Fremantle Arts Centre secures Australia Council grant

The City of Fremantle’s Fremantle Arts Centre has been awarded a $100,000 grant from the Australia Council for the Arts to implement Groundwork, a new initiative to bolster the careers of Western Australian artists.

Groundwork will provide six practitioners with a studio space and a weekly wage while they participate in an intensive, three-month creative incubator designed to support the creation of new work, develop their arts business acumen and engage in critical response and review.

Facilitated by FAC and its partner organisations, Groundwork will provide access to a range of meaningful resources and support, including structured professional development, networking with senior artists and arts managers, access to studio space, support with installation, production and presentation of works as well as cross-industry collaboration.

Fremantle Arts Centre Director Anna Reece said Groundwork had been developed in response to the significant gap within the Western Australian arts sector for structured, outcome-based capacity building for artists.

“As a creative campus committed to fostering a community of innovation and collaboration, Groundwork harnesses FAC’s existing activities to offer a cohesive and accessible program that maximises opportunity and impact,” Ms Reece said.

“The program is about empowering practitioners and providing them with the resources they require to embrace risk and engage in rigor in their practice.

“We are truly grateful to the Australia Council for the Arts for this grant, enabling us to appropriately and strategically support our cultural ecology.”

While Groundwork is an outcome-based program, it is entirely artist-led, enabling each artist to self-determine the outcome they seek and address the most pressing needs of their practice.

Among the comprehensive range of support, resources and collaborations on offer, artists will have the chance to partake in a series of specially curated think tanks, featuring local and national provocateurs immersed in a conversation about culture, politics, technology and the environment through the lens of artistic practice. 

Recognising the importance of generating writing and scholarship around practice, FAC will also support one piece of long form writing in response to or around each artists’ practice and their work.

In keeping with FAC’s commitment to truth-telling and place-based narrative, Groundwork artists are provided with access to custodians of Nyoongar culture to inform their practice and ground their projects to the Country on which they are made, Whadjuk Nyoongar Boodjar.

Groundwork is open to all practicing emerging and mid-career artists working in a range of artistic disciplines with applications opening on Monday 4 April. The six selected artists will take part in the inaugural program from September to November 2022.

This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body.

For full application details please visit fac.org.au.