£38.3m for ACE’s Creative People and Places

£38.3m will be invested to expand Arts Council England’s (ACE) Creative People and Places (CPP) programme over the next three years. 

Eleven new projects are included, each located in a place that ACE ranked as having low levels of cultural engagement and a high need for further investment.

Thirty-nine projects spanning 56 local authorities will each receive between £750,000 and £1m to deliver community led cultural activities.

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Six new project locations – Wigan, Copeland, Rochdale, Crawley, Newham and New Forest – are among ACE’s 54 ‘priority places’ for investment.

Few of ACE’s priority places are among the lowest funded, analysis by ArtsProfessional found, despite research pointing towards deprived areas benefitting the most from culture.

The funder says the chosen projects made the strongest applications against CCP criteria.

“They all showed a commitment to community-led decision making and demonstrated a strong mix of geographic spread and diverse populations.”

The 39 projects cover England, with 14 located in the North, eight in the Midlands, 11 across the South East and West, and six located in London.

Funding for two former CPP projects, Hull’s Back to ours and South East Northumberland’s bait, will being phased out by March 2023, as cultural engagement there has improved. 

To determine eligibility in this round, ACE used data from Active Lives Survey 2015-2017, which coincided with Hull’s tenure as City of Culture 2017.

Local opportunities

Newly funded projects are looking to put local communities at the centre of cultural engagement.

New Forest’s Culture in Common will enable communities to create their own artistic opportunities, similar to Wigan’s Down to Earth programme, which focuses on local green spaces.

Staffordshire Moorlands is the only new project area rated as ‘low opportunity’ for culture engagement by ACE. Its programme Outside will deliver activities “rooted in local life,” ACE says, with emphasis on boosting arts and culture in rural settings.

Crawley LGBTU+, Diverse Crawley, and Crawley Town Community Foundation are among those involved in Crawley’s Creative Playground, a £1m programme of creative workshops, gigs, digital projects, outdoor art and festivals.

Creative Crawley Chair Steve Sawyer says the programme will help the area build a reputation as a place where creativity, imagination, experimentation and culture are celebrated.

“This announcement is a huge stimulus to some very exciting plans that I am thrilled we will now collectively have an opportunity to bring to life.”  

High engagement

7.4 million people, including 17,400 volunteers, have engaged with CCP since its inception in 2012, ACE estimates.

83% of participants come from groups with low-to-medium levels of engagement with arts and culture.

1000 local partners have helped deliver project objectives. ACE says partnerships are key to success of CPP: “Partners have recognition for the significant value that creative, cultural activity can add to strong and vibrant communities.”

Chief Executive Darren Henley said the projects change villages, towns and cities for the better, helping people lead happier, healthier lives.

“Our new investment means more people in more places across England will benefit from that magical spark of possibility, innovation and invention that only happens when culture and creativity becomes part of their daily lives.”