ALTHOUGH mercifully early this year, as usual ACT arts funding is a mixed bag.
On the national front, Creative Partnerships Australia has announced $1,338,148 in-principle matched funding to 48 arts organisations around Australia under its “Plus1”, with ACT organisations M16 Artspace and Craft ACT: Craft + Design Centre succeeding in their applications.
ACT Arts Fund 2018 Project Funding has also been announced across the theatre, dance, visual arts and music and literature sectors, with significant dollar funding going to literary applicants and, at last, to Richard Johnson’s beleaguered SoundOut Festival of improvised and experimental music.
Funding applications for film and screen projects are made through Screen Canberra although they are also part of the ACT Arts Fund.
As part of the Arts Project funding category, grants were also allocated to ACT music organisations to access Llewellyn Hall and went to: The Australian National Eisteddfod Society to support eisteddfod events at Llewellyn Hall $15,000; Music for Canberra to support two youth orchestra concerts at Llewellyn Hall $15,000; and The National Capital Orchestra to support two concerts at Llewellyn Hall including new Australian works $12,000.
Good news is that 57 projects have been funded although “CityNews” has already been contacted by a number of disappointed applicants.
In the 2017 round, announced immediately before Christmas, the list of funded arts projects dropped from $700,000 in 2016 to $300,000 in 2017, or numerically 75, to just 13.
After very public protests from the arts community and its supporters, the then new ACT Arts Minister Gordon Ramsay restored $230,000 of funding, amounting to 14 more projects.
The project funding category is intended to support one-off arts activities with a focus on “self-determined artistically interesting and exciting projects; quality arts activities in which the ACT community can actively participate; excellence in arts practice across all artforms; and unique arts development opportunities for artists at all stages of their careers”.
The successful project funding applicants (alphabetical order)
Adair, Sally to create an immersive installation piece for exhibition, $2990
Art Monthly Australia Ltd to publish and promote ACT writers and artists, $14,000
Atfield, David to produce a new theatre work ‘Exclusion’, $40,000
Australian Dance Party Ltd create and present a new dance work ‘Energeia’, $39,689
Barnes, Matt to attend an international music-mixing seminar in France, $5200
Blake, Sally, research and develop artworks based on local eucalypts, $15,927
Canberra Dance Theatre Inc to choreograph a work for 40th birthday performance, $25,260
Clay, Jo to write articles and a manuscript for ‘The Carbon Diet’, $8250
Conflux Inc to support a guest speaker at Conflux 14 Science Fiction Conference, $3480
Cross, Dean to research a group of paintings ‘Ghost River’, $5000
Delatovic, Nicholas for development of an experimental, live, touring show on freestyle wrestling, $17,644
Delcastillo, Mariana to create and install new sculptures $5109
Endrey, Chris to record and release an album of original works, $13,189
Fearnside, Karyn for an exhibition with a workshop, $3369
Fuller, Lisa for skills development and mentoring workshops, $19,570
Galan, Andrew to develop a new collection of poetry, $7494
Goldwin, Chella for researching and writing a book in Torres Strait Meriam Mir and English, $22,124
Gorman, Ginger to research and write the first draft of a manuscript, $23,965
Grapple Publishing to produce an anthology of prose, poetry, comics and art, $4600
Grassia, Chiara to support Girls Rock! Canberra: a mentorship program for girls through music, $24,341
GW Bot to produce a series of glassworks, $10,000
Handel in the Theatre to mount performances of a production of Handel’s ‘Athalia’, $32,500
Hark the Heart to attend residencies and instrumental training in Italy, $13,014
Harper, Sophie to write and edit a literary memoir, $11,000
Harris Hobbs Landscapes to support local artists to present at ‘Contour’ 556, $30,000
Hay, Paul to develop new work at a residency in Georgia, US, $5065
Hughes, Meredith to create an artist book set, $12,596
Latham, Christopher for the performance and recording of “The Diggers’ Requiem”, $29,400
Lea, Liz for production and presentation of a new dance work, $18,990
Luminescence Chamber Singers to commission four choral works and perform with Frank Martin’s Mass, $20,000
McCartney, Tania to write and illustrate a fiction series for children, $9000
McGrath, Jim for a creative development workshop for a theatre script, $9813
McMahon, Ann to undertake a residency in NZ, $2000
McManus, Emma to develop and present new theatre work, $16,532
McQuire, Hayley for Blak Writes Indigenous Youth Writing workshop, $15,026
Mettes, Marianne for development of an environmental puppet theatre production, $23,634
Newton, Catherine to attend the Glass Art Society Conference in Murano, Italy, $5349
Noted to support the development of Noted – Canberra’s emerging writers festival, $2250
Rebus Theatre for creative development of a multidisciplinary performance about climate change, $21,854
Seccombe, Erica to attend a photopolymer printing residency in Victoria, $3251
Smith, Melinda to research and complete a new poetry manuscript, $29,300
SoundOut for SoundOut Festival of improvised and experimental music $23,048
Strapps, Emma for creative development of a dance performance ‘Flight/less’, $9103
Studio Auntara to exhibit six Canberra artists responding to vintage slides of South East Asia, $10,663
The Dionysus Movement to develop and tour ACT performers to the NZ Fringe $39,887
The Griffyn Ensemble to create an all-ages musical playground, $33,988
Vincent, Sam to develop first draft of a memoir, ‘Peasant dreaming’, $12,000
Withers, Matt to tour and record new Australian music with The Acacia Quartet, $14,909
Who can be trusted?
In a world of spin and confusion, there’s never been a more important time to support independent journalism in Canberra.
If you trust our work online and want to enforce the power of independent voices, I invite you to make a small contribution.
Every dollar of support is invested back into our journalism to help keep citynews.com.au strong and free.
Thank you,
Ian Meikle, editor
Leave a Reply