Irish Film Board and Arts Council launch new documentary production fund

The Irish Arts Council and Bord Scannan na hÉireann/the Irish Film Board (BSÉ/IFB) have called for proposals for a new production fund, 'Documenting the Arts'.
Complementing existing documentary and other funding programmes already provided by the two agencies, Documenting the Arts aims to encourage new and established film-makers to produce personal, creative and compelling arts-based documentaries that examine, in an exciting way, the diverse issues of arts and culture in a contemporary or historical context
The Documenting the Arts fund plans to finance five or six new documentaries per year. Between the two agencies, a maximum of €90,000 is available per documentary.
Mary Cloake, Director of the Arts Council, said: “The Arts Council is delighted to lead on this important initiative. We consider it to be a major step forward in chronicling the contribution of the arts and artists to our society and of capturing the excitement of artistic life. Partnership is a key approach is this project and we look forward to working with BSE/IFB on realising this opportunity”.
“We are delighted to partner with our friends at the Arts Council on this unique new scheme, the structure of which is a first for the Irish Film Board," said BSÉ/IFB CEO Mark Woods. "Creative documentary film-makers can be empowered by initiating Arts Council funding to seek pre-sales from broadcasters and thereby, for the first time, automatically trigger financing from the Irish Film Board”.
The fund is a stepped whereby firstly, the Arts Council can provide an award of up to €40,000 (Stage 1) which can be used by the applicant to fully fund their project. Or the applicant may use this initial ‘seed’ funding as part-finance, in which case, the applicant may then choose to move on to Stage 2 whereby the Irish Film Board may provide further automatic funding of up to €50,000 per project, triggered by broadcaster commitment(s). Applications for Stage 1 funding will be assessed in one round per year. Applications for Stage 2 funding will be processed year round.
The deadline for Stage 1 Arts Council applications is Tuesday June 7 2005 at 5pm.
Filmbase will administer the Documenting the Arts fund on behalf of the Arts Council.
For further information on guidelines and application forms, please visit: www.filmboard.ie , www.filmbase.ie , or www.filmboard.ie .
(GB)