Introduction
Ongoing open calls for travel grants will occur up until end of 2018; artists and cultural operators living and working in the Euro-Arab region who wish to undertake collaborative projects satisfying the criteria below are invited to apply.
Both the Roberto Cimetta Fund and Valletta 2018 see freedom of mobility as essential to the development of the arts and strongly support the right of the artist to travel freely. In the context of Valletta’s title of European Capital of Culture 2018, where Valletta is physically and culturally a crossroads and meeting point in the centre of the Mediterranean, this fund aims to aid mobility, communication, collaboration and exchange between diverse cultures and to contribute to local, community participation in the arts in the broader context of the Euro-Arab geographical zone.
The current call is launched on 1st June 2017 for one month; the Cimetta Fund will programme a series of calls up until December 2018.
Applications can be made in Arabic, English or French.
General Roberto Cimetta Fund Criteria
The following general criteria apply to the fund:
iii. Travel can take place as soon as the call opens but in this case the applicant runs the risk of paying for travel without guarantee of the success of the application;
vii. Applications must be made by individuals rather than organisations. Only three members of a group can apply for a grant concerning the same project;
viii. The fund will only be granted to any one individual three times in total;
xii. The Roberto Cimetta Fund and the Valletta 2018 Foundation request that grantees send 5 to 10 photos (hd), within the 3 weeks of their return to their home country. These photos will be used by the Fund/Foundation for promotional purposes, free of pertaining rights.
Specific Valletta 2018 Criteria
The following specific criteria apply to the fund:
Schedule
The open call will operate on a quarterly basis, where applications are reviewed every three months. Applicants will be advised of the results of their applications no later than two months following the close of the respective call.
For example, the first call will open on 1st March 2017 and will remain open until 31st March 2017. Applicants will be advised of the results of this call by 1st June 2017. At the same time, the second round of the call will open on 1st June 2017 and will remain open until 30th June 2017. Results will be announced in September.
Any funds left unused following the results of a round of the call will be passed on to the next round, however funds will not be passed on from year to year.
Administration and Evaluation
The call will be administered by the Roberto Cimetta Fund, however evaluation will be carried out jointly by the Fund and the Valletta 2018 Foundation.
Funds will be released to successful applicants after travel and upon submission of proof of travel and written report.
Rules
The following rules apply to the fund:
iii) Dates in the schedule must be respected and complied with in full; failure to do so may result in disqualification.
Further Information
More details on the call can be found on www.cimettafund.org and www.valletta2018.org.
The overall Valletta 2018 themes are:
Island Stories
What’s island life really like, anyway? We may be able to drive across the whole of Malta or Gozo in a single morning, but it doesn’t mean we’ve seen it all. Indeed, a closer look at life on the Island soon reveals that there’s more than one narrative at play.
One side of the island story goes that Malta’s a small, loud, emotional island where you can never escape your neighbour’s gaze and where your family’s always just around the corner bearing either good news, bad news, enough food for a week, or all three. So living on our Islands is often seen as a domestic drama, with a dose of tragi-comedy that’s hard to resist. The flip-side to that view is that Malta happens to be one of the most densely populated countries in the world – a fact that brings to the fore issues of over-crowding and a growing concern over space and what to do with it.
How to better explore and reconcile the various narratives that play out in both Malta and Gozo is a question that’s constantly evolving. Certainly, community spaces and the image of the open sea play a big role in our journey towards imagining better solutions – for when private spaces aren’t easy to come by, the Maltese turn to community spaces for company, and to the sea for air to breathe.
The narratives that Island Stories seeks to draw out portray vivid, timely pictures of life on our shores – its realities, its communities and the spaces they use, of how old spaces are, or could be, utilized for new things, and of how to create new spaces inside which one may appreciate tradition.
Future Baroque
Future Baroque is about a way of life; it’s an extravagance and theatricality that’s part and parcel of our daily rhythms. It means colour and ornamentation, exaggerated gestures and actions; spectacle is the central philosophy of Future Baroque.
Our capital city, Baroque at heart, and layered with a succession of diverse stylistic interventions across time, is a backdrop which tells stories about our history and culture even when the hustle and bustle of daily activity won’t stop to listen.
Contemporary Malta speaks the language of the Baroque as loudly as its architecture. Today, communities engage with the fabric of the city as it is developed and rethought across time, making Valletta a stage where life and ideas are constantly evolving, settling and re-shaping themselves.
Future Baroque contains a kind of spirituality that’s suspended somewhere between the traditional and the contemporary. The backdrop of Valletta is enriched by the necessity of ritual; the colourful ornaments and banners that line the streets to celebrate our famous karnival and the capital’s own festi, or feasts, may boast of material riches, but they also create spontaneous soundscapes of revelry and joy. Behind the clinking of jewellery and the honking of new cars, and in the blasting of loud speakers and the chanting of prayers through the streets, might reside our plain and simple tendency to make noise. But beyond this is a newer, ever-growing need that’s married to our old sense of spectacle – a need to make our voices heard over and above the noise of the city.
Voyages
Thanks to its harbours, Valletta has always been a melting pot of different cultures. And Malta’s ancient heritage, with Arabic roots that stand alongside a European past and present, combined with a strategic geographic location which place it right between Europe and Africa, translate into a unique capital city – a space that’s able to host meaningful encounters with and between its close neighbours, both in and beyond the Mediterranean.
Our capital is no stranger to surges of conflict and resistance: Valletta is a city surrounded by fortified bastions, built for warding off external attacks and for celebrating victory within. Even now, the city stands inside a wider global context that’s marked by growing political instability, and which brings into sharp relief issues of violence, exile and migration.
Valletta 2018 is an opportunity to celebrate life and creativity in our capital while nurturing vital dialogue; it provides a space in which to challenge dominant perspectives, and extends a hand of friendship to artists and creatives working under threat. An openness to different cultures is vital for a healthy community, and as we strive to recreate a sense of belonging in an age of cultural diversity, we have the power to give diverse communities a platform for expression and the necessary networks to support meaningful exchange.
Submitting ...
Saving ...
Any applications related to this entity, will also be automatically deleted.
