The Civitella Ranieri Foundation provides Fellowships to visual artists, musicians and writers on an invitational basis. It does not accept unsolicited applications and cannot award a Fellowship to anyone who has not been recommended by one of the Foundation’s nominators. The Foundation's nominators are anonymous and are rotated on a regular basis.

The Foundation selects its Fellows in a two-tiered process. A rotating group of diverse artists, academics, critics and others nominates potential candidates for the Fellowship. These candidates are then invited to submit an application along with representative work samples for review by an international jury of peers.

The process was designed to provide the Foundation access to the widest selection of artists in a variety of disciplines from all parts of the world.