Creative New Zealand’s support for festivals, residencies, touring, the commissioning of new local work and professional development has recently been highlighted by its latest funding round - offering grants to 27 annually funded arts organisations throughout the country. Announcing the funding decisions of its two boards – the Arts Board and Te Waka Toi – Creative NZ CEO, Elizabeth Kerr, noted that in an overall static funding environment, the boards were able to offer modest increases to most of their emerging ‘New Voices’ organisations to support their consolidation and contribution to the sector. Creative NZ, provides recurrent funding support to a total of 38 professional arts organisations on an annual or three-year basis. In the latest funding round, it considered 27 of these such organisations. This figure marks a 31 per cent increase to recurrently funded organisations, since the inception of the government’s Cultural Recovery Package in May 2000. ‘This year is the final allocation of grants through the Cultural Recovery Package funding and overall, we were able to maintain funding levels,’ Kerr said. ‘The boards supported a number of exciting activities that will benefit the arts sector, provide opportunities for individual artists, develop arts practice, and be enjoyed by New Zealand and overseas audiences,’ she added. The grants, which totalled $5,510,886, were awarded to regional orchestras and theatres, contemporary dance companies, Maori arts organisations, national advocacy and service organisations, and experimental galleries, they are as follows;

Artists’ Alliance ($100,000)

Arts on Tour NZ ($127,000)

Artspace Aotearoa Trust ($265,000)

BATS Theatre ($195,000)

Black Grace Dance Company ($341,000)

Booksellers New Zealand ($132,500)

Capital E: National Theatre for Children ($200,500)

Centre for New Zealand Music Trust(SOUNZ)($146,000)

Christchurch Symphony Orchestra ($425,000)

Dance Aotearoa New Zealand (DANZ) ($200,425)

Downstage Theatre ($460,000)

Footnote Dance Company ($204,000)

Fortune Theatre ($372,500)

Kahurangi New Zealand Maori Dance Trust ($133,700)

Moving Image Centre ($147,657)

Museums Aotearoa ($160,000)

New Zealand Book Council ($140,000)

New Zealand Choral Federation ($135,000)

New Zealand String Quartet ($152,500)

Playmarket ($258,000); Southern Sinfonia ($250,000)

Taki Rua Productions ($305,000)

Tautai Contemporary Pacific Arts Trust ($90,000)

Te Whanau Paneke ($103,000)

Te Whare Tu Taua o Aotearoa ($100,000)

The Physics Room Trust ($137,000)

Wellington Sinfonia ($230,000).