Your Chance to Reimagine the Arts and Our Next Strategic Plan
As Canada’s public arts funder, the Canada Council for the Arts is proud to support the creation and sharing of the arts through our investments in Canadian artists and arts organizations.
As we embark on a new 5-year strategic plan we want to hear from you, to shape a plan that reflects the arts sector’s current reality and looks ahead to how the Council can continue its support and also help to reimagine the arts for the benefit of all Canadians.
Transcript
Bringing the arts to life, Canada Council for the Arts
It inspires us.
It stirs our imagination; feeds our creativity and sets us in motion.
It takes us places we never thought possible.
It is freedom, experimentation, pain and joy.
It creates new myths and reinvents old ones.
It soothes the weary and offers us hope; touches our very souls.
It breaks new ground, breaks down walls, and brings us together.
Art connects us with ourselves and drives us forward.
Telling our stories and giving us voice.
Art shows us who we are.
Arts are part of us all.
The Canada Council’s offices, located in Ottawa, are on the unceded, unsurrendered Territory of the Anishinabe Algonquin Nation whose presence here reaches back to time immemorial. Read our full land acknowledgement here.
The Situation
Art is important. It speaks, creates connections, changes perspectives, inspires positive social change and decolonization, and promotes healing and reconciliation. But in the midst of a global pandemic, many Canadian artists and arts organizations are struggling. The sector’s recovery and its ability to thrive in the years to come will require reflection, dialogue, and the involvement of many.
The Opportunity
By tapping into the insights of Canadians from diverse communities, perspectives, interests, and relationships to the arts, we hope to develop a strategic plan for 2021-26 that enables a resilient, sustainable, and inclusive arts sector, stronger than ever before. The plan will outline the Council’s role and intentions to support these aspirations, by leveraging our mandate, resources and efforts over the next 5 years.
Our last strategic plan was launched in 2016. Since that time, the Council has increased its overall support to artists and arts organizations and has made important investments in digital, international promotion and Indigenous arts. The new plan will guide the Council through the next five years, a critical time for the arts as it emerges from the global COVID-19 pandemic.
A Message from the Director and CEO
Today, we have the responsibility of reimagining the arts. We need to reimagine better conditions for artistic creation, dissemination and remuneration. We need to reimagine more resilient, inclusive arts organizations with even greater attendance and support. We need to reimagine an arts sector determined to eliminate racism and discrimination in every form, and the legacy of colonialism. We need to reimagine the arts’ rightful place in the conversations that shape our future. And we need to reimagine, through the arts, a greener and more just and equitable world.
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The Process and What We Heard
As part of the development of its 2021-2026 Strategic Plan, the Council undertook a broad engagement process with its stakeholders throughout 2020 to learn about the current arts landscape in Canada and what stakeholders think the Council should consider for its upcoming Strategic Plan. The process provided artists and arts organizations, among others, the opportunity to share their views and was designed to ensure a diversity of voices was heard. These included youth, Indigenous peoples, culturally diverse groups, Deaf and disability groups, and official language minority communities, from across Canada, including the North. Input was collected through an online engagement survey tool, a series of dialogue sessions, written submissions, and additional public opinion research.
Other ways to engage
