Deadline: 07-Jul-21
Engage Scotland is seeking proposals from visual arts organisations / galleries across Scotland to deliver a co-produced project with young people as part of a new youth arts programme.
ART Evolution is Engage Scotland’s exciting new collaborative and responsive programme supporting young people aged 16 – 25, freelance artists, creative educators and visual arts organisations/galleries as they emerge from the pandemic.
The next phase of ART Evolution aims to support the sector to tackle some of the challenges and barriers; but also explore some new ideas/approaches; around engaging young people with the visual arts, as identified in the scoping report.
Engage Scotland will support 3 visual arts organisations/galleries across Scotland to deliver a co-produced project with young people as part of the ART Evolution youth arts programme.
Each partner will deliver an exemplar, youth-led visual arts project that engages with young people aged 16 – 25; including an associated, paid youth traineeship; and fairly-paid opportunities for freelance artists/creative educators.
Aims
ART Evolution aims to:
- support young people, visual arts organisations/galleries, and freelance artists in Scotland to respond to and recover from the COVID-19 pandemic
- tackle some of the pre-existing concerns around youth arts engagement with the visual arts that have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic
- enhance the current capacity of the youth arts infrastructure within the visual arts/gallery sector in Scotland
- demonstrate new, innovative and creative models of working with young people, with a particular focus on tackling inequality, and in response to further barriers to engagement with the visual arts created by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Focus Areas
Projects will focus on at least one of the following criteria around engaging young people with the visual arts (as identified from the scoping phase):
- Fostering positive mental health and wellbeing
- Engaging and supporting young people who face barriers to participation that have been exacerbated by the pandemic
- Using a person-centred/youth-led approach to project design
- Exploring the outdoors and/or the natural environment as a way of tackling barriers to young people’s engagement with visual art
- Exploring high-quality, innovative and inclusive approaches to ‘blended engagement’ (i.e., a combination of remote and in-person)
- Exploring innovative solutions for safe in-person working
- Reinforcing models of partnership or collaboration with other organisations, e.g., 3 rd sector, local authority or other cultural partners
Funding Information
- The following funding is available for each visual arts organisation/gallery partner:
- £6,000 – to support project work with young people (x 3 projects)
- Note: freelancers contracted to projects must be paid at Scottish Artist Union rates.
- £2,000 – to support a paid trainee position for a young person aged 16-25. (x 3) The trainees will work alongside the artists and young people to deliver the projects in each organisation. They will be involved in all aspects of the project delivery including planning meetings, preparation, delivery of workshops, marketing, set up and clear up, presentation/showcase/exhibitions, trips and evaluation of the project.
- Partner organisations will need to commit to providing £2,000 of in-kind support for ART Evolution.
- ART Evolution project activity will take place between September – December 2021. However, given the ongoing uncertainty around the COVID-19 pandemic, they are aware that some flexibility may be necessary, e.g. in the event of any significant changes to government guidelines that might impact project delivery.
Evaluation and Project Dissemination
- A dedicated evaluator will support ART Evolution funded partners to develop a robust project evaluation framework.
- Engage Scotland will spread the impact of the work through wider sharing, networking and training opportunities around youth arts for the visual arts sector in Scotland.
For more information, visit https://engage.org/happenings/art-evolution-youth-visual-arts-programme/