Provincial Government Invests in Arts and Culture Spaces
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The African Friendship Society receives $65,000 to create its new hub, Studio Bantu. | Image: African Friendship Society.
Twenty-six arts and culture groups throughout the Lower Mainland are getting more than $1 million help to improve their spaces or buy equipment.
“Arts and culture groups operate vitally important spaces of belonging in communities throughout B.C., and this funding will help enhance their facilities so they can come back strong after the pandemic,” said Melanie Mark, Minister of Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport. “We’re supporting arts groups to upgrade their spaces, improve safety features, increase accessibility or buy equipment so they can continue to offer virtual programming and contribute to B.C.’s economic recovery.”
As the first recipients of the BC Arts Council’s new program, arts and culture groups in the Lower Mainland are getting dedicated funding to improve arts infrastructure. In Vancouver, the African Friendship Society received $65,000 to create Studio Bantu, a new hub for African arts and culture. The society will transform an existing storage space at Vancouver Opera into a culturally safe space of healing and connection. The studio will be a place Black and African communities can gather to preserve, celebrate and share their history, traditions, arts and culture.
Groups are also getting grants to buy special equipment. For example, the Vancouver Native Housing Society received $28,000 to build a mobile livestream studio to support Vancouver's urban Indigenous and artistic communities. Having this equipment will help the artists in residence at Skwachàys teach, promote and sell their work remotely. It will also offer the society’s tenants access to virtual cultural programming. The society hopes to have the studio up and running by this spring.
In total, 50 arts and culture organizations across B.C. received nearly $2 million in grants to help improve arts and culture spaces and support the sector’s resilience.
