MassDevelopment has provided a $10.9 million New Markets Tax Credit allocation to Artists For Humanity (AFH), a Boston nonprofit youth arts enterprise and one of the largest on-site employers of youth in the city.

AFH will use proceeds from the allocation to build a 27,871-square-foot addition on its Artists For Humanity EpiCenter headquarters. The addition will allow AFH to double the number of teenage employees who provide fine art and creative services for businesses, institutions and individuals from 250 to 500; develop pre-apprenticeship vocational programming in technology-based arts media and trades; build a fully-equipped maker studio; form new partnerships with universities and industries; and hire more artists and social entrepreneurs to lead its programming.

MassDev previously provided $2.8 million in tax-exempt bonds for AFH, which the organization used to build its EpiCenter in 2004. MassDev, along with the Massachusetts Cultural Council, also provided three Cultural Facilities Fund grants: $38,000 in 2009, $380,000 in 2014 and $225,000 in 2017.

“Massachusetts’ creative economy contributes millions of dollars in revenue and countless jobs while attracting visitors from across the globe to experience the state’s wealth of cultural and historic assets,” Lauren Liss, MassDevelopment president and CEO, said in a statement. “We are pleased to continue supporting this key sector while also bolstering the commonwealth’s workforce development efforts through this financing of Artists For Humanity.”

“Our expanded facility will be an urban laboratory where youth and community intersect in experiential and alternative education, creative placemaking, enterprise, and in pioneering social and environmental change,” Susan Rodgerson, AFH co-founder and executive/artistic director, said in a statement. “We are honored by MassDevelopment’s long-term investment supporting under-resourced youth to become active contributors to our commonwealth’s creative and innovation economy.”