Copyright Agency announces recipients of $440k in Cultural Fund grants

Twenty-seven arts organisations have received a total of $439,840 in the latest round of funding from the Copyright Agency’s Cultural Fund, which will also support nine writers’ festivals.

Among the organisations and projects that received funding this round are:

• Adelaide Writers’ Week: $15,000 for writers’ panel sessions
• Agency Projects: $15,000 for UNTOLD: First Nations storytelling, discussion and exchange
• Association for the Study of Australian Literature (ASAL): $20,000 for the ASAL Writers and Critics Program 2024
• Australian Book Review (ABR): $10,000 for political/cultural commentary and review essays in ABR
• Australian Poetry: $14,000 for Australian Poetry Festival 2024
• Australian Rural & Regional News: $6000 for writers’ fees for book reviews and author interviews connected to rural and regional Australia
• Australian Society of Authors: $24,000 for Copyright Agency Developmental Mentorships for Writers and Illustrators
• Blak & Bright First Nations Literary Festival: $10,000 for writers’ panel sessions
• Brisbane Writers Festival: $10,000 for writers’ panel sessions
• Byron Writers Festival: $10,000 for writers’ panel sessions
• Canberra Writers’ Festival: $7500 for writers’ panel sessions
• English Teachers Association of New South Wales: $5500 for ETA Conference 2024: ‘Teaching students to write like writers’
• Express Media: $17,000 for Toolkits 2024—‘Connect’
• Fremantle Press: $18,000 for writers’ fees for ‘Stories from the Heart’, an anthology of Indigenous women’s memoir
• Griffith Review: $20,000 for the Griffith Review Emerging Voices Award 2024
• Guardian Australia: $21,000 for weekly reviews of Australian books
• HEAT magazine: $10,000 for HEAT writers’ fees in 2024
• Island magazine: $15,000 for writers’ fees
• Melbourne Writers Festival: $15,000 for writers’ panel sessions
• Nine Entertainment: $35,000 for SMH Best Young Australian Novelist and Age Book of the Year
• NT Writers Festival: $5000 for writers’ panel sessions
• Red Room Poetry: $22,000 for Poetry Month Showcases 2024
• State Library of NSW: $5000 for writers’ fees for ‘Going places—authors on tour’
• State Library of Queensland: $27,500 for the 2024 QLA David Unaipon Award and Judith Wright Calanthe Award
• Sydney Writers’ Festival: $15,000 for First Nations programming and writers’ panel sessions
• University of Technology Sydney, Creative Writing: $30,000 for writers’ fees for Copyright Agency–UTS New Writer in Residence 2024
• The Walkley Foundation: $14,000 for advancing arts journalism
• WestWords: $25,000 for writers’ fees for the Writers in NSW Regional Schools program
• Writing WA: $12,000 for Love to Read Local Week 2024
• Writing WA—Perth Festival Writers Weekend: $15,000 for writers’ panel sessions.

These grants cover the November 2023 funding round.

In a media release, the Copyright Agency announced changes to the Cultural Fund’s priorities in 2024 and 2025, effective from the first funding round, closing in April this year. ‘As a result of the increasing number of applications and a slightly smaller allocation of funding … grants for Australian organisations will now prioritise support for audience development projects that will grow audiences and readership and sector development support,’ the Copyright Agency said. Fellowships and Create grants will continue to support writers and artists to create new works.

The full list of recipients is on the Copyright Agency website.

Category: Local news