Annual Assistance to Media Arts Festivals
Deadline
1 November
If this date falls on a weekend or statutory holiday, the deadline moves to the next business day.
If your festival occurs on the deadline date or within four weeks of the deadline, you may be able to request an extension for submitting additional materials. However, you must contact the program officer named below well in advance of the deadline date to receive approval of an extension for submitting additional materials.
Incomplete applications, applications postmarked after the deadline date and applications sent by fax or email will not be accepted.
Program Description
The Canada Council for the Arts views media arts festivals as key events for raising the profile of Canadian, independent media artists and their works. The Council views them as central in linking artworks to audiences, distributors, curators, exhibitors and broadcasters and to stimulating dialogue and exchange between artists and the public at large.
The Canada Council defines media arts as works in film, video, audio and new media.
Support is given to festivals that:
- raise the profile of independent Canadian artworks
- display vision, innovation and risk-taking in their programming
- present works by Canadian artists from various regions and cultural communities, and highlight a diversity of voices and visions
- make independent Canadian media artwork accessible to distributors, curators, exhibitors and broadcasters
- reach diverse audience groups, including young audiences, and
- are recognized nationally and internationally.
The Canada Council’s support is directed to the Canadian independent component of a festival’s programming. Specifically, this program encourages the presentation of independent works that are innovative in the themes and subjects they address, the point of view they express and the aesthetic strategies they employ. The Council encourages festival programmers to contextualize and incorporate a diversity of culturally specific practices, voices and visions.
The Canada Council considers independent productions to be those over which the director/artist maintains complete creative and editorial control.
Media arts festivals are considered to be annual or biennial (held every two years) events that bring audiences, distributors, curators, programmers, broadcasters, mass media and artists together over a concentrated period of time (a minimum of three days).
The presentation of media artworks must be the primary purpose of the festival. (Multidisciplinary festivals that include media arts programming may be eligible to apply to the Canada Council through the Multidisciplinary Festivals Project Grants program of the Inter-Arts Office.)
Eligibility
Applicants must demonstrate a serious, ongoing commitment to presenting independent film, video, audio and/or new media artworks produced by Canadian media artists. Applicants must pay artists' fees and/or distributor rental fees for the Canadian, independent media artworks presented. At the time of application, organizations are required to submit a list including the name of the artist and/or distributor, the date and the amount of payment for each Canadian, independent media artwork presented in the most recent festival. We also reserve the right to demand cancelled cheques or other proof of the payment of artists' and/or distributor rental fees.
Festivals must have been in operation for at least three years and have produced at least three full festivals. They must also have received support previously from this program or the Dissemination Project Grants program.
Applicants must have an established administrative structure and be legally constituted as a Canadian, non-profit organization. They must be directed by a board of practising media artists, programmers and/or curators, or have an advisory or programming committee with strong representation from these groups.
Internet-based festivals must also feature a series of scheduled events that offer a platform to bring artists, distributors, curators, exhibitors and audiences together to optimize the impact of festival.
Organizations that also receive Canada Council funding for annual, ongoing media arts programming are not eligible to apply to this program.
Eligible costs include:
- programmers’ and curators’ fees, research and travel costs
- payments to Canadian artists, including artists’ fees and/or rental fees, travel costs and honoraria
- rental of presentation equipment and facilities
- shipping costs for media artworks
- technical costs, including projectionists’ or technicians’ fees, and installation costs
- costs of writing and publishing interpretive documents (including catalogues and program books)
- publicity and promotional costs, including production of marketing/promotional tools, media relations and advertising
- costs of audience development and education initiatives, including outreach activities, panel discussions, artists’ talks and workshops, and
- costs for travel, meetings, special showcasing of works and other initiatives to reach curators, distributors, programmers and broadcasters.
Ineligible costs include:
- any activities covered by another Canada Council for the Arts grant
- equipment purchase costs, capital costs, costs associated with the presentation of non-Canadian or non-independent works, and costs associated with the production or commissioning of artworks (organizations may apply to the Media Arts Commissioning Program for the commissioning of artworks)
- costs associated with the circulation of festival programs outside the festival’s home city after the main festival event (activities such as touring/circulation may, however, be eligible for support through the Dissemination Project Grants program).
All Canada Council programs are accessible to Aboriginal arts organizations and arts organizations from diverse cultural and regional communities of Canada.
Grant Amount
There are no minimum or maximum grants that may be requested or received.
Applicants may receive less than the full amount they request. Grants contribute only to the direct costs associated with presenting independent, Canadian media artworks at festivals occurring in the calendar year following the application deadline.
Retroactive funding is not available.
Assessment of Applications
Media Arts Section Officers review all applications to this program for eligibility. A peer assessment committee then makes a comparative analysis of all eligible applications. On the basis of the committee’s grant recommendations, the Media Arts Section prepares recommendations for approval by the Canada Council for the Arts.
The peer assessment committee reserves the right to recommend grants for festivals not receiving assistance from this program at present, or to recommend an increase or decrease in existing grant levels for festivals currently receiving assistance.
The committee is made up of media arts professionals. Members are also selected to provide fair representation of gender, regional and cultural diversity, Aboriginal peoples, genres and both official languages. Festivals are invited to submit names of peers to serve on peer assessment committees. All names submitted are subject to review by the Canada Council for the Arts Media Arts Advisory Committee.
Applicants will be notified of the results, by letter, within four months of the deadline. Results are not released over the telephone.
Application Form
Annual Assistance to Media Arts Festivals (pdf, 100 KB)
This form can only be printed and cannot be filled out on-line.
Further Information
This program summary is an overview of the Annual Assistance to Media Arts Festivals program. For further details or to obtain an application form, please contact Michèle Stanley, Media Arts Section Officer.
Telephone: 1-800-263-5588 (toll-free) or 613-566-4414, ext. 5251
TTY (TDD) machine, for hearing-impaired callers : 613-565-5194
Fax: 613-566-4409
Media Arts Section
Canada Council for the Arts
350 Albert St., P.O. Box 1047
Ottawa ON K1P 5V8
October 2007