FEAST builds on Arts Council investment to raise a total of £2m for creative activities in Cornwall

Last updated: 28/06/2012 Add to My Bookmarks Subscribe

FEAST, a programme to make great art happen across Cornwall, has generated a total of £2 million for arts projects and organisations in Cornwall.  This has been built on an initial 3 year funding package of around £700,000 from Arts Council England.

An independent evaluation conducted by Annabel Jackson Associates details how FEAST has commissioned over 140 projects in 572 locations and has featured diverse art forms from dance and art installations in bathing pool cubicles, to synchronized swimming and community map making.

Castles, pubs, empty shops, village halls and even a tent have been venues for high quality and inspiring projects with around 62% of events happening in places not normally associated with hosting arts events.

Celebrating the FEAST projects’ £2m achievement, its director Rose Barnecut from Cornwall Council’s Cultural Services team, who works on delivering the FEAST project with the Cornwall Arts Centre Trust said:

“FEAST commissions widely spread, mostly small scale projects which harness the energies of artists and communities and enable them to raise more money for themselves.  In leaner times, this is a model that works. We are delighted with the impact of the programme.  FEAST commissioned projects have involved over 2,000 artists, more than 2,500 volunteers 28,500 participants plus audiences of nearly 135,000 people.

The vision for FEAST was to ‘deliver a programme of arts activity that touches and inspires people of all ages and backgrounds across the breadth of Cornwall’.  Judging by some of the comments from participants and stakeholders featured in the independent report, FEAST has delivered that vision. FEAST has brought tea dances to residential homes; coracle making to Lostwithiel; environmental art to Bodmin Moor; bonfire poetry readings to the Roseland and much, much more.”

Cornwall Council cabinet support member for culture and leisure Joan Symons said: “FEAST has proved to be so successful and such good value for money because it has concentrated on giving small grants; had huge support and help in kind from partners; encouraged and developed a joined up approach to add value and been a reflection on the needs of the community. This means that many projects have continued beyond the initial FEAST grant period.  It has also helped the creative sector itself and the survey shows that more than 60% of successful applicants to FEAST had gained work opportunities as a result of their project.

FEAST has been hugely successful in acting as a lever to access other funding for arts projects. The target was to attract up to 70% of additional funding on top of the total money supplied by FEAST when in fact, as of April this year when the independent report was produced, FEAST had generated 130% more funding which equates to over £845,000 to artists and arts organisations. But things have moved on even further since the report was published and we are now up to total funding at around the £2million mark. This is a tremendous boost to the long term sustainability of the arts in Cornwall and reflects the aim of the recently announced endowment board set up by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport to help arts and heritage organisations secure their future financial stability.”

Some of those involved with the arts organisations that received funding from FEAST explain what it means to them:

Jenny Foster, Volunteer Organiser Liskerett Centre, Liskeard said: “FEAST means we have been able to work with a range of local artists all to the benefit of the local area. Relatively small pots of funding have given us the means to develop projects into lasting events involving the whole community.”

Denzil Monk, Director of awen productions cic: “An often invisible benefit of FEAST to Cornish arts organisations is the impact this local funding can have on other national bids - who look positively on applications where local match is secured.  Our FEAST archive film project led to our making a short film for BBC1’s Turn Back Time and an award of £36,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to expand the project for another 3 years”.

Helen Tiplady, c-scape Dance Company said: As a practitioner working in Cornwall, FEAST is an incredibly important support for the arts. For us and many other companies FEAST has been crucial to our development and made so many things possible.

Story posted 14 July 2011