“Support for the projects has already increased. […] I promise to increase them again next year”, responded the minister Pedro Adão e Silva, questioned by the Lusa news agency, on the sidelines of the 14th National Congress of Mercy, in Lisbon, about a possible increase in the allocation of support tenders. Projects 2022, claimed by representative associations of the sector.
In January, Plateia — Association of Performing Arts Professionals warned the Minister of Culture of the “true chaos” in project support contests, if there were no reinforcement of funds.
“What we fear is real chaos, for a very short time. Because the support for the projects goes to the smallest projects and to all the structures that could not have guaranteed their biennial support. And, therefore, they will pervert what is the essence of supporting projects”, said Sara Barros Leitão, director of Plateia, in statements to the Lusa news agency.
In a statement released last week, that association reinforced that it considers the reinforcement “viable and essential”, arguing that “it is still on time.”
This Thursday, the Minister of Culture recalled that “the item to support projects, from about eight million, went to ten million,” and added: “Therefore, we have already had growth. The Minister of Culture is not only interested in increasing the endowment, as it has increased”.
Pedro Adão e Silva highlighted that it is “a significant growth in the total endowment, as well as a growth in what is the maximum amount that each project can be supported, which went from 50,000 to 55,000 euros.”
“The idea is that the Culture budget continues to grow, following the dynamics that exist in the country, of cultural creation. Now, a growth of 22% is already a significant growth. We have had a very sustained growth of what is the budget in Culture. This growth in the Culture budget program has been reflected in particular in support for the arts, ”he said.
When the call was opened in May of last year, the six calls for sustained support had allocated a global amount of 81.3 million euros.
In September, the Minister of Culture announced that this amount would increase to 148 million euros. However, the reinforcement only covered the four-year modality of the competitions, leaving dozens of structures outside the support.
The results were highly questioned by various associations, which led to several appeals to the minister Pedro Adão e Silva, petitions and a demonstration in front of parliament.
At that time, associations and professionals in the sector warned of the possibility that the number of requests for project support could be very high, taking into account the dozens of structures not included in the biennial modality of sustained support.
On Wednesday, this fear was confirmed, with the disclosure by the General Directorate for the Arts (DGArtes) of the number of applications this year in project support contests.
The number of applications admitted to the contest to support projects in the Programming area more than doubled compared to last year, with increases also being registered in the areas of Creation and Simplified Procedure.
In the case of the call for support for projects in the Programming area, 383 applications were accepted (that is, considered eligible to receive support after analyzing the process). The previous year there had been 178. Which means an increase of more than double.
In the Creation area, 831 applications were accepted, a third more than the previous year, when 624 applications were accepted (128 for visual arts and 496 for performing arts). In the case of the simplified procedure, 525 applications were accepted, compared to 333 the previous year.
The DGArtes annual statement for 2022 established that project support tenders would open until October, but this only happened at the end of December.
In the clarification released this Wednesday, the DGArtes indicated the forecast of publicizing the results of the contest to support projects in the area of Programming and Simplified Procedure for June and the contest in the area of Creation for July.
Said entity stated that “in situations in which there is a high number of applications and in which there is a temporary overlap between different tenders – as is the case of the four tenders to support projects open at the end of 2022, to which The tender for support in the Art for Democracy alliance inaugurated in January 2023 has been signed, a volume of work is generated that requires a very significant allocation of resources ”.
Last week the results of the contest in the area of internationalization were announced, whose applications had also been opened at the end of December. With a budget of 900,000 euros, the support will cover 80 applications, out of a total of 176.
The calls to support projects in the areas of creation and programming have a total budget of 8.3 million euros.
Source: Observadora
