Balkan Incentive Fund for Culture (BIFC)
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26 Jan 2012
Presentation of the Balkan Incentive Fund for Culture (BIFC) and the workshop on applying for a BIFC Grant, by BIFC Regional Hub, Ljubljana, and ECF office representatives
Funding overview
The BIFC Fund awards grants to support collaborative artistic and cultural exchange within, between or with countries of the Western Countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia).
The aim of the grant schemes is to promote Empowerment of People through Art and Culture, Connecting Sources of Knowledge and Linking Policy and Practice. The eligible applicants are independent organisations coming from the region or any other European Union country wanting to collaborate with partners from Western Balkans.
Contemporary art biennial D-O ARK Underground is one of the recent projects funded by BIFC and is organized in Herzegovian town Konjic in order to promote human rights and tolerance. In May 2011, the project partner SCCA-Ljubljana Centre for Contemporary Arts will organize six lectures, where respectable art historians present the development of contemporary art from 1990es until today.
BIFC Regional Hub
The BIFC Regional Hub was launched in 2010 with the financial support of the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia and based on their Platform for South East Europe initiative. The Regional Hub is run by Asociacija, Association of Arts and Culture NGOs and Freelancers. The applicants for BIFC grants pursuing international and regional collaboration with independent art and cultural organisations from the region are welcome to apply for a grant throughout the whole year.
In 2010 BIFC Hub supported 13 projects, in Spring 2011 the film-making workshop Who Is Afraid of the Big Bad Crisis for young film-makers is organised in three cities from the region: Tirana, Skopje and Athens.