful, because that's just a form of very expensive wager - there's not a huge amount of money in comics (or art in general), some notable exceptions aside.

So, let's assume that - like me - none of the above are open to you. What else can you do? We can split this into various sub-options: (2a) Look for grants and awards, (2b) Go the traditional publishing route, (2c) Go the crowdfunding route, or (2d) Seek advertising or sponsorship. For the rest of this post I'll look at the first option.

(2a): Grants and Awards. I live in the UK, so most of what I'm about to say simply reflects my experience - things will no doubt be different in other countries (let me know if they are). Also, I won't pretend that I'm an authority on this route, or that I've exhausted it, but I have gone some way down that road - and found it largely a dead end. However, please feel free to correct me on anything - I would love to be wrong on this occasion!

Firstly, there is public or government funding. In the UK, this mostly means lottery money, a percentage of which supports the arts. This is distributed regionally. Where I live, therefore, arts funding is distributed by the Arts Council of Wales (but there will probably be something similar in your area). The problem with this, however, is that any viable project must be (a) non commercial, and (b) provide public benefit. So, even if I could persuade them that might graphic novel about Sigmund Freud would help engage the public with the arts in Wales, I wouldn't be able to make any direct money from the project (i.e. sell the graphic novel). Also, I would be up against the type of artist that the council was setup to support: the traditional gallery-exhibiting, public space using painter/sculptor/etc. So, if you're a graphic/comic book artist looking to fund a definite product, then this is likely to be an unfruitful option. You could of course try to broaden the scope of your project - the council are keen on collaboration (especially international), on 'exploring' themes and ways of working, so I could have said that I'd travel to the US to work with my collaborator to 'explore Freud's concept of the unconscious in the medium of sequential graphic art' (or something equally dubious), but it seemed to me to be taking me too far from what I wanted to do (make a comic book), and also somewhat dishonest. It's a shame that there's simply no money to fund that simple ambition, but that seems to be the case regarding public money.

However, remember, comics are also a form of writing. So, if you're also scripting your own comic, then you are also eligible for literary grants and bursaries (unfortunately, in this instance, I'm just drawing). For instance, Literature Wales supplies bursaries for just this purpose. This is also public money (made up of lottery, local council and private trust funding), but there seems to be no restriction on commercial publication. So, if you're writing a comic for yourself or someone else, then it might be worth you checking it out (or whatever the equivalent is where you live). Remember, though, that this is a competition - to stand any chance, your project needs to show potential/be some way along, or else you need to show that you have some literary track record (which, again, will debar many first-time creators).

Having struck out with both of these, I moved on to look at private trusts and funding. The Wellcome Trust, who support biomedical research and the medical humanities, have some money to help engage and inform the public about scientific issues. Given that our book is about Freud (and psychology - according to some, anyway - is a science!), then I thought maybe I was in luck. However, once again there is a restriction here to do with commercial exploitation - I couldn't sell the book I'd made.

And this is the problem with private trusts and funding. Each has their own specific set of criteria and priorities. You may indeed be lucky enough to find that you meet those criteria, but often you'll find that there is some public or charitable goal that the money is tied to, or that applications are geared to organisations with those goals in mind. So, you are welcome to plough through the lists of grants that are available - see e.g. Esmee Fairbairn - but there's slim pickings for commercially orientated comic book projects that I can see.

Which isn't to say that there aren't such grants. Until recently, in the US, the Xeric Foundation funded comics creators to self publish (however, as of 2012, they now only fund non-profit or charitable projects). But apart from being hard to find, such grants are also hugely competitive, and you'd be up against established professionals - and being creative and expressing yourself shouldn't really be about winning a competition.

Again, in summary...

Pros: Can dedicate all your time to your project, can treat it like a normal job (time off for leisure and family). Cons: grants are highly competitive, they are difficult to find, and favour those with a track record or who are a certain type of artist.