Galway City Council axes arts grants in the ‘Capital of Culture’

Bradley Bytes – a sort of political column with Dara Bradley

The amount of money awarded by Galway City Council in arts grants this year has been cut by about 6%.

Some €425,000 was distributed to arts organisations last year, when they were late receiving their cheques.

This year it has been confirmed that the grants will total €400,000 or €25,000 less than in 2020, when Galway held the Capital of Culture title.

Cynics might say that the extra 6% in funding last year was thrown at arts organisations in order to keep them quiet about the delay in distributing the funding.

Now, the local authority has reverted to the pre-2020 figure, not that you’d know from the press release issued by City Hall last week.

Funding to some groups was cut by half. Galway Choral Association is down €1,000 to €1,000; Galway Art Club is down €500 to €500; and An Taibhdhearc is down €1,000 to €1,000.

Brú Theatre lost 33% of its City Council funding, down by €1,000 to €2,000. Druid also took a €1,000 hit and was allocated €28,000 for 2021.

Macnas has suffered the biggest cut – it’s down by €5,000 from €24,000 last year to just €19,000 this year.

It was not all cuts. Westside Arts Festival was among the groups that got more money this year – up €600 to €3,000. But axing the overall allocation of arts grants is not a clever move by the local authority of a city that benefits so much off the backs of artists’ endeavours.

(Photo: Gilgamesh, a Galway 2020 commission by Macnas, which has had its arts grants cut by the City Council).
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