NEWARK, NJ.- The Newark Museum this week received a half-million-dollar National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grant in support of its African art initiatives – the largest of eight awarded in New Jersey and representing almost 60 percent of the total monies awarded.

The NEH matching grant was awarded to African Art at the Newark Museum: Building for the Second Century, a project directed by Dr. Christa Clarke, Curator of African Art and Senior Curator, Arts of Africa and the Americas . Museum Director Mary Sue Sweeney Price said the grant requires the Museum to raise $1.5 million in matching operating and endowment dollars to fund renovation and expansion of the Museum’s highly-respected African galleries and to support programs, publications and a new assistant curator for the Arts of Africa collection.

According to the NEH grant announcement, challenge grants strengthen the humanities by encouraging non-federal sources of support and helping institutions secure long-term improvements in and support for their humanities programs and resources.

The Newark Museum joins the Rutgers University-Newark Institute on Ethnicity, Culture and the Modern Experience (IECME), awarded a $250,000 matching grant in
support of two programs: City Children and their Cultures and Teachers as Scholars. Dr. Clement Alexander Price, IECME founder was project director for the grant.

Newark was one of only two cities in the country to receive more than one grant in this cycle. The other was New York City . Institutions and projects in six other New Jersey cities were cited. NEH awards to New Jersey in this cycle ranked eighth in the United States and totaled $870,689. In total this cycle, the NEH awarded $23 million for 371 humanities projects.

According to Mrs. Price, the NEH grant is the latest in a string of recent awards to the Newark Museum .

The Henry Luce Foundation has awarded $200,000 as part of its American Art Renewal Fund, established to focus predominantly on stabilizing American art activities at U.S. art museums in response to the economic downturn. The Newark Museum is one of the two largest grants awarded in the 2010 round.

The Healthcare Foundation of New Jersey has awarded $200,000 for the exhibition, Generation Fit: Breaking the Cycle of Childhood Obesity, an interactive family experience — opening in October 2011 — that will explore and address the issues of nutrition, exercise and related disease prevention. This is one of the Foundation’s top five awards in 2010.

The Roche Foundation also awarded $200,000 to fund this highly-anticipated educational exhibit.

“The talented Newark Museum team of project directors, fund raisers, administrators and providers of services who work countless hours preparing grant applications are unsung heroes in the Museum’s ongoing efforts to present the public with the highest quality cultural exhibitions especially in these difficult financial times,” Mrs. Sweeney said.