Will the future EU programme for culture take into account our needs?
Dear IETM member,
The European institutions are currently evaluating Creative Europe and collecting suggestions for the post-2020 programme for culture. To make sure the voice of the contemporary performing arts sector is not absent from the debate, we have drafted a position paper, which we intend to send to the EU policy-makers in the upcoming month. But first of all, we would like to have your feedback on the paper, to be able to adjust it as closely as possible to your interests and concerns.
Besides, we would like to know your personal experiencers with the Creative Europe programme so far. Having real case studies would be very helpful in our advocacy work. Please respond the questions below:
- Have you applied for a Creative Europe grant (2014-2017)? Were you successful? If not, what was the given motivation behind your low scores?
- If you have never applied for an EU grant, can you please specify a reason why not?
We would appreciate a lot if you could comment on the paper and / or reply these questions using the comments field below by Thursday 13 July.
PS: if you have never dealt with an EU grant, we nevertheless encourage you to join the conversation. You do have the right to apply for EU funding, and the future programme must suit your needs and priorities.
Thank you in advance.
Nan van Houte
I think this is a well reasoned and argued position paper.
We have not applied for a Creative Europe grant in the past but are considering this in the future
Nick Fearne
General Manager
plan B, Scotland
A simple note about past EU calls:
- we tried to apply 2 times (no success)
- we tried to apply on 2015 with 3 partners from EU but the platform crashed so we didn't managed
- we are working at a project for 2018/2020 may be it will be useful to share it with IETM
I think it is very important to underline the misleading of some priorities of the creative europe programm. The programm didn't support cooperation on artistic projects well. To build sustainable cooperations we need to be supported on what brings us together : artistic projects, creation, production. The priority given to audience developpement, to the digital shift in terms of audience development... made cooperation project quite complicated. Audience development is manly a matter of local contexts. The priority should be given to the support of artistic projects, artistic cooperations (on which we can then imagine sharing on other levels like audience development). Best. Hermann
Well argued paper. I fully agree with the recommendations for post 2020.
Our institution applied for Creative Funding in 2016 with 2 other theatres, and came close but did not receive the grant. We expect to reapply in the next call. A simpler budget form in the application process would be an asset, it is quite complicated.
Thank you.
Good paper ! Congratulation to the writer(s ?)
We applied for a Network grant and were not successfull, due to :
- Lack of support from EU desk (only 1 meeting after so many phone calls... and no feedback on the application form before submitting
- lack of monney to pay a professional writter who is aware of the EU burocratc langage (the network is existing since more than 30 years, but faced a big difficulty to enlarge cooperation, as all members are professionnal, but involved in the network as volonteers,
- and thus, missunderstanding within the membership on the priorities and the expected impact from the EU
Dealing with frustration is really difficult, especialy once we had a (quite) good evaluation (68 points). EU should definetely provide a minimum fee for unsuccessful aplicants, at least those getting a "good" note (more than 50 ?), in order to help them going further into prospective and action, what we cannot do, after these months "lost" in the appication without any funding. Members do not understand, energy felt, and Board and coordinators have to double their work/energy to find solutions, motive members ...
EU (and we also all tgether) should think about different ways of sharing experience and tools for EU funding application:
- mutualising experinces of applying,
- tools and processes of financial/administrative management before and after applying, especially between big and small organisations
Comments, amendement and proposition for the text :
Pge 5 (recomandations) :
- Instead of "Continue the support for the cultural and creative sectors..." I would say "Increase the support..."
- New proposition : providing a minimum fee for unsuccessful aplicants getting at least a from 50 points, in order to balance their investment durng the application time, and giving them the opportunity to think about new strategies, udate a relevent prospective and adapt their action / action plan,
- regarding to "the transversal approach to culture and the arts within other policy areas", the cultural sector must also work and convince other sectors, from the ground and at national/european level to be coherent in the transversality: At the moment, we all stay and discuss within the sector, and "face to face" with politics. advocating for transversality means (perhaps first ?) making it concrete to show it has an impact. We must move forward, inviting other sector at our table as they are facing the same problems in their fields. The most we are together and speaking with one voice, the stronger we will be.
I am interested in what is ment with "two stage application process". Can we have more detail ont thisproposition?
Good and clear position paper - thanks for your work on this. We, like many other organisations in Wales and beyond, applied to Creative Europe in 2016 and were unsuccessful, despite having a good score - it's a highly competitive funding programme, and you refer to this in the paper. That said, we would consider reapplying, but mindful of the time and resource that submitting an application can take.
The following recommendations are particularly interesting and reflective of conversations we have had with organisations in Wales;
- introducing the idea of a European touring grant to support mobility and international touring
- the proposal for a two stage application process and a special strand for smaller organisations
- enabling creative and cultural sectors to participate in other EU programmes
On the last point we do not think it is enough to create better awareness of other funding opportunities - as you say, the role of DG Education & Culture to mainstream culture in appropriate DGs is really important too. Other EU programmes do not always consider that cultural/creative projects can deliver their objectives, so some work is needed to challenge this perception.
Wales Arts International
Thank you for all your work and suggestions regarding this clear paper!!
We never applied for A Creative Europe Grand, but might well do so in the future.
One of the reasons we did not apply was that in our case having such a small organisation, we were not sure if all the efforts that needed to be done on paperwork, would be realisticly worth it.
kind regards,
Roswitha Bergmann
Operatheater Amsterdam
Thanks for the work on this, it seems well researched and argued.
We have considered but not led an application in the past, as, despite being well placed as a network organisation, we are small (under 10 staff) and would struggle with capacity to manage the application process or handle the administrative requirements of the grant if successful.
I'm therefore particularly interested in the propositions around 2 stage process and strand for smaller organisations, which would make a big difference.
Theatre Bristol, UK.
Thanks for this position paper. We agree with the recommendations and the reasoning behind them. Tryater has not applied yet. We find it hard to find the right partners to apply with and the application proces seems difficult. We are more comfortable with 'simple' bi-lateral co operations. This might change in the future as interesting partners and opportunities may arise.
Clear and well written position paper.
As an independent artists Creative Europe Grants are simply beyond my capacity. As an issue for all independent artists this leaves a lot of great work unrecognised and generates a larger divide between established organisations and emerging artists in terms of sustainability.
The following points address this:
- introducing the idea of a European touring grant to support mobility and international touring
- the proposal for a two stage application process and a special strand for smaller organisations
Having been an artist involved in projects funded by Creative Europe, I would say that I have definitely benefitted from funding and would like to see considerations for repeat investment in initiatives that are proven to work. Many organisations I have worked with simply don't have the capacity to apply for large grants regularly due to success rates and ultimately it is the artists who lose out in this instance.
Due to the low success rate I wonder how/if the hours that go into application writing are measured in any way to acknowledge the investment in application writing that presumably outweighs the investment in art.
Great recommendations. Much needed. I think the criteria for the programme are not always easy to figure out. Finding the right partner is king. I tend to get desperate calls from organisations I don't know, from partners I got no time ti research to join their projects just because we "fit the criteria". This is seldom a good reason to collaborate. In the past we have been involved in two different EU projects. Both with 10+ international partners across the continent. One was super well written and researched. Very ambitious. It got no funding. The second project was hastily written, with a shallow ground to stand on. No one really believed we would get the money for this one. Most partners where not even prepared to execute their branch of the project. BUT the project got all the money. The result was not amazing. Post-mortem no lasting effect can be identified. We also think that the bureaucracy involved is not enpair with the times we live in. There needs to be a better way to handle reports of projects involving less paper. If anything, It's not very ecological. Overall We have refrained from getting involved in new EU projects due to observations made during involved in such endeavours. As the local funding and culture political climate will possibly swing towards a more conservative side in the coming years our organisation feels the need to reconnect with the EU funding. It would be amazing to see the recommendations in this paper to be implemented. Please keep us informed about further development. Thank you for your time!
Clear, well argued paper.I have never applied but will be considering it with one multi partner project coming up. Mostly, I have heard that the application process if hard and with low success rates, also there is a lot of monitoring and reporting that I anticipate I would find very hard to manage without additional help of someone who has managed such a complex project before.
I totally agree with the document, thank you very much to all the people who took care of it.
Crucial point:
- 2 step process for small organizations
- european mobility grant
I'd also totally agree with Hermann saying we need to come back to our specific focus: I don't underestimate audience development or new media and their impacts on society, but we need to strength cooperation, promote new creation (and new models/format) and also facilitate creative entrepreneurship. This last point is probably the one will discuss concretely the most in the next years.
I also fully agree with the document, thank you for the work!
If I may suggest, it would be nice to underline the importance of operational grants not only for networks but also for cultural organisations in general. The period when Fabbrica Europa most benefitted from Culture grants was at the time when festivals could ask for operational grants...
Good work and good luck
Marina
Thanks for preparing this paper, which has constructive suggestions on opening access to funds to make them more useful.
As an artist working in a small organisation, it has never been possible to take a lead in submitting a project because the barriers (time, finance, planning horizon) are too difficult to cross. The simple idea of a mobility grant to enable work at a variety of scales to cross-fertilise European cultures is great for presenters and creators of work.
Simplifying both application processes and the ongoing monitoring of / reporting on projects is really key. Even large organisations with experience administering European funds seem to find these extremely onerous, and expensive.
Dear all,
Thank you for your valuable comments and experiences with the Creative Europe programme. Not all your proposals made it into the final version, but they give us extra ammunition for the meetings we plan to have with members of Parliament and Commission.
Please find the final version, endorsed by the European Dance houses network, here!