Major funding success

Boost to the arts in Cornwall with funding from Arts Council England

Arts Council England has announced its National Portfolio Organisation (NPO) grant funding for 2023-2026, to nine arts organisation in the county. Newlyn Art Gallery & The Exchange, already an NPO, secured a commitment of £1,105,251 in revenue funding over the three years to 2026. The funding will enable us to continue to offer a wide and varied exhibition programme of the highest quality across our two sites, as well as actively supporting the creativity and wellbeing of the wider community.

James Green, Director of Newlyn Art Gallery & The Exchange said: “This funding, and the continued support of Arts Council England, will enable us to deliver a programme that expands on our Community Curated programming, making community-curated main gallery exhibitions a consistent strand of our next three year’s work. We will also be able to address issues that our communities and partners identify as urgent.”

To apply for the funding we submitted plans for the three-year period, based on our four key areas, Well-Being, Hyper Local & Internationally Connected, Artist Activism, and Creativity In Education. The good news comes on the back of a successful three-year partnership with Arts Council Collection enabling us to work with Newlyn School, and Mounts Bay Academy; LGBTQIA+ young people with the Intercom Trust; a group referred through social prescribing networks; Black Voices Cornwall, and young dads, through the charity WILD Young Parents. In addition, our Paul Hamlyn-funded teachers’ CPDL programme has led to more than 80 artworks from national collections being loaned to 10 schools on Scilly and across West Cornwall.

Miranda Bird, Chair of the Gallery said: “I am delighted that we have secured a further three year’s support from Arts Council England. This demonstrates how highly they value the work James and the team have done to reach communities that were not previously engaged with the arts. This new funding will allow that work to continue and for the gallery to reach even more people, both in the gallery, and with exciting new off-site programming, making our work relevant to the lives of a much broader cross-section of people.”

James Green explained: “Our work will be characterised by deeper, more explicit relationships with our communities, many in our immediate locality.  However, we recognise that the greatest impacts may often be achieved through national and international partnerships. As a direct result of this funding, our programmes will bring communities in Cornwall into direct engagement with their peers across the world. Closer to home, our proximity to the sea and our work on the low-lying Isles of Scilly, highlight the urgency of our response to the climate crisis. The location of the Newlyn Tidal Observatory, within sight of the gallery, has fascinated artists and been the inspiration for commissions that explore climate change through the century of data captured there. We will launch a programme of artist’s action, as part of our commitment to social responsibility within our existing programme.”

We have also just launched our redeveloped community space, and creative multi-purpose learning studio at The Exchange. Designed as a functional art classroom, digital studio, and inspiring social space to gather, The Engine Room aims to be a hub of creativity at the heart of gallery, for use by schools, community groups, or for creative meet ups. The blended digital functionality allows users to reach people in the space and those joining in remote locations, such as the gallery’s Tea, Cake & Art programme of creative workshops for older, isolated people. Earlier this year, our bid to host a Dash Future Curator was successful, with a d/Deaf disabled curatorial internship planned for 2023-25.