CREATIVE EUROPE DESK UK

WHAT WE DO AND HOW WE HELP

Our aim is to make Creative Europe more accessible to UK professionals. With offices based at the British Film Institute, British Council, Creative Scotland and Welsh Government, we work with our partners to reach out to new audiences in all four nations of the UK and provide support to applicants looking to secure funding for their projects.

Our activity over the final two years of the programme has been wide ranging and 2019 saw us participate in events across the length and breadth of the country. These events ranged from the Celtic Media Festival in Aviemore and one-to-one consultations in Dundee, to organising a Culture Beneficiary Gathering in Birmingham, European Co-Production Weekender in Leeds and an animation workshop in Cardiff, or participating in the Agor Drysau performing arts festival in Aberystwyth, collaborating with Docs Ireland in Belfast and co-hosting an International Partnerships Seminar in Dundalk.

Towards the end of 2019 we decided to hold the third edition of our cross-sector conference in the digital space. TRANSFORM! brought together a range of cultural and audiovisual voices from across Europe for a month of discussions, interviews and predictions. To date the site has attracted over 3,000 visitors from 80 different countries.

Little did we know then that just a few months later we would be delivering all of our promotional activity this way due to the restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic. The lockdown encouraged us to work together on UK-wide activity delivering seminars, case studies and gatherings from our homes and through various online platforms in order to continue encouraging the UK’s creative, cultural and audiovisual organisations and companies to expand their networks and collaborate with their peers across Europe. As the programme neared its end in 2020 and the outcome of the negotiations meant that the UK would not be participating in the new edition of programme, we focused our efforts on a legacy campaign which highlighted the economic, social and cultural impacts the programme has made in the UK, both on a national and regional level. In addition to the second edition of our ‘Impact of Creative Europe in the UK’ report we also produced publications and video interviews featuring testimonials from beneficiaries ‘in their own words’.

We are keen to see the spirit of international collaboration continue now that the UK has left the EU and we know that many of you feel the same. We wish you every success in these endeavours.

Many thanks The Creative Europe Desk UK team

Participants at the inaugural European Co-Production Weekender in Leeds in 2019.