European Platforms for the promotion of emerging artists

Expected impact

The action aims to support around 15 Platforms covering different cultural and creative sectors. As the support is intended to have a structuring effect, the intention is not to support more than one Platform targeting the same type of artists or works of a same cultural sector. While respecting merit based on the evaluation of the award criteria, the evaluation committee will ensure that the portfolio of projects selected is diverse and respects a balance between cultural sectors.

Together, the coordinator and members of the Platform must:

• establish a Platform composed of a coordinating organisation and member organisations (third parties, please refer to section 5 and 6).
• develop a joint and coordinated artistic programming strategy to identify and present emerging European artists and their works outside their country of origin.
• set up a cascading grant mechanism to support emerging artists, raise their profile and increase and promote European cultural and artistic diversity. Commit to devoting at least 70% of the grant to supporting emerging artists.
• support at least 50 emerging artists per year.
• build a strategy to develop the Platform by increasing the number of member organisations, at least one per year as from the second year.

The above elements are mandatory and must be clearly detailed in the proposal.

Objectives

This action will support projects aimed at promoting emerging European artists and their works, improving their international visibility, and facilitating their circulation. Projects should also improve access to and participation in cultural events and activities, enhancing audience engagement and development. These projects must be designed and developed to contribute to the implementation of the EU's policy priorities in the field of culture, in particular the working conditions of artists.European Platforms’ action is open to all the cultural and creative sectors. However, considering that this action aims at pursuing the objectives of the Culture strand of the Programme, projects involving exclusively organisations from the audiovisual sector are not targeted for funding under it.

For the purposes of this action, projects will need to establish Platforms that can be defined as showcases or springboards made up of a coordinating organisation and member organisations, with a common programming and branding strategy.

Theme and priorities (scope)

Proposals should address the cross-cutting issues of (i) inclusion and diversity, notably gender balance, and (ii) greening of Creative Europe, as explained in section 1. Background.

Proposals should also address the following specific priorities:

Artists and cultural professionals: empowering the cultural and creative sectors.

In the current context, the need to promote fair, inclusive, and diverse frameworks supporting emerging artists careers and cultural and creative professionals is crucial and should be a key strategic consideration when drafting proposals. Projects’ proposals should include effective ways to ensure and promote better working conditions and fairer remuneration, skills’ development, and life-long learning as well as artistic freedom. To this end, applicants are highly recommended to draw inspiration from the report “The status and working conditions of artists and cultural and creative professionals”.

Culture for the people: enhancing cultural participation and the role of culture in society.

With this priority, applicants should propose concrete activities to build the capacities of the cultural and creative sectors to enhance cultural participation as well as audience engagement and development that help promote citizenship, values, and democracy. Proposals addressing this priority should consider the beneficial aspects of culture for health and wellbeing, particularly mental health.

Culture for co-creative partnerships: strengthening the cultural dimension of EU external relations.

With this priority, applicants should propose concrete activities to help culture professionals and emerging artists to be (more) active outside the EU borders, within and beyond the Creative Europe participating countries, and contribute to foster international cultural relations.

Culture for digital transformation: help the European cultural and creative sectors to fully take advantage of new technologies to enhance their competitiveness.

With this priority, applicants should propose concrete activities to help professionals and emerging artists to critically and creatively embrace new technologies and changes driven by the digital transformation based, inter alia on the EU’s digital strategy.

Proposals should present complete need analysis and demonstrate how the above priorities and cross-cutting issues are addressed. The way proposals address all the above-mentioned cross-cutting issues and priorities will be assessed under the award criterion “relevance”. For more details, see section 9.

Activities that can be funded (scope)

Applicants must present a sustainable strategy for the coordination and management of the Platform, as well as for the joint activities of the members.

Members’ joint activities:

• promote, celebrate, and boost the diversity of the European artistic repertoire by developing a common European programming of non-national emerging artists,
• promote a fair, inclusive, and diverse environment for emerging artists, looking particularly at effective ways to reach better working conditions and fair remuneration,
• contribute to building more resilient and sustainable societies and encourage the necessary adaptation of practices. Demonstrate that a strategy and a progressive path towards sustainable practices is foreseen, as well as tools allowing to monitor this progression,
• develop a strong common communication and branding strategy and establish a European quality label,
• strengthen peer-learning and networking, notably with other Platforms and other projects, actions and initiatives supported by Creative Europe.

Coordination and management of the Platform:

• provide financial support to members through a cascade grant mechanism,
• increase the European dimension and diversity of the membership by broadening the platform and its scope.

These activities should be formulated within a solid strategic framework and be structured in work packages. A work package is a major sub-division of the project. Each work package is accompanied by an objective (expected outcome) and should list the activities, milestones and deliverables that belong to it. For more details see section 10 (Milestones and Deliverables).

The quality of the proposed activities, work packages, deliverables and milestones will be assessed under the award criterion “Quality of content and activities”. For more details, see section 9 (Award criteria).