In a year when a lack of funds left so many arts and cultural organizations reeling, it’s comforting to see the normal spring influx of grant announcements. Local arts organizations’ answer to a fairy godmother, Pew Charitable Trusts, recently announced its visual arts awards, under the Philadelphia Exhibitions Initiative (PEI) and its program administered by Drexel, Dance Advance, awarded $506,000 to local movers and shakers. As usual, both grant lists give a sneak preview of some of the work being developed immediately and over the next few years.

PEI's categories this time around were exhibitions and curatorial consultation and planning. The Philadelphia Museum of Art was awarded $70,000 for a visual and sound installation themed on the Liberty Bell and one of the PMA's claims to fame, Marcel Duchamp's The Large Glass. The installation is scheduled for next May.

The Gershman Y also has an exhibit planned for May '03, a retrospective of contemporary art from the gallery's shows in the 1950s through the early '70s. They've received $173,080 to fund the show.

Further along down the road (August 2004, to be exact), expect a comic "opera" about the Rosenbach brothers by artist Ben Katchor, commissioned by the Rosenbach Museum and Library. I guess we'll have to wait a couple of years to find out what a $70,000 series of comic strips about the Rosenbachs looks like, but it certainly sounds intriguing.

Four groups, the Asian Arts Initiative, Fleisher Art Memorial, Philadelphia Folklore Project and the Sedgwick Cultural Center, received $25,000 curatorial grants to bring in consultants for short- and long-term planning.

As for Dance Advance, the list of grantees' projects looks promising. Two individual artists received $10,000 grants: Nichole Canuso (Moxie, Headlong) for a new work based on Italian folk tales and Roko Kawai for a project combining Japanese dance and postmodern improvisation.

The company/organization grants include familiar faces, like the Philadelphia Fringe Festival, who will use their $51,000 grant to commission Headlong Dance Theater's Britney's Inferno, a piece focusing on teen-pop culture. No word yet on whether we'll see David Brick or Andrew Simonet clad in school-girl outfits ˆ la Ms. Spears. But newer projects, like the Wilma's successful DanceBoom! festival (the inaugural festival was curated by Nick Stuccio, founder of the Fringe), also received support from Dance Advance for their second go.

I've always found camp to be a unique form of torture, but Headlong, Brat Productions and Pig Iron might change my mind with their Dance Theater Camp, a monthlong series of classes and workshops. The three companies were awarded a joint grant of $6,000 toward the project.

Besides their Fringe commission and co-counselor duties at Dance Theater Camp, Headlong will receive $20,000 for rehearsal and development of a dance theater adaptation of Donald Barthelme's novel Snow White. City Paper Editor David Warner did initial dramaturgical research on the adaptation while on sabbatical this year at Columbia University on a National Arts Journalism Fellowship. Headlong liked the idea of working with a dramaturg so much that they're using a small part of their grant money to support further research.

Warner won't continue as dramaturg, however; he'll be too busy at City Paper, where he returns to work in the middle of June.

Brat Productions, known around town for zany shows and Fringe Festival antics, is undergoing a shift in leadership. The company’s producing director, Greg Gephart, who’s had the job since the group formed in 1998, is leaving to pursue “other opportunities in the corporate sector,” according to a letter Brat’s artistic director and founder Madi Distefano and company president Fergus Carey (yeah, Fergie) sent out to Brat’s supporters and the press. Distefano, who is finishing up her MFA at Temple, will take over the reigns as both the artistic and administrative director of Brat. She’s going to have her hands full, so come out and wish her luck at Brat’s annual fundraiser, Bratwürst, taking place this year on Sat., May 18 at the Khyber (7 p.m., 52 S. Second St.). Bratwürst will feature no less than eight bands, including Brothers Suggarillo, Strapping Fieldhands and Ty Cobb. Brat also promises a silent auction, prizes, food, special guests and “cheerleaders.” You never know what to expect from Distefano and co.

Even if you aren’t able to make it around to all of the local art schools’ end-of-the-year exhibitions this month, you don’t have to miss out completely on our city’s wealth of talented students. Five schools -- Moore College of Art and Design, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, University of the Arts, Tyler School of Art and the University of Pennsylvania -- will feature sculpture by a few of their students in a joint exhibition sponsored by the Philadelphia Sculptors (opening reception Sun., May 19, 1–4 p.m., runs through June 8, Reading Terminal Headhouse Upper Balcony, Market Street between 11th and 12th.; for more information call 215-468-0554).