Meet The 3 Chicagoans Offered MacArthur 'Genius' Grants
By Emma G. Gallegos in News on Sep 29, 2015 4:00PM
Every year the MacArthur Foundation offers no-strings-attached funding to a select group of "geniuses" so that they have the money and space to do their best work. This year's group of 24 includes winners in a variety of fields from playwrights to community organizers to chemists. Each of these winners will get $625,000 over five years. Three of those recipients for 2015 are Chicagoans: computational biologist John Novembre, photographer LaToya Ruby Frazier and community leader Juan Salgado.
"We take 'no strings' quite seriously," Cecilia A. Conrad, the foundation’s managing director, told the New York Times. "They don’t have to report to us. They can use the funds in any way they see fit."
Not all of the recipients are unknowns or early in their careers. Ta-Nehisi Coates, for example, is well-known for his work for The Atlantic, tackling the legacy of slavery and taking up the case for reparations. Vermont poet Ellen Bryant Voigt is 72 is a recipient. Lin-Manuel Miranda is the current writer and star of a hit Broadway musical Hamilton. However, the foundation looks for people who are on their way up in their respective fields. Conrad told the Times, "We try to reach people who have shown evidence of exceptional creativity but show the potential for more in the future."
The recipients are concentrated heavily on the East Coast; seven of the 24 winners are from New York City alone, and more than two-thirds come from the East Coast, the Chicago Tribune notes.
The foundation released videos for each of the recipients, profiling their work.
John Novembre, 37, is a faculty member at the University of Chicago and a computational biologist. He creates algorithms that help us better understand, genetics, human evolution and migration patterns.
He told the Tribune that he hopes to use this award to do research that might not otherwise receive funding: "It's incredible how affirming it is. It makes me feel like the work we're doing is making an impact."
LaToya Ruby Frazier, 33, is the youngest recipient. She's an assistant professor in the department of photography at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She focuses on the plight of a once-vibrant steel mill town: her hometown of Braddock, Pa. Some of her work has focused on her and her family, and other parts have documented the lives of older African-Americans struggling to get the health care and help they need after putting in years of labor. She told the Tribune: "I'm fighting for the relevance of social documentary work."
Juan Salgado, 46, is the president and CEO of Instituto del Progreso Latino on the West Side. He works with low-income workers to improve their education and skills so that they can advance in the work force. An improved work force, he says, is the key to Chicago's future.