Arts & Disability Ireland receives increase in Arts Council 2018 Strategic Funding announcements

Arts & Disability Ireland was among 156 organisations to receive their 2018 Strategic Funding announcements on the 20th December. In addition to an increase of 5.5% on 2017, ADI was invited to participate in Arts Council’s multi-annual Strategic Funding programme.

This 3 year funding announcement from Arts Council will allow ADI in line with our new strategic plan, to scale up our impact, through a series of strategic multi-annual projects between now and 2021. To read our full strategic plan for 2017 – 2021, download Leading Change in Arts and Culture here.

Plans for artists with disabilities include a production award which we hope to pilot with Cork Midsummer Festival and Project Arts Centre in 2018-19. Looking further ahead to 2021 we intend to partner with the Ark to develop an open call commissioning process for artists with disabilities to create new work for children, young people and their families.

For audiences we plan to develop and foster local and regional access partnerships, comprising of a combination of multi-disciplinary arts venues, theatres, galleries, museums and festivals which, with our support, can realise an accessible arts infrastructure and shared accessible programme in their locality or region. The first of these access partnerships will begin in Dublin and Galway in 2018 and will be rolled out to other parts of the country in the proceeding years.

In 2020 ADI will host an international conference facilitating a peer to peer exchange with a range of arts and cultural access professionals and advocates from Ireland and abroad. The conference will draw on our longstanding relationship with the annual Leadership Exchange in Arts and Disability (LEAD) Conference organised by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Washington D.C., who have committed a budget of $100,000 towards realising the first LEAD Conference outside the United States.

As ADI embarks on this new multi-annual Strategic Funding journey with the Arts Council, we want to acknowledge the work of our board, staff, freelancers and partners who have contributed to bringing us to this point in our development.

Pádraig Naughton
Executive Director
Arts & Disability Ireland