The Rogue Arts Festival and Driftwood Players have received $5,000 each from the British Columbia Arts Council to support “safe, entertaining activities this year,” according to the Ministry of Arts and Culture.
“The goal is to get some much-needed funds into arts workers’ hands while providing our community with some much-needed stimuli and entertainment,” Rogue Arts Festival artistic and administrative director Arwen MacDonald told Coast Reporter.
While public health orders will dictate how the Rogue Arts Festival events roll out this summer, MacDonald said the plan is to host six live events on consecutive Saturdays starting July 24 featuring music and visual arts.
Venues haven’t been determined yet.
Driftwood Players will be using its grant funding for a production for the Sechelt Arts Festival.
In early March the theatre organization also received $18,000 from the B.C. Arts Council. “Without it, we may not have been able to survive,” producer and treasurer Bill Forst told Coast Reporter in an email.
Those funds will cover the cost to hold tuition-free online Driftwood Theatre School classes, to rent space from Heritage Playhouse in Gibsons to produce a “COVID safe” video recording of Spoon River this spring, to hire a summer student for their costume shop and to purchase a headset system to use for outdoor productions.
Driftwood Players is also hoping to produce Blood Relations in October at the playhouse, using the funding to subsidize the lost revenue from reduced audience sizes and ticket sales.
“With this funding, we’re helping ensure the arts scene is able to adapt to pandemic restrictions so it can remain vibrant this year and into the future while supporting local artists,” said MLA Nicholas Simons in a release highlighting the funding for Lower and Upper Sunshine Coast organizations.
“Many of these festivals and events were cancelled last year and are adapting their formats to ensure everyone in the community is kept safe,” said the release.
The grants will support community arts festivals and installations by compensating artists for their performances and works. MacDonald said their funding “will go directly to participating musicians.”
In total, the B.C. Arts Council is providing $1.9 million for arts festivals, visual artists and co-op placements to hire students.
