£1m boost for 40 arts projects as Creative Scotland reveals funding
MUSIC in a mausoleum, a theatrical work about being eaten, a celebration of James Kelman, and a series of festivals are to receive funding of almost £1 million.
More than 40 cultural projects are to receive £950,000 from Creative Scotland’s open project funding pot.
Awards of between £1,240 and £125,000 have been made to festivals, musicians, visual artists, film festivals, dancers and writers.
These include £4,400 for the Mausoleum Music Project which will see composer Francis Macdon- ald write, arrange and produce an album of contemporary chamber music to be recorded in Hamilton Mausoleum, in South Lanarkshire.
Working with a small ensemble, the project will “use the unique reverb and acoustic ambience of this beautiful, historic building”.
The biggest award is £125,000 for Showcase Scotland Expo, to “further the performance opportunities for Scottish based artists working in the genres of folk, traditional, Scots, Gaelic, world and acoustic music.”
Mamoru Iriguchi has received just over £7,000 to support the research and development of “Eaten, a performance piece for family audiences ... Eaten explores the notion of food from the viewpoints of the eater and the eaten.”
The acclaimed writer Kirsty Logan receives funding to travel to Iceland and begin her fifth book, The Night Tender.
It is a “linked collection of short horror stories exploring fears around childbirth, houses, and the past”.
There is £23,000 funding to support Flint & Pitch Productions, a new spoken word, music and theatre project for Scotland, directed by programmer and promoter, Jenny Lindsay, who was in Rally & Broad.
The national arts funding agency said it would produce late-night, monthly revue shows featuring top bands, poets and performers; Scotland’s first ever dedicated regular platform for long-form spoken word-theatre shows, and two 10-act variety nights at the Royal Lyceum [in Edinburgh].
The Drouth magazine has received funding to stage James Kelman at 70: A Celebration.
The event will celebrate the writer’s life and art “thus far, including tributes from luminaries in Scottish writing, roundtable discussions tracing the context and development of Kelman’s work and unique performances interpreting Kelman’s work”.
Harriet Warman, producer of Alchemy Film & Arts, who have also been appointed to curate the Scotland + Venice presentation at the Venice Biennale 2017 with Rachel McLean, said of their £79,700 award: “It will allow us to move forward with exciting plans.”