Australia Council supports more than 200 diverse arts projects and national tours

Photo: Australia Council

The $6.8 million delivered through the Australia Council’s core grants program will support 222 projects by 133 individual artists, 30 groups, and 59 arts organisations.

In addition, more than 2.1 million will be delivered through Playing Australia, the Contemporary Touring Initiative and Contemporary Music Touring Program.

Australia Council CEO Tony Grybowski said he was impressed by the diversity of arts activity being funded in what was a particularly competitive round.

“We continue to receive many high quality and ambitious proposals, and demand for our grant programs is far greater than the number of projects we are able to support. We congratulate all recipients who have been successful in this highly competitive environment.”

Some of the highlights in this round include:

·  Support for a group of First Nations performers, Aboriginal Comedy Allstars, to take their comedy show to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, showcasing Australia’s diverse artistic talent globally.

·  Musician Genevieve Lacey is being supported through a career development grant to work with industry leaders in developing a sustainable business model for independent artists.

·   First Nations performer Jessie Lloyd supported through the Contemporary Music Touring Program to take her work to audiences across regional Australia. The work was developed as the result of a previous Career Development grant, demonstrating the impact of investing in artists at key moments in their careers.

The Australia Council received a total of 1,336 applications in the latest core grants round, spanning Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Arts, Community Arts and Cultural Development, Dance, Emerging and Experimental Arts, Literature, Multi-art form, Music, Theatre and Visual Arts.

The national touring initiatives support a range of arts and cultural activities to reach audiences across Australia, with 65% of performances from this round taking place in regional and remote communities.

The Council’s core grants program continues to attract new applicants, with 29 per cent of applications this round coming from people applying for the first time.

Australia Council grant applications are assessed by panels of expert peers from across the country who bring deep artistic knowledge and industry experience. Of the 93 peers involved in assessing the latest round, 37% were based in regional and remote areas, 25% identified as culturally and linguistically diverse, 19% identified as First Nations Australians, and 11% identified as people with disability.

Applications for the next grants round close on Tuesday 5th June 2018.