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