In response to that, mac have said they might have to close for 6 weeks from January 2013, reduce their operating hours and feature less adventurous work.

The Music Hub organisations (Symphony Hall, the Town Hall, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Ex Cathedra) are apparently being accused of not getting their act together sufficiently and have been told they can just have one year of funding for the time being.

So, yes. Grim. The Post goes so far as to use the phrase ‘plunged into crisis’.

I’d like to quote something I wrote a year ago:

The leaked figures suggested a rather bleak scenario of 2012/13 and 2013/14 – one that’s been described as ‘politically unacceptable’. The idea, as I understand it, is for the figures announced yesterday to hold for the next three years. Funding is to be kept at this level by income generated by (for example) sponsorship secured by the likes of Performances Birmingham (Town Hall/Symphony Hall to you and I)

Is the scenario any less bleak or, for that matter, politically acceptable? The attempts to sell naming rights for the Town Hall and Symphony Hall have apparently fallen through too, by the way – corporate cash being a bit more tricky to come by these days.

One last thing – it’s worth noting that the Birmingham Post article was written by Paul Dale who left the paper yesterday. Over the years he’s done more than his fair share of bothering people in power and I’ve enjoyed reading his work. I was gutted to see him go (I bet there are a few who feel relieved) and wish him all the best in whatever he does next.

If you’re after something local:

• This link will take you to a list of West Mids culture/sport charities
• This link will take you to a search of charities that mention the keyword ‘Birmingham’
• Audiences Central has a list

AngelShares is a new crowdfunding service for the arts.

It was developed locally (founded by Sarah Gee of Indigo Ltd and built by Made Media) and launches with projects from Ikon Gallery, Craftspace, Light House Media Centre, Belgrade Theatre and Herbert Art Gallery & Museum.

The interesting thing about this one being that eligible donations can attract Gift Aid, adding a healthy chunk of extra cash to any projects that you choose to support.

AngelShares is on Twitter and on Facebook.

Birmingham City Council has launched a Public Consultation on its Budget Plans from April 2012. Please support the cultural life of the city by taking part in this. The official deadline for responses is 8 January, however we urge responses by the end of November, as they can then feed in to the Council Cabinet’s decisions on arts spending in early December

A public consultation might not be very exciting, but if you want this city to support culture and creativity then it wouldn’t hurt to mention that to the people who make the decisions – they’re not psychic, y’know.

Ammo reckons Birmingham’s arts scene is too safe and middle-aged, claiming that rather than providing art that appeals to Brummies, “a human tide of middle class professionals floods Birmingham each day from the suburban shanty towns that ring our city”:

Groomed by the local authority and a small elite of ‘tastemakers’, half-a-dozen ‘flagship’ venues and ventures in the city centre now hoover up most of the taxpayer and corporate cash. Just like the banks, they’ve become ‘too big to fail’.

More and more their programming reflects the tastes – and train timetables – of an alien clique.

Meanwhile, Stan’s Cafe remind us that, as of 1 October, city council funding for some of the smaller organisations ended (see my post with bonus hedgehog vid here):

last time I did the sums it appeared 50% of the City’s revenue funded portfolio was being cut by 100% to save 2.6% of the Arts Revenue budget. I can’t conceive how the city missed out on its last two bids to be crowned a Capital/City of Culture.

That last bit was sarcastic, btw.

CommunityForce is

a platform that empowers local projects and charities to raise awareness of their work and make their plans a reality with the support of NatWest and their local community.

Local charities and projects stand to be awarded £6k if they accumulate enough votes. Of the local projects, the following would appreciate your click:

• Indigo Arts
• Infamous Community Arts
• Petty hate Productions
• Redditch Arts Centre Steering Group
• West Midland Crystaletts Marching band
• Women & Theatre

This from Stan’s Cafe:

It’s sad because Brightspace were behind a huge number of inspirational projects that took artists into schools to work creatively with students and teachers. Now, despite a great report from OFSTED setting out the great value of these projects, the plug as been pulled, the axe has fallen, the bubble burst, the goose cooked, the turkey plucked, the swan sung and the full stopped.

I’d lost track of what’s happening with Creative England - I thought it was going to be based on a partnership of all the screen agencies but here’s a press release:

On Friday 30th September 2011, regional screen agency Screen WM will bring the curtain down on nine years of support for the screen media industries in the West Midlands and welcome Creative England as the new umbrella body for the creative sector.

The closure of Screen WM follows the coalition government’s decision to replace the UK Film Council’s support for film-making, which core-funded the regional screen agencies, with funding through the British Film Institute.

All the best to the folks working at these organisations who are moving on.

Sadly, I’m predicting a few more posts like this over the next few months.

Jo Gleave’s project is a site-specific promenade performance taking place in the now-disused Newman Brother’s Coffin Fittings Factory.

The Pod Project by Illographics aims to inject positivity and creativity into a deprived area of Birmingham through a community space, where groups learn and share skills and ideas.

In case a bit of background’s useful, over the past few years, the Arts Council funds organisations in two ways – by giving cash on a project-by-project basis (that’s called Grants for the Arts) and through what’s called ‘regular funding’. In the latter you’d be given an amount of money over a period of time.

The regular funding part is changing – as from this time next year, there will be a number of organisations that will be known as National Portfolio Organisations. Today we’re finding out which those will be.

Headline figures:

Nationally, 695 organisations have National Portfolio status (down from around 880 that had regular funding previously). 206 organisations that were regularly funded didn’t make it into the portfolio. 110 organisations that weren’t regularly funded have got in.

In the West Midlands (and according to my rather iffy maths) we’ve gone from 66 regularly funded organisations to 50 National Portfolio Organisations.

National Portfolio Organisations in the West Midlands

As my first boss always told me – always work from first sources. The official Arts Council info is here. Of course, there’s only so much you can tell from a spreadsheet so the following won’t reveal much detail and may be slightly misleading in places (doesn’t take account of mergers or name changes). Still, this what I’ve made of it, and if I’ve made any mistakes, then please let me know (links are to statements put out by the orgs):

Funding increased from current position:

• Ace Dance And Music
• Arena
• Birmingham City University
• Black Country Touring
• Dancefest
• DanceXchange
• Fierce! Festival Limited
• Geese Theatre Company
• Live & Local Ltd
• Punch
• Stan’s Cafe
• Wolverhampton Arts and Museums Service

It seems that some of these increases reflect mergers with other organisations, while others (Stan’s Cafe for one) have requested funding for money that would previously have come via applications to Grants For The Arts Awards.

Funding decreased:

• Arts Alive
• Belgrade Theatre
• Big Brum
• Birmingham Contemporary Music Group
• Birmingham Opera Company
• Birmingham Repertory Theatre Limited
• Birmingham Royal Ballet
• C&T
• City Of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra
• Craftspace
• Dance Touring Consortium Limited
• Dash
• Ex Cathedra
• Ikon Gallery Limited
• Ixia
• Ledbury Poetry Festival
• Midlands Arts Centre (MAC)
• Motionhouse Dance Theatre
• Multistory
• New Art Gallery Walsall
• New Vic Theatre
• Pentabus Theatre
• Rhubarb Rhubarb
• Royal Shakespeare Company
• SAMPAD
• Talking Birds Theatre Company Ltd
• The Courtyard Centre for the Arts
• The Drum
• Tindal Street Press
• Warwick Arts Centre
• Welsh National Opera

As a side note, most of the reductions in funding here are relatively small. In a few cases they’re  a little more significant – check the spreadsheet for full info.

New to the portfolio:

• 2 FaCeD DaNcE Company Ltd
• Imagineer Productions
• Meadow Arts
• Nofit State Community Circus
• Performances Birmingham
• Sonia Sabri Dance Company
• Writing West Midlands

Current RFOs that won’t be in the National Portfolio

Please be aware that a lack of inclusion in the National Portfolio doesn’t mean these are just going to shut up shop. There’s also a couple of orgs here (flagged up where they’ve alerted me) who’s funding will come from one of those who are in the portfolio. Of course, some of these might well have not made an application, preferring to stick to project funding.

• Audiences Central
• B Arts
• Bilston Craft Gallery (although they’re part of Wolverhampton Arts and Museums Service)
• Black Voices
• Blue Eyed Soul Dance Company
• Chitraleka Dance Company
• Contemporary Glass Society
• Designer Maker West Midlands
• Foursight Theatre
• Hereford Photography Festival
• Ludlow Assembly Rooms
• Made
• Malvern Theatres Trust
• Open Theatre Company
• Rideout (Creative Arts For Rehabilitation)
• Shindig (which is now covered by Live & Local, so they’re fine)
• Sound It Out
• Theatre Absolute
• Vivid
• Writers in Prison Network

Links elsewhere:

• Arts Council England’s official info page
• Statement from DCMS/Jeremy Hunt
• A Google Doc showing all National Portfolio Organisations
• Before the official announcement was made there was plenty coming through on Twitter
• Clare Edwards is looking to gather feedback about Sound It Out “from those who have been involved or been touched by the work of SIO. Even if it doesn’t help their cause it might be useful to gather a bit of feedback for the company in these circumstances”.
• Birmingham Jazz – Joint Birmingham Bid Secures Arts Council Funding
• The British Journal of Photography reports that Rhubarb Rhubarb’s funding won’t quite cover their existing activities. Fundraising and new ways of working required
• D’log’s round-up
• Catherine Edwards has blogged about the status of various writing and theatre organisations
• Katy Raines at Indigo has blogged about the position regarding audience development organisations
• The Guardian have been doing a good rolling news update thing, covering the whole of the country. They’ve been doing some visualisations too.
• The Birmingham Post’s article is here

I’ll keep on updating this post as and when I can. If I’ve made any errors (which isn’t unlikely) then please let me know and I’ll correct them.

Punch are offering between £500 – £3000 through their BASS Commissions fund for artists to create new work in music, dance, spoken word and theatre.

Here’s the themes that they’re wanting commissioned pieces to explore;

Musical Revolutionaries: – artists who have changed the face of Black music

Promoting the next generation – what is the next big thing?

Showcases for heroes in the emergence of Dubstep, Hip Hop, Afrobeat Jazz.

May the Circle be Unbroken: Sounds that have made the soundtrack to changes in society such as Steel Pulse or Gospel singers

Spins and Flips: revolutions on the dance floor

Transformations: can you through words imagine new ways to present work or new stages to present it

There’s also a BASS Talent Award to be claimed, in association with Aspire 4u. Young people aged between 16-24 will have the opportunity to produce a specially commissioned performance, with an award of up to £1000.

For more information and how to apply, visit the Punch website. Deadline for applications is 12 noon on 14 February 2011.