The Nigel Buesst Screen Art Grant is available to creatives working across all screen mediums, from film and digital games to installation art, VR and AR.
It's aimed at providing opportunities for emerging creatives to develop their practice or for established artists to experiment and broaden their creative horizons.
The late Nigel Buesst's many accomplishments included being the first director of the St Kilda Film Festival (SKFF), proudly presented by City of Port Phillip.
Fittingly, the successful candidate for the $15,000 grant will be announced at the 2026 SKFF in June and their project must be delivered in time to be considered for the 2027 Festival. The selection panel will include Nigel's daughter Amanda Falvo.
"As a St Kilda Film Festival Director, it's a great honour to serve in the lineage of one of the great contributors - not just to the festival but to the Australian film industry," current director Richard Sowada said.
"For us to be able to take the spirit of that legacy and turn it into an opportunity to create new moving image work for emerging artists is something we're humbled to do now and into the future," he said.
Mayor Alex Makin said the new grant reaffirmed City of Port Phillip's commitment to supporting emerging screen creatives and providing pathways to accessing the creative arts.
"Our City is known and loved as a creative hub where the arts play an incredibly important role in our identity and local economy," Cr Makin said.
"Through many initiatives, including this grant and our SKFF's free Filmmaker Development Program, we are helping incredible Australian talent let their imaginations run wild as they dazzle us on small - or big - screens."
Nigel Buesst was a co-founder of SKFF as well as acting as artistic director from 1986-90. He is also remembered as a champion of Melbourne's independent film scene and a noted filmmaker in his own right, having helmed a wide range of documentaries and dramas.
