Friday, 25th November 2022

Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, Catherine Martin, and Minister for the Environment, Climate, Communications and Transport, Eamon Ryan, today launched a €3 million fund to support imaginative creative projects that build awareness around climate change and empower citizens to make meaningful behavioural changes.

Applications for the scheme will open in December 2022 at www.creativeireland.gov.ie

The successful teams will include experts from the climate science, community engagement as well as the arts and culture sectors.

The ‘Creative Climate Action II: Agents of Change’ programme is a joint initiative of the Creative Ireland Programme and the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications.

The programme is calling for creative projects which address the following:

• Encourage everyone to rethink their lifestyles
• Connect with the biodiversity crisis
• Enable a fair and just transition in making lifestyle changes
• Assist citizens to understand the climate crisis
• Adapt to the effects of climate change

There are two funding strands:

1.Spark

This strand is for those looking to pilot a new idea, or who want to deliver a creative project at a local level. Organisations, community groups and creative groups who can inspire, build knowledge, skills and confidence are welcome to apply for grants between €20,000 and €50,000.

2.Ignite

This funding strand is suitable for those with experience in delivering public engagement projects at scale, and are proposing durational projects with extensive public participation. Applicants may be eligible for grants between €50,000 and €250,000.

Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, Catherine Martin, said: “In 2021 Ireland’s Climate Action Plan outlined the steps that needed to be taken to create a more sustainable future for Ireland. That plan was ambitious and called on all sectors of society including the creative community to play their part in achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. I am proud that the Irish government has such an explicit link between national cultural policy and climate policy. The first Creative Climate Action projects have done much to capture the public imagination, mobilise communities and show how to make the changes needed. Climate change is humanity’s most important challenge and we need creative projects such as these to galvanise positive action”.

Minister for Environment, Climate and Communications, Eamon Ryan, said: “Significant cultural and systemic change across all of society is needed to address the climate crisis. This change can only be achieved through fully exploring avenues for innovative and creative ways to inspire people to take action. The cultural sector has a unique part to play in this culture change and I look forward to seeing the exciting ways projects funded through the next phase of the Creative Climate Action Programme will engage people.”

For more information please go to https://youtu.be/ZcmVRmI4mXw

ENDS

Press and Information Office

An Roinn Turasóireachta, Cultúir, Ealaíon, Gaeltachta, Spóirt agus Meán

Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media

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Notes to the Editor

Creative Climate Action Fund

The first fund was launched in July 2021 by the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media in collaboration with the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications. It supported 15 pilot projects from around the country. This included dramatic light installations that demonstrated rising sea levels, urban pollinator paths, immersive agricultural programmes in Dingle and Tipperary, decarbonising projects in Limerick and Waterford and the regeneration of the repair and reuse culture in Westmeath.

Project partners included artists and the wider creative sector, climate scientists, local authorities and community groups. The key objective of Creative Climate Action is to provide support for creative and cultural based projects that engage the public about the behaviour changes society will have to make to address climate change.

It is part of the Programme for Government commitment to “support Creative Ireland in its ‘Engaging the Public on Climate Change through the Cultural and Creative Sectors’ initiative.”

In November 2021, the Creative Ireland programme announced fifteen successful recipients of the inaugural Creative Climate Action Fund. For a full list of Creative Climate Action projects please go to https://www.creativeireland.gov.ie/en/blog/creative-climate-action-fund-projects/

Highlights included:

For the month of April 2022, the Callan Energy Store hosted a series of talks, discussions, workshops and film screenings – all with one goal: to improve the energy efficiency of the town. In 1907 ‘The Callan Powerhouse’, was a locally-owned electricity generating company that provided electricity to a dozen local businesses, and provided public street lighting, long before such things illuminated other rural towns. This project aimed to recharge the idea of locally-produced and owned electricity generation, and empower citizens to start making the changes we all need to see. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4SK_HR3zDQ

Línte na Farraige is a collaborative project that highlights the issues of rising sea levels due to climate change. Artists Timo Aho and Pekka Niittyvirta, have created light installations at the Spanish Arch in Galway and Wexford Harbour which represent future sea levels as predicted by international research agencies such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Further installations can be seen in Dún Laoghaire and Balbriggan next year.  The project was led by scientists Zoë Roseby (from Trinity College), Maeve Upton (Maynooth University), Gerard McCarthy (Maynooth University), and Jamie Mathews (Imperial College London), as well as the Dublin Climate Action Regional Office. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjJ3SGGzWu4

Field Exchange was presented by Brookfield Farm in collaboration with artists Deirdre O’Mahony and John Gerrard. The project was launched on the Summer Solstice, 21st June 2022, and culminated in a conference and Harvest Feast on 16th September 2022.

Over the summer a group of farmers, experts, interested public and artists met at exchange tables led by the National Organic Training Skillnets. These Field Exchanges brought together art, food, and agriculture and created opportunities for the public, artists, farmers, scientists, and experts from relevant fields to congregate and exchange ideas about how to combat climate change, as well as about production and consumption. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SJs0rdJQes