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News Releases - 2006

Canada Council to increase funding for artistic projects

Ottawa, December 22, 2006 – For the second consecutive year, the Canada Council for the Arts will increase its funding to arts organizations undertaking artistic production projects, including theatre, dance, opera and interdisciplinary productions, musical concerts, visual and media art exhibitions and literary publishing projects.

At its quarterly meeting earlier this week, the board of the Canada Council voted to increase the 2006-2007 budget for project grants by $1.5 million, bringing the total project grant budget to $12.5 million. This is in addition to a $1.2 million increase to the project grants budget in 2005-2006.

Earlier this year, the Council announced that it would use the $50 million in new funding announced in last May’s federal budget to supplement operating grants for arts organizations, as well as grants for individual artists and initiatives aimed at increasing public access to the arts. However, production project grants were not included in that amount.

“Even though we were not able to fund production projects with the new money, we think it is important to provide support for these initiatives that also reflect the dynamism of Canada’s arts community,” said Canada Council Chair Karen Kain.

The additional money will be divided among the various project grant programs in all artistic disciplines. As the competitions for this year have already taken place, the money will be used to support projects which were highly recommended by Canada Council juries but were not funded because there wasn’t enough money in the program budget to do so.

At its meeting, the board was also updated on the positive response from arts organizations to the competition for the supplementary operating grants, which closed on December 15.

“We are delighted with the interest the arts community has taken in this initiative,” she said, adding that the applications will be evaluated by juries in January and February and the results will be announced in early April.