The Connections Through Culture (CTC) grant programme awards up to PHP 700,000 supporting collaborations tackling climate change, diversity and inclusion
18 January 2024, Manila – The British Council is thrilled to announce its support for ten (10) creative collaborative projects between the United Kingdom and the Philippines through Connections Through Culture (CTC). The programme has provided over GBP 645,000 in support for artists and arts organisations from across the UK and East Asia, covering Australia, Japan, New Zealand, China, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines.
The Connections Through Culture grants programme is designed to nurture fresh cultural partnerships between the Philippines and the UK. The grant will support projects across a variety of art forms, with focus on two distinct areas: diversity and inclusion and addressing climate change.
“We’re excited to support these innovative collaborations between the Philippines and the UK. We have seen the exceptional talents of Filipinos and we look forward to supporting them through this grant,” said Mich Dulce, Head of Arts at the British Council in the Philippines.
The British Council’s Connections Through Culture Grant Programme 2023 stands as a testament to the organisation’s commitment to cultivating international artistic connections and promoting the exchange of ideas and creativity between the UK and East Asia.
Projects supported by the grants may employ diverse approaches, including but not limited to art residencies, exhibitions, performances and showcases, publications, webinars, and conferences.
Projects supported from the Philippines
The British Council will be supporting the following collaborations and projects for this round of the CTC grant:
Listen: Can you hear the fish cry? An embodied audio project with writers in the UK and the Philippines platforming voices impacted by Climate Crisis
UK: Michelle Roche
Philippines: Binhi Creatives
This innovative project fosters a cross-cultural dialogue between artists in Bacolod and the UK, focusing on climate crisis narratives through experiential audio drama. Led by Michelle Roche, co-founder of Play Inside, the project aims to amplify underrepresented voices affected by climate change, particularly women.
Inspiring Creative Action to Help Artisan Communities Surmount Climate Change Induced Disaster
UK: League of Artisans CIC
Philippines: Twinkle Ferraren
This project aims to develop a practical toolkit for textile artisans in disaster-prone areas, drawing on experiences in Kerala, India, Sri Lanka, and Peru. The toolkit focuses on pre-disaster planning and post-disaster recovery, aiming to support mainly women-led creative enterprises.
Song and Sovereignty: Food Justice and the Preservation of Local Farming Culture
UK: Tilted Axis Press
Philippines: Gantala Press, Inc
The project seeks to preserve the literary culture of women in the Philippines amidst changing farming practices due to climate change and political instability. Through partnerships with organisations, fieldwork, and community events, the project will record folk songs, poetry, and recipes. Literary translation workshops and collaborations with Filipino migrants in the UK will contribute to diverse publications highlighting the intersection of literature, food justice, and cultural preservation.
Wild Patch
UK: Ligaya Salazar
Philippines: Derek Tumala
The collaborative multi-site project exploring the symbolism of weeds, challenging societal norms and othering. Through workshops, film screenings, and reading groups in the Philippines and the UK, the project questions the perception of weeds as ‘other,’ drawing parallels with queerness and diasporic communities.
Biosignals
UK: Dr. Amy Holt
Philippines: UPOU-FICS, Dr. Diego S. Maranan
“Biosignals” is a collaborative project between the Philippines, the UK, and New Zealand (AwhiWorld), uniting diverse perspectives to create a planet-wide new media artwork. The project aims to collect, process, and transmit signals from local plant life at each site, connecting isolated entities and addressing challenges posed by climate change and biodiversity loss.
Performing Diwata: locating ecotransfeminism in precolonial Philippine mythology
UK: Giulia Casalini
Philippines: Ram Botero
This collaborative Research and Development project, inspired by the ‘Diwata’ image series, tackles the theme of precolonial Philippine mythology whilst intersecting its legacy in contemporary society. It will produce a performance for camera, a written piece, and an audio file, and includes performance training, research trips to Davao and Nabunturan, interviews with indigenous communities, and a two-day performance filming.
God Save The Queers, Bless The Badings
UK: INFERNO LONDON
Philippines: Elephant
This collaboration will culminate in a month-long Queer Festival in June 2024, hosted by ELEPHANT and INFERNO LONDON, that aims to platform the spectrum of religious experiences through a queer perspective by interpolating activism in alternative queer art and nightlife spaces.
Where The Flowers Bloom: Transforming the Colonial study and artistry of Philippine-U.K. Botanicals through weaving identity in the retelling of Biodiversity amidst the Ecological Crisis
UK: Beatriz Gemperle
Philippines: TAYO House of Culture & Creativity
A collaborative project that aims to deconstruct and reimagine the colonial study of Philippine botanicals by weaving Filipino Identity such as myths, patterns, stories, relationships, and rituals into a collaborative process of botanical preservation. The project will weave local and indigenous understanding in immersive art pieces exhibited alongside archival botanicals, crafting new educational material co-created by artists and scientific institutions.
The Possibility of Forests: Twin Installations in a Celtic Rainforest and a Tropical Cloud Forest
UK: Curtis Cresswell
Philippines: Mica Cabildo
Connecting Celtic rainforests in Britain with tropical cloud forests in the Philippines, the project explores climate-sensitive biomes through interactive media, art, and ecology practices.
Comics Create a Better World
UK: Lakes Arts Festivals
Philippines: Komiket
Building on a 2021 collaboration, the project focuses on exchanging knowledge between UK and Filipino creators to engage children and young people in the process of creating their own original work on climate change. Key elements include selecting creators from underrepresented communities in the UK and the Philippines, providing virtual training sessions, and mentoring the creators for workshops with young people. The project culminates in two creators, one from each country, participating in each other’s festivals, conducting workshops, and exhibiting their climate change-themed comics.
For more information, visit https://www.britishcouncil.ph/programmes/arts/connections-through-culture-grantee-2023.
About the British Council
The British Council is the UK’s international organisation for cultural relations and educational opportunities. We support peace and prosperity by building connections, understanding and trust between people in the UK and countries worldwide. We do this through our work in arts and culture, education and the English language. We work with people in over 200 countries and territories and are on the ground in more than 100 countries. In 2021–22 we reached 650 million people.
Connections Through Culture
The Connections Through Culture grants programme is designed to nurture fresh cultural partnerships between East Asia and the UK. These grants are instrumental in supporting new ideas and collaborations from artists and cultural organisations at any stage of development. The grants support new connections, exchanges, and collaborations.
