Communities across the Bradford district are being invited to bid for a plethora of new funding opportunities to help them get creative – and to ensure their authentic stories and original, community-led ideas shine.
The Leap, Bradford’s creative people and places programme – which champions community-led arts, culture and heritage – has launched the first of FOUR new funding pots which will offer people of all backgrounds and skills levels the chance to apply for awards from £250 to £10,000 over the coming weeks to help bring their creative ideas to life.
The awards will be open to individuals and organisations, and to artists, facilitators and ideas-makers. A variety of support – including online Q and As and community-based pop up advice sessions – will be available to help people fine tune their applications and ideas.
The first of the new awards programmes, the Radical Social Awards, are open from today (4 September) for applications.
The Radical Social Awards are aimed at young people aged 16-25 who are invited to pitch radical and socially conscious ideas to receive funding and bespoke support. The projects ultimately chosen by an independent panel will get support to develop their ideas. These awards, ranging from £250 to £3,000, are all about harnessing the creative energy and entrepreneurial flair of Bradford’s young population and turning it into amazing new cultural experiences that have a positive impact in Bradford and Keighley’s communities.
Image: The Leap
Previous Radical Social Award winning ideas which have flourished include: Brown Paper Books, a series of community book club meetups and creative spaces which is already discovering and supporting new local authors; T*ts up Fashion, a two-day event held at Bradfords Science and Media Museum which was all about using recycled fabrics to design gender challenging fashion aimed at all body types; and Youth TV, a Bradford based podcast which aims to empower young people and surround them with good role models.
Also being launched in the next few weeks are:
The Pioneer Awards – This fund is about uniquely Bradford commissions, co-commissions and projects with potential for scaling up. Awards of £3,000 to £10,000 are being offered for ambitious arts and culture projects which will create impact for people and places in Bradford and Keighley where engagement with arts and culture is proven to be low. These awards are for people who are motivated to use their time, energy and ideas to tackle social, economic and environmental issues in communities through arts and creativity. Previous award winners have included West Riding, a group of young women from Bradford and Keighley who formed a rock band; Al Asma Al Husna, an arts project which combined Arabic calligraphy, neon lighting and inventive design to co-create three beautiful new light installations in inner city locations; and a pilot project working in Keighley to transform the way libraries embed arts and culture in their spaces.
Image: The Leap
And the Leap’s new programme, the Festival Awards, will also be launched later in the month. This funding pot is open to anyone over the age of 18 who wants to create a new, community based festival or develop an emerging one. Applications can encompass any theme whether it be music, food, rap, dance, spoken word etc. It could also be a festival highlighting or championing a particular issue. Awards of £500 to £10,000 are being offered for festivals relevant to the people and places in Bradford and Keighley where engagement with arts and culture is proven to be low.
The final award opportunity being launched this Autumn is for new Creative Place Partners. This is a chance for community based organisations to work with The Leap to develop their own arts and culture programme, and to act as a conduit to provide financial and non-financial support to their community members. It’s all about the people who know their communities the best, and are trusted by them, helping to nurture and discover the creative talent hidden within them.
Osman Gondal, project operations director at The Leap, says: “As Bradford 2025, the district’s year in the cultural spotlight gets closer, we want to shine our own light on the big opportunities available for our communities through The Leap’s awards programmes.
“Hundreds of group and individuals could benefit from these four very different funding opportunities which we are opening up in the coming weeks.
“It’s an amazing chance for grassroots communities to take the creative power back.
“We know they already have the ideas and will, now they can have the money too to make it happen.
“The Leap is all about championing arts, culture and heritage, and about celebrating the bold, brave, youthful and creative energy in our communities.
“This suite of funding could be a stepping stone for some great community-led ideas to be born, to be developed with The Leap’s help – and to ultimately have a chance to truly shine.
“We want the communities of Bradford to be at the front and centre of Bradford 2025 – and this is a chance for them to start that journey, and to shape their own creative futures long-term. So please watch out for the launch dates – and get applying!”
For more information on any of the new awards programmes, application details and forms, visit www.the-leap.org.uk.
