Hannah shares this latest news from Independent Arts. Ed
Local charity Independent Arts has been awarded an £85,000 grant from Arts Council England to fund their new project Time & Tide.
The Celebrating Age grant will fund an exciting Island-wide programme of participatory arts to increase older people’s engagement with cultural organisations and address social isolation.
Promoting older people’s engagement in arts
Independent Arts has a 30-year history of supporting and promoting older people’s engagement in arts activities. Working in partnership with Age UK, Southern Housing Group, local museums and libraries, Time and Tide will provide new opportunities for older people to attend creative workshops, curate pop-up exhibitions and take part in cultural site visits, enabling them to experience and participate in high-quality arts and heritage activities.
Through the charity’s involvement with the Age Friendly Island initiative a training and development programme will be offered to all partners to ensure their museums are welcoming places to older people.
A dynamic Islandwide programme
Kate Ball, Chief Executive of Independent Arts said:
“The Isle of Wight has long suffered from a lack of investment in its arts and cultural provision. The Celebrating Age grant will enable Independent Arts to create a dynamic Island wide programme of participation in beautiful high quality arts initiatives.
“All our projects are aimed at inclusion, and we hope that in our thirtieth anniversary year, with this timely support from the Arts Council our project, Time & Tide will continue to build on our core aims of engaging the most isolated and disadvantaged members of our community with the extraordinarily rich arts and cultural heritage that is such a unique part of our Island history.”
The importance of arts and cultural activities
Phil Gibby, Area Director, South West, Arts Council England, said:
“We believe that arts and cultural activities can make a huge difference in everyone’s lives – and even more so when those people are at greater risk of isolation.
“Celebrating Age recognises the positive role of arts and culture in overcoming social isolation for older people; supporting them to be more engaged in their local communities, to meet people and to have fun.”
The Time & Tide project will launch in October on International Older Persons Day and run until 2019.
