Culture Minister Owen Bonnici yesterday announced a new €100,000 fund for artists to create programmes within their local communities.

“At a time when so much cultural initiative stems from local communities, we felt the need to invest in their creativity, particularly by encouraging initiatives focusing on diversity, training and research,” Dr Bonnici said.

“Art can help pull communities together, create connections and overcome challenges creatively. By sup­-­ porting it, we are going to the heart of the community.”

Toni Attard, director of strategy at the Arts Council Malta, said the aim of the scheme was to leverage the cultural diversity and collective memory of local communities to forge lasting partnerships with professional artists and voluntary organisations.

Art can help pull communities together, create connections and overcome challenges creatively

The scheme will focus on community-led creative and artistic activities, primarily addressing local communities. It provides an opportunity for training, research and the development of artistic projects led by the community for the community while celebrating cultural diversity.

Mr Attard said there were 177 voluntary organisations active in the cultural sector, representing about 16 per cent of all voluntary organisations in Malta.

The Arts Council will be holding information meetings and one-to-one brokerage sessions to enable voluntary organisations to take full advantage of the opportunity.

Dr Bonnici noted that, with the new scheme, public funding for the arts now amounted to €1.3 million. As part of the larger restructuring of the Arts Council, the creative communities programme would be administered by the council rather than the ministry, in a bid to boost transparency.

He said the government would soon be announcing another fund for local councils to organise artistic events themselves.

The first round of applications for the creative communities fund is open until April 2 for projects taking place between this June and June 2016.

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