The impact of the Creative Europe

programme in the UK – beyond the

direct funding.

A report for the Creative Europe Desk UK in the British Council

January 2018

1
Index

1 Introduction

2 Summary

3 Background

4 The Creative Europe Programme

5 Creative Europe & Soft Power

6 Creative Europe in the UK

7 Evaluating Impact

8 Assessing the impact of Creative Europe in the UK

9 Evidence of Impact

10 Conclusions

11 Future Priorities

Appendix A - Surveys of UK Impacts

Appendix B - The Impacts Workshops

Appendix C - CEDUK Collaborate Day

Appendix D - Case Studies & Testimonials

Appendix E - Interviews

2
1 Introduction
1.1 The brief
The project is designed to assess the impact of Creative Europe (from 2014 until present,
including impacts of the previous programmes Culture and MEDIA since 2007, where
practicable), and in particular its two sub-programmes MEDIA and Culture, in the UK
under the following headings:

Economic Impact
a.  Increase in output and employment

b. Increase in investment

Internationalisation and networks

a. Partnerships

b. Increasing market potential

Innovation and skills

a. Improving employability

b. Creation of new content and IP

c. New business / management models

Audiences and cultural impact

a.  Audiences

b. Access to high-quality content

Prosperity/influence/attraction
a. How has Creative Europe supported developing cultural relations between UK and
other countries

b. To what extent has Creative Europe realised the profile of the UK’s screen, arts, culture
and heritage sectors?

c. What would have been the impact on the UK had the funding not been received?

1.2 The approach and method

The project was commissioned in October 2017 and a ‘kick off’ meeting took place with
the project’s steering group on the 19th October. The project began with a detailed
analysis of the existing information that Creative Europe Desk UK had requested from
beneficiary organisations around the impact of Creative Europe on their work across both
sub-programmes. This included a mixture of quantitative and qualitative data.

3
The project team considered evidence that has previously been assembled. This
included:

• CEDUK evidence to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee of Enquiry into the impact
of Brexit on the creative industries, tourism and the digital single market in October
2016.

• The findings of the Mid-term Survey of Creative Europe impacts in the UK, that brings
together surveys of both the MEDIA sub-programme and the Culture sub-programme.

• The Creative Scotland survey of prospective sectoral impacts arising from Brexit.

• The results of two impact workshops organised by CEDUK in Manchester and London
in September 2017.

• The record of the CEDUK Collaborate Day which brought together over 100 creative
and audiovisual professionals and gave a platform for Creative Europe project
participants to present their experiences of working with Creative Europe. The event
took place in Rich Mix (East London) in July 2017.

• Research into the soft power impacts of cultural and creative investment.

• Case studies and testimonials assembled by CEDUK.

• Face to face or skype consultations with UK beneficiaries of Creative Europe.

This work was supplemented with a series of skype interviews during November and
December 2017 and listed in the Appendices.

4
2 Summary

2.1 Background
Creative Europe was established by the European Commission in 2014. It builds on two
previous programmes: MEDIA – supporting the audiovisual industry, and the Culture Pro-
gramme supporting cultural and creative sectors. Creative Europe is the only EU multi-
annual programme directly targeting the cultural and creative sectors (CCS) with a total
budget of €1.46 billion for the period 2014-2020. The Programme has two overarching
policy objectives: safeguard and promote cultural and linguistic diversity and Europe's
cultural heritage, and strengthen the competitiveness of the European cultural and cre-
ative sectors.

UK organisations and businesses have consistently engaged with Creative Europe, play-
ing central roles in transnational partnerships and networks, and with high success rates
in applications for funding to both the Culture and MEDIA sub-programmes. Surveys have
consistently demonstrated overwhelming sectoral support for Creative Europe and for
continuing participation in the programme.

The current position is that UK partners will continue to have full access to Creative Eu-
rope until the end of the current programme in 2020, and existing projects will be seen
through to completion. However, it is becoming clear that Brexit is already constraining
the participation of UK organisations in Creative Europe. The UK’s cultural and creative
sectors (CCS) are very successful, generating £91.8 billion GVA for the UK in 2016 and
with a year-on-year growth rate of 7.6% and supporting 6% of the UK’s workforce. Brexit
will impact on the sector in a variety of ways, with the impact of constrained freedom of
movement and an increased administrative burden to the fore of current concerns.

The Creative Europe Desk UK (CEDUK) has assembled evidence to demonstrate the likely
impact of leaving the Creative Europe programme, and to inform future plans in this even-
tuality. This evidence gathering exercise has involved a wide range of UK organisations
and individuals who are Creative Europe beneficiaries, using surveys, symposia, inter-
views and desk research. This evidence has been assembled in an impacts framework
that reflects the priorities of both the Creative Europe programme and of the UK benefi-
ciaries.

5
2.2 Creative Europe in the UK
From 2014-2016 Creative Europe has supported 283 organisations and distributed 115
British films in other European countries with grants totalling €57 million. In the Culture
sub programme, 156 organisations have received a total of €18.2 million. The majority of
this was awarded to organisations working in partnership across European countries to
increase capacity in the cultural sector. In 2014-2015, UK cooperation partners were
involved in almost half of all Cooperation Projects. Creative Europe proved critical in
helping secure additional investment for 52% of MEDIA recipients and 68% of culture
beneficiaries.

The UK received €28.5m MEDIA funding in 2104-16. €16m in grants went to support 82
UK companies and 53 UK cinemas in the Europa Cinemas network. There was €12.5m in
investment to support the distribution of British films in other European countries.
Between 2014 and 2016, Creative Europe supported distribution of 108 films in over 30
countries, generating over 53 million cinema admissions. In its first year, the UK was
awarded nearly 25% of the available funds for the MEDIA audience development scheme
and 22% of funds awarded to distributors and sales agents were used on British films.

In the Culture sub-programme €11.3m was allocated to 93 UK organisations for

collaborative, transnational projects 2014-16. Success rates were well above average for
the biggest funding strand of Cooperation Projects (19% as opposed to a 13% EU
average). In the case of European Platform projects, 25% were led by UK organisations
and 75% involved UK organisations over this period. Culture sub-programme
beneficiaries were able to leverage match-funding worth 83% of the amount of their
Creative Europe grant, taking all sources of match income into account.

2.3 The Impact of Creative Europe in the UK

The research has shown that the impact of Creative Europe on UK organisations goes far
beyond the obvious benefits of inward investment, reaching new markets, and overseas
influence. Almost every aspect of the CCS in UK has benefited from participation in
Creative Europe.

a. Internationalising Culture
• International partnership development, co-production and collaboration is a feature of
many of the UK Creative Europe partnerships. This includes establishing production
partnerships that function independently of Creative Europe. There has, in some cases,
been a sharing of costs and risk on new productions that makes them feasible. In some
cases new international partnerships form around participating organisations as well as
the partners themselves.

6
• Culture sub-programme beneficiaries emphasised the value of international mobility and
exchange. Four fifths of CEDUK survey respondents pointed to Creative Europe being
effective in internationalising staff and their organisation. The centrality of transnational
exchange, dialogue and mobility had transformative impacts on perceptions of different
countries and cultures at a local level, and within professional sectors.

• A significant minority of respondents to the CEDUK Culture survey are members of a

European Network supported by Creative Europe and of these, four fifths indicated
membership addressed the needs of both their organisation and the wider UK CCS.

• There are many examples where UK partners’ involvement in Creative Europe led to
their expansion into international markets as well as internationalising programmes in
the UK. Artists have been offered performances around the world as a result of project
work.

• Creative Europe funded market events have been attended by around half of the MEDIA
respondents increasing access to collaborators, buyers and financiers.

• Project durations of up to 4 years have allowed for the fulfilment of the complete cycle
of project development, production, and international distribution and have also
translated into opportunities for new investment partnerships and project initiatives.

• Consultation reveals a range of ‘soft power’ impacts, including: the overcoming of

barriers to transnational working and the establishing of trust between partners; longer
term projects translating into deeper and more sustainable international links; and
increasing the credibility and capacity of UK organisations to work internationally.

b. Innovation, Research & Development

• Creative Europe markets and events have been the trigger for co-productions, pre-sales
and distribution deals. This has had positive impacts on the quality and innovativeness
of the work of organisations, and has in some cases scaled up work to a level where
innovation is possible.

• Projects provide a platform for artists to create and present work around Europe. Artists
are being commissioned by other partners to create work as a result of projects. The
impact on artists and ‘start up’ companies can be dramatic, such as work produced for
festivals being seen by 200 promoters across the world.

• The focus on knowledge exchange, learning and research in many projects has directly
improved the work of UK organisations and developed R&D skills in their staff teams.
Higher Education collaborations have had impacts that extend beyond the initial project.

• The Creative Europe focus on responding to the digital shift is present in a number of
UK projects that have developed new or enhanced approaches to digital technology.
The research revealed strong support for the impact of Creative Europe in stimulating
and supporting cross-sectoral and interdisciplinary working at a time when this is
becoming ever more important, and pointed to projects that include education, science
and research.

7
• Projects have allowed for the testing of new business models and have given partners
the ability to take creative risks, along with the preparation time and development funds
to improve the quality of scripts, productions or other creative products.

• Projects have new approaches to resilience and reducing core donor dependency,
including ‘stepping outside of familiar structures’. Learning from other business models
has also supported resilience and diversification of operations and markets.

• Strengthened links with Higher Education concerning student placements, PhD

candidate participation and collaborative approaches to programme presentation have
all developed business practice.

• Work with young producers and artists has included partnering them with producers to
strengthen their business model and to help them beyond the life of the project.

c. Skills and Capacity

• The research indicates that most Creative Europe projects have a positive impact on
skills development. Some projects have training and skills at their heart, but almost all
project partners experience up-skilling impacts. Skills related to digital activity figure
strongly due to the amount of projects that include digital developments.

• There are many project examples where skills and professional development have
directly translated into employment, business development, and project opportunities.
This includes specialist technical production skills development and innovative
techniques. In some cases the professional development of key staff has directly
improved their careers, including up-skilling to meet the project management and
administrative responsibilities of the project. Some training has included academic and
research methods for incorporation into working practices.

• UK partners have been involved in projects that acted as incubators in the sector and
led to the start up of new projects and the kick starting of careers. Consultation
revealed particularly strong impacts on the skills and employment prospects of young
professionals and artists, improving their employability in a very competitive labour
market.

• A quarter of MEDIA respondents to the CEDUK survey have undertaken some form of
Creative Europe-funded training since 2012 and nearly all said that the training enabled
them to meet potential collaborators (94%) and enhanced their skills and knowledge
(91%).

d. Audiences and cultural impact

• Creative Europe projects often directly impact on the quality of the artistic or creative
work involved. This is achieved through the international mobility and exchange
involved in producing the work. It also results from additional production resources and
time for the development of work. There are many examples of projects where
international markets were tapped through showcasing, longer term planning, and the
scaling up of work.

8
• Projects have delivered work in previously unreachable locations and helped partners to
locate and present work in the optimum venues. The digital dissemination of work is a
feature of some UK projects, including reaching people that can’t go to the theatre. The
development of new digital and technical audience pathways features in a number of
projects.

• Projects have included audience involvement in the whole project process, including
rehearsals, to deepen the audience relationship. In the case of smaller companies
projects have enabled them to deliver audience development training and to analyse
audience segmentation.

• Projects have broadened perceptions of the value of inclusive practice across the
sector, including targeting of the LGBT community in one project.

• Projects create new opportunities to present work to potential promoters and have
diversified and enhanced programming for UK audiences. Projects have introduced
audiences and participants to cultural institutions from communities they had never
engaged with previously.

• Producing work that is meaningful to audiences in more than one country has proven
possible in some projects, and the inclusion of youth exchanges and residencies into
programming deepens cultural impact.

• Internationalising and improving programme quality has directly impacted on audience

size and expectations. The biannual music competition in York is now internationally
recognised and attracts entrants from around the world as a direct result of Creative
Europe investment.

e. Social impacts
• Projects have created professional opportunities and pathways for young people and
people from under-represented or marginalised groups, including targeted opportunities
for disabled practitioners, young people, and refugee artists. Projects have also led to
stronger local partnerships, with Higher Education links particularly referenced, as well
as the development of communities of practice.

• Social impacts arose through the strengthening and wider dissemination of the work of
socially engaged companies, and one UK company pointed to how Creative Europe
projects had challenged preconceptions around inclusion. There have also been
impacts at policy level, through creating new community partnerships at regional level,
as well as through diversifying activities and programming for UK practitioners and
audiences.

• Priorities for Creative Europe in 2018 include promoting positive values around diversity,
civic engagement, and international links, and UK organisations could be expected to
take a leading role given the country’s leadership and innovation in relation to socially
engaged practice. For example, in 2016, UK organisations led Refugee Integration
Projects that made up a quarter of the funding call’s overall budget.

9
• Projects’ impact at the local level also occur through the development of successful
creative partnerships with other local artists, the creation of a market for work with local
presenters, and the introduction of refugees and migrants to local cultural institutions.

f. Economic impacts
• Creative Europe has had a significant positive impact on output and employment for UK
partners. The majority of Creative Europe beneficiaries consulted state that Creative
Europe funding had been effective in growing their business or organisation. The
projects have helped some UK partners to scale up their operations, improve
infrastructure and develop talent.

• Organisational resilience is supported, extending, for example, to business expansion

and plans for a new venue. Full cost recovery in projects also makes a net contribution
to an organisation’s resilience.

• The credibility and profile of working internationally provides a platform for new funding
relationships and gives companies confidence to talk to investors.

• Four fifths of MEDIA TV Programming beneficiaries said their award helped to maximise
the project’s international market potential and 95% indicated that the funding helped
complete the funding package allowing their project to go into production.

• Over half (52%) of MEDIA beneficiaries and two thirds (68%) of Culture beneficiaries
responding to the CEDUK survey stated that Creative Europe funding proved critical in
helping to secure additional investment.

• 59% of Culture and 41% of MEDIA respondents to the CEDUK survey secured
additional funding from UK sources as a result of their Creative Europe award, and 51%
and 33% respectively attracted investment from outside the UK.

g. The impacts of not participating in Creative Europe

• Many UK beneficiaries of Creative Europe funding thought that had participation not
been possible their position would be fundamentally different today, and in some cases
at every level of their organisation.

• Organisations would have lagged behind in new approaches and best practice in
production, marketing, dissemination and administration.

• A number of individual artists and producers would not have developed markets for
their work abroad.

• UK organisations and cultural leaders would have much less international influence as
their current roles in networks and partnerships would not have developed.

• Smaller organisations would have been particularly badly affected as they are
dependent on Creative Europe for the capacity and pathways to international working.
They have also benefitted from the credibility of international partnerships in securing
new investment and markets in the UK.

• There are concerns that UK students will not be eligible to join European initiatives and
ensembles, and that future events, such as a major conference in 2020, will now not be

10
 hosted in the UK. There will be no UK partners in some subsequent project proposals
arising from some existing partnerships.

• A number of partners voiced concerns over the loss of mobility for staff and artists, and
the associated risks to projects and their core business.

• Partners are worried that additional administration and bureaucracy will be a barrier to
international collaboration and exchange. Smaller companies feel they will be
disproportionately affected.

• Some projects would simply not have been feasible at all without Creative Europe
funding. This applies to some projects that will go on to be self-sustaining and also
projects that will be embedded as transnational networks.

2.4 Future Priorities

• UK organisations should be encouraged to play a full part in Creative Europe until the
end of the current programme in 2020. Particular attention should be given to smaller
scale organisations.

• Continuing to liaise and align UK investment and projects with Creative Europe will
provide a platform for UK organisations and professionals to work with colleagues
throughout Europe, to influence developments and to contribute at the European level.

• Design of a successor programme that provides a project fund for international

partnerships of up to 4 years in duration. Such a fund could support UK organisations
to be a partner in projects based in other countries and to lead their own initiatives.

• The needs and approaches of cultural and audio-visual organisations are different, so
continuing to offer a more technically specified range of grant opportunities to the latter
is recommended.

• A successor scheme should be future facing, be aligned across the CCS and across the
four nations of the UK, respond to increased demand for transnational projects, and
focused on the priorities of potential applicants rather than institutions.

• Any future scheme or schemes should have a simple framework of a small number of
priorities or principles that could also be applied beyond Europe and can be adopted
across institutions.

• The scheme should commit to transparency of evaluation and quality of commentary to

applicants. Implementation should be supported by a mechanism committed to
diversifying take up of the scheme.

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3 Background

3.1 The cultural and creative industries in the UK

The success of the UK’s creative industries is widely celebrated and the sector generated
£91.8 billion GVA for the UK in 2016, the latest year for which statistics are available. This
shows a year-on-year growth of 7.6%, compared with  growth of 3.5% for the UK
economy as a whole over the same period. Since 2010, the GVA of the creative industries
has increased by 44.8% and the sector now makes up 5.3% of the UK economy. The
sector also performs well in relation to exports. In 2015 a year on year increase in the
value of exported services of 7.2% was achieved bringing the value of sectoral exports to
£21.2 billion and establishing the UK as the third-largest exporter of cultural goods and
services in the world. Europe accounts for 57.5% of the total exports of cultural services
from the UK.

There are nearly 1.96 million (1,958,000) jobs in the creative industries and the sector is
growing at four times the rate of the wider UK workforce, now providing 6% of all UK
jobs. 6.7% of people working in the sector are from a non-UK EU country and 6% are
from outside the EU. There are, however, large variations between sub-sectors, with, for
example, a quarter of architects coming from non-UK EU countries and almost a third of
visual effects (vfx) professionals.

The performance of the sector is variable across the UK. For example Scotland’s growth
in creative industries employment was 13% in 2015/16, while there was a decrease in
Northern Ireland and Wales over the same period. This picture is also reflected in EU
research. The Culture and Creative Cities Monitor covers 168 cities in 30 European
countries and provides comparable data on how European cities perform in the areas of
culture and creativity, and how this performance relates to jobs, wealth and economic
growth. This tends to confirm the strong performance of the UK sector, but indicates that
it is geographically uneven, with the cities of Glasgow, Edinburgh, York, London,
Manchester and Norwich all performing in or near the top quadrant of cities, but others
like Bradford, Liverpool or Birmingham in the lower half of the table.

Supporting the development of the arts, culture and creativity as a sector is challenging
due to its scale and apparently fragmentary composition. It is heavily dominated by
SMEs, micro-businesses and freelancers, many of whom work flexibly between roles and
sub-sectors. This challenge particularly applies to supporting the smaller businesses and
organisations in the sector to work internationally and to reach or create international
markets. Creative Europe is unusual in that it is designed around how the sector works,
rather than attempting to change core professional behaviours to fit a wider industry
model.

12
3.2 Brexit and UK’s culture and creative industries
The UK Government undertook a number of sectoral analyses of the impact of Brexit. The
economic output and analysis that prefaced the sectoral analyses included the following
overview:

Sector Economic output % of economy Employment % of employment

GVA - £ million (1000s)

Advertising & 12,871 0.01 170 0.01

marketing

Architecture 29,469 0.02 625 0.02

Broadcasting 6,447 0 43 0

Crafts 407 0 7 0

Film, TV, video, radio 15,880 0.01 231 0.01

& photography

Museums, galleries & 1.086 0 97 0

Libraries

Music, performing & 8,457 0 286 0.01

visual arts

House of Commons Library

The Creative Industries Federation welcomed this sectoral analysis but pointed to the role
of freedom of movement in the creative industries’ success, including for the short-term
workers, freelancers and international touring companies that deliver many Creative
Europe projects.

The ongoing negotiations between the EU and the UK have impacted on the approach of
UK Creative Europe partners in a variety of ways. Some are continuing with projects and
applications as ‘normal’, others are seeing their role in projects diminished or are finding
inclusion in new applications challenging. While the longer term position is uncertain, the
UK’s full participation in programmes in the Multi-annual Financial Framework until the
end of the current 2014-2020 programme is agreed. There is anecdotal evidence that
other countries want the UK to remain in the Creative Europe programme. However, there
are a range of contingent issues that have a bearing on the future relationships between
the UK organisations and the Creative Europe programme, or any bi-lateral programme
with similar objectives. These include:

• Compliance with relevant regulatory regimes, such as those applied to copyright, the
Digital Single Market, or employment.

• Freedom of movement, in that much cultural practice requires performers or

practitioners to be in situ and to travel between partners.

• Mobility, in that much of the Creative Europe programme activity requires an exchange
of creative goods.

13
4 The Creative Europe Programme
4.1 Introduction
Creative Europe is framed by the European Commission’s priorities for Culture and the
Creative Industries:

• Responding to changing skills needs by promoting innovation in education.

• Supporting the mobility of artists.

• Coordinating with Member States to reform regulatory environments.

• Developing policies and initiatives to promote market access for and investment in
CCS.

The EU has recognised that while the CCSs are responsible for around 3% of the EU’s
GDP and jobs they remain undervalued and a range of instruments and initiatives are
brought to bear on this challenge, including a Policy Learning Platform and the European
Creative Industries Alliance. Culture is also supported through a number of programmes
and schemes: Cohesion Policy Funds; Connecting Europe Facility; COSME; and Horizon
2020. However, Creative Europe is the programme that is most clearly focused on culture
and the creative industries. The European Commission produced an impact assessment
in 2011, prior to establishing Creative Europe, that proposed that the new integrated
programme would:

• Create policy synergies across the CCSs.

• Facilitate knowledge exchange and cross-fertilisation between sectors.

• Simplify management and produce efficiencies.

• Allow the development of a financial instrument to increase access to private funding.

4.2 Creative Europe

Creative Europe was established by the European Commission in 2014. It builds on two
previous programmes: MEDIA – supporting the audiovisual industry, and the Culture
Programme supporting cultural and creative sectors. Creative Europe is the only EU
multi-annual programme directly targeting the cultural and creative sectors (CCS) with a
total budget of €1.46 billion for the period 2014-2020. The Programme has two
overarching policy objectives: safeguard and promote cultural and linguistic diversity and
Europe's cultural heritage, and strengthen the competitiveness of the European cultural
and creative sectors. This is pursued through specific objectives:

• Supporting the capacity of these sectors to operate transnationally.

• Promoting the transnational circulation and mobility of cultural and creative works and
artists to reach out new audiences.

• Strengthening the financial capacity of cultural and creative SMEs and organisations.

• Supporting transnational policy cooperation to foster policy development, innovation,

creativity, audience development and new business models.

14
The intention is to tackle a number of key challenges, including:

• Fragmentation of the sector along geographic, cultural, linguistic and sub-sectoral lines.

• Globalisation and the digital shift.

• Access to sustainable and diversified funding.

Delivery is through a number of Sub-programmes:

• The MEDIA Sub-programme supporting the audiovisual sector.

• The Culture Sub-programme supporting the cultural and creative stakeholders other
than audiovisual.

• A Cross-sectoral Strand supporting the Cultural and Creative Sectors Guarantee

Facility, cross-sectoral activities, transnational cooperation, and the Creative Europe
Desks.

The Sub-programmes support:

• Skills development and training.

• Internationalisation of careers and cross-border mobility.

• Access to markets and new audiences.

• Creation and circulation of cultural and audiovisual works and content.

Creative Europe funds five European Union prizes in the fields of: Contemporary
architecture, Cultural heritage, Emerging rock and pop singers, Literature and Film.

4.3 Creative Europe developments

The EU is in the process of commissioning a research project into the next generation of
Creative Europe programmes. The brief includes within its scope “evidence from the UK
(as a major recipient country) in as far as such evidence would have value for actual
Member States in 2021”. Should the UK aim to be able to participate in Creative Europe,
or to design programmes that will support UK organisations to be partners in Creative
Europe projects, then providing evidence to this enquiry is likely to be important. The EU
conducted an open public consultation in 2017 as part of its work to evaluate the
programme. The EU is also designing a self-assessment process for culture projects in
Creative Europe to address an historic absence of evidence of impact. The draft method
provides for both quantitative and qualitative evidence, and acknowledges that some of
the most significant impacts of the culture project cannot be captured with statistical
evidence.

Demand for Creative Europe investment far outstrips the available budgets. For example,
in 2016, the average success rate for the Culture Sub-programme was calculated as
13%. Year on year incremental growth in the programme’s budget is seen as part of the
solution to this dilemma.

15
4.4 2018 Priorities for Creative Europe
Following the mid-term review of the programme a number of priorities have been
established for 2018. Priorities in the MEDIA Sub-programme include:

• Investment in talent and a mix of creative, technological and entrepreneurial skills.

• Innovation in audiovisual storytelling reflecting the blurring of the distinction between

cinema and TV.

• Promotion to support the branding of product to reach a wide public increasingly

gatekeeping their own content.

• The financing of European films to accommodate changes in the investment landscape

for production.

Priorities in the Culture Sub-programme include:

• Strengthen the capacity of cultural and creative players at European level (support
talent, training and skills, internationalisation of careers, audience development). This
includes special attention being given to small-scale cooperation projects to build
capacity where there has been little experience of operating at the European level.

• A better focus on sub-sectors and priorities, including a focus on and dedicated call for
the 2018 European Year of Cultural Heritage.

• An agenda for Europe based on positive values (cultural diversity, civic engagement and
responsibility, public space to engage, international dimension).

• Continue building knowledge of the different cultural and creative stakeholders through
meetings and dialogues, and building on dialogues with the music sector over the
previous two years.

Priorities for the Cross-Sectoral Strand:

• The priority is to continue to develop this strand in responding to cross-sectoral

challenges of digital shift, market fragmentation, and limited access to finance and
access to data.

• The Cultural and Creative Guarantee Facility will build on the progress made since its
launch in 2016. Given the strong market take up, the Commission intends to top up the
budget of the Guarantee Facility by 50% with funds from the European Fund for
Strategic Investment.

• In 2018, the cross-sectoral project will focus on the creative economy at local level
developing new tools, networks and policy learnings.

• Data analysis will be focused on market developments in the context of the Digital
Single Market strategy notably relating to copyright, audio-visual media services, and
online platforms.

16
5 Creative Europe and soft power
5.1 Soft power and the EU
“Promoting a nation’s culture and political ideals on the global stage brings significant
economic and strategic advantages”. Institute of International Cultural Relations,
University of Edinburgh, 2017

The study from which this quote was taken identified a wide range of benefits relating to
the cultural aspects of soft power, from increases in foreign direct investment (FDI) and
tourism, to influence within international institutions. The EU clearly understands the
potential of culture when it comes to diplomacy within and without the 28 Member States.
The EU launched a Culture Diplomacy Platform in 2016 ‘to enhance the European Union’s
engagement with third countries and their citizens’ with three elements:

• Cultural diplomacy activities

• Supporting and advising EU institutions, including the EU Delegations across the globe

• Setting up a global cultural leadership programme.

There have been two calls for participation in the Global Cultural Leadership Programme
and the most recent focuses on candidates from the ten Strategic Partners of the EU
(Brazil, Canada, China, Japan, India, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, South Korea and the
USA), as well as 10 participants from the 28 European Union Member States.

The ‘Voices of Culture ‒ Structured Dialogue between the European Commission and the
cultural sector’ provides a framework for discussions between EU civil society
stakeholders and the European Commission with regard to culture. There have been 7
themed dialogues to date and UK participants have played an influential role in the
working groups. The reports that emerge from the working groups are considered by the
relevant OMC (Open Method of Coordination) strand. The OMC process is designed as a
‘light touch’ framework for best practice from member states to inform policy
development. This work eventually feeds through to the Work Programme of the EU, and
through this connects to wider strategic goals.

The EU views culture as more than just creating a neutral space that exempts participants
from political, social and economic forces. As U.S ex-diplomat Dana Linnet argues, for
diplomacy to succeed you need to understand who you are negotiating with, and there is
no better vehicle to achieve this than arts and culture.

17
5.2 Soft power and the UK
The British Council thinking around these issues was captured in a recent paper for the
2017 ENCATC Congress by Ian Thomas which provided an in depth analysis of the
composition of cultural diplomacy and suggested how future evaluation of impact in this
area may be tackled. The approach complements the philosophy underpinning the EU
approach and is based around five thematic pillars:

• Sharing UK Arts with the World.

• Policy and Research.

• Arts for Social Change.

• Capacity Building.

• Fostering Collaboration and Networks.

The issue of evaluating soft power has also recently been addressed in a report
commissioned by the British Council (Arts, Culture and Soft Power: Developing and
Evidence Base). The report considered potential indicators for the arts and soft power,
and offered a potential framework that can be summarised as:

a. Broadening the appeal of the UK to a wider public in the targeted nation (measured
by: the number of people making a visit/engaging in a cultural exchange as a direct
result of their engagement with a British Council programme);

b. Enhanced profile of UK brand in targeted nations (measured by: recognition of UK

cultural assets by wider public in targeted nation; the perception of the cultural scene);

c. Enhancing diplomatic relationships with key influencers in the targeted country

(measured by: successfully attracting targeted individuals to attend events; number
and importance of bilateral agreements; number of influencers committing to concrete
plans; forming strategic partnerships that lead to the creation of new artistic or cultural
work);

d. Improved trust in the UK as a nation (measured by: global surveys measuring

perceptions of the UK, internationally; expressed digital and social media sentiment);

e. Developing sustainable collaborations between artists and other cultural practitioners

(measured by: number of new and continued partnerships and relationships that
extend beyond the initial cultural relationship and period of funding);

f. Improved academic exchange and student enrolment with British universities

(measured by increase in international students and number of cross university
research applications that were initiated through cultural activity or programme)

g. Improved trade relations with the UK (measured by: number of trade deals that were
initiated through engagement with arts and cultural activity).

The UWS report also considered the potential for use of logic models or theory of change
in this work and concluded that the British Council should adopt a small number of high
level outcomes for its international arts and cultural activity, and work at alignment with
others working in the field.

18
5.3 Soft power and Creative Europe beneficiaries
A recent report on ‘The Art of Soft Power’ from King’s College, London, identified two
main drivers for deploying arts and culture in diplomacy. The process of ’standing out’
aims to differentiate a country, assert its qualities and influence, and gain attention. The
aim of ‘reaching out’ is more about demonstrating alignment, shared purpose and unity.
When it comes to ‘standing out’ cultural strategists, such as Philippe Kern of KEA, have
commented on the lack of effort that has gone into creating a European cultural identity,
and question whether this has resulted in a lack of global influence in comparison to
Europe’s leading role in the global cultural economy. However, there is no doubt that the
EU has been active in using culture to ‘reach out’ and it is in this latter approach where
Creative Europe excels. Our consultation process tended to confirm this position:

• The establishing of shared purpose between transnational partners supported with

criteria devoted to the quality of the partnership impacts positively on many levels:
stakeholders; partners; educators; artists; audiences; and the general public.

• The reciprocal approach to project development, management and outputs means a

collaborative effort is devoted to overcoming barriers to transnational working, and also
creates a level of trust and goodwill that supports long term partnership and
developments.

• The duration of projects (up to four years) was sufficient time for relationships to
develop that provide a platform for further collaboration.

• The visibility and scale of Creative Europe lent participants credibility and influence with
funders and stakeholders at the international, national and local levels.

• The centrality of transnational exchange, dialogue and mobility had transformative

impacts on perceptions of different countries and cultures at a local level, and within
professional sectors.

• The involvement of community and educational strands in projects ensures that young
people directly benefit from the transnational activities.

• Projects are designed to address skills gaps which benefits specific sectors and
cements transnational relations between practitioners and with audiences.

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6 Creative Europe in the UK

6.1 Introduction
Research and consultations across a number of areas to determine the benefits of
Creative Europe and the impact that the loss of funding could have on the UK suggests
there are clear impacts around: economic and financial impact, soft power impact,
decreased audience reach, loss of collaboration, loss of innovation and skills through
decreased free movement, and more difficult trading conditions.

6.2 Impact in the UK

From 2014-2016 Creative Europe has supported 283 organisations and distributed 115
British films in other European countries with grants totalling €57 million. In the Culture
sub programme, 156 organisations have received a total of €18.2 million. The majority of
this was awarded to organisations working in partnership across European countries to
increase capacity in the cultural sector. In 2014-2015, UK cooperation partners were
involved in almost half of all Cooperation Projects. Across the range of Sub-programmes:

• UK partners are sought after for their expertise, and 75% of platforms involve UK
organisations.

• The UK had 25 books translated into other languages in 2016 making it the second
most represented country.

• 25% of the Creative Europe refugee integration projects were UK led, reflecting the
UK’s expertise in working with socially engaged arts and across countries.

• The European Creative Hubs Network (ECHN) is a 2-year project. British Council is
leading the work, in partnership with six European creative hubs. Creative Europe only
awarded a grant to one consortium and the UK leads the project.

6.3 MEDIA Sub-programme

• The UK received €28.5m MEDIA funding in 2014-16.

• €16m in grants to support 82 UK companies and 53 UK cinemas in the Europa Cinemas

network.

• €12.5m in investment to support the distribution of British films in other European

counties

• The development funding led to the production of several critically acclaimed films (e.g.
Brooklyn, High Rise, and Carol).

20
• 53 cinemas across the UK are part of the Europa Cinemas network. This network is
more than just about funding. On their own, each cinema is a small business but
together they can be a voice for the independent sector exchanging know-how,
adapting to the digital shift, and changing customer habits.

• In its first year, the UK was awarded nearly 25% of the available funds for the audience
development scheme.

• Creative Europe proved critical in helping secure additional investment for 52% of
MEDIA recipients and 68% of culture beneficiaries.

• 41% of MEDIA respondents secured additional funding from UK sources and 33%
attracted funding from outside the UK.

• 59% of MEDIA respondents secured additional funding from UK sources and 51%
attracted funding from outside the UK.

• The UK has a good funding success rates in most MEDIA schemes, often higher than
the EU average.

• It performs less well on Single Project funding (5% as opposed to the 15% EU average)
and Video Games (10% attainment as opposed to the 15% EU average).

• In the MEDIA Sub-programme 22% of funds awarded to distributors and sales agents
were used on British films.

6.4 The Culture Sub-programme

• Success rates well above average for the biggest funding strand of Cooperation
Projects (19% as opposed to a 13% EU average) and European Platforms (10% as
apposed to 7% EU average).

• There are no UK beneficiaries of European Networks but UK organisations are

members.

• €11.3m was allocated to 93 UK organisations for collaborative, transnational projects.

• The supported organisations vary greatly in scale and size and some them are Higher
Education Institutions.

• European Platforms is a relatively new funding stream in 2014 with an emphasis on

audiences and supporting emerging talent. 25% of platforms were led by UK
organisations and 75% involved UK organisations.

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7 Evaluating Impact
7.1 Introduction
"Creative enterprises or cultural entrepreneurs are not satisfactorily captured by statistical
tools due to their size, the project-based nature of their activities or their social value (a
major feature of cultural activities)” KEA, 2015

Evaluating the impact of the cultural and creative industries in a holistic and meaningful
manner is an ongoing challenge. We know that quantitative data alone only captures a
small part of the impact picture. Work on establishing authoritative qualitative evidence
has been developing at a pace, but is not coordinated across different sub-sectors,
institutions and countries. The EU is currently working on a M&E system and self-
assessment process that will provide a pan-European body of evidence of impact that
includes both quantitative and qualitative methods. In the interests of producing
authoritative evidence, the UK may decide to align with this approach for transnational
cultural and creative projects. In the meantime there is the question of what framework
this report should adopt.

7.2 CEDUK
CEDUK have used an impacts framework in their recent work with UK beneficiaries of
Creative Europe and in the brief for this project. It consists of five areas of impact:

Economic Impact
Three factors are prioritised: increases in output; increased employment; and increased
investment.

Internationalisation and networks

This indicator includes both the partnerships and networks through which UK
organisations work internationally, and the markets for their work.

Innovation and skills

Improving employability is a core priority here, but in a rapidly changing sector there is
also an emphasis on development, with both the creation of new content and IP and the
establishment of new business models included.

Audiences and cultural impact

Both expanding the audience base for work and deepening audience engagement is
considered here. Most cultural activity requires elements of both approaches for
sustainable growth. The quality of cultural and creative content is also relevant as this is
the basis for both future demand for the work, and for its intended cultural impacts.

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Prosperity/influence/attraction
This category addresses how financial investment and the resulting work supports the
development of cultural relations between UK and other countries. It also considers to
what extent it has realised the profile of the UK’s screen, arts, culture and heritage
sectors. In relation to existing UK beneficiaries of Creative Europe it also addresses what
would have been the impact on the UK had the funding not been received.

This framework is closely aligned with the aims and objectives of Creative Europe and is a
good core platform for an impacts framework that is relevant at both strategic and
operational levels. However, in its current form it does not capture the full range of
impacts described by Creative Europe beneficiaries.

7.3 The British Council approach to evidence

The British Council has recently published a report that explores how evaluation practice
across the Arts can be updated to improve the standards and range of data and evidence
that demonstrate impact. The recommended approach proposes use of either a Theory of
Change model or a Logical Framework in each project, along with Monitoring &
Evaluation and Lessons Learned plans. Furthermore the report recommends a bespoke
mixture of quantitative and qualitative methods are applied in relation to each project.
This approach may be pursued in the future in relation to Creative Europe projects or
successor programmes. However, for the purposes of this report, which gathers existing
evidence from a range of sources and supplements this with beneficiary interviews, a
more pragmatic approach is needed. Consequently, the findings of the consultative
process have been organised around a number of core impact statements contained in
the British Council report:

Impact Statement 1: The development of social outcomes of targeted individuals which

contributes towards greater social inclusion and social engagement in targeted countries.

This includes factors like:

• How people feel about themselves, other people or cultures.

• Increased connections or networks between individuals.

• Addressing alienation as a result of socio-economic inequalities and globalisation.

Impact Statement 2: Cultural professionals develop their knowledge, skills and networks.
This includes factors like:

• Outputs such as number of accreditations or qualifications.

• Artists and cultural professionals’ assessment of their own skills and knowledge.

• New professional contacts and partnerships.

23
Impact Statement 3: Arts and cultural organisations in the UK and target countries raise
their profile, showcase UK arts, and increase the economic value of their partnerships
contributing towards UK’s influence and attraction in the World. This includes factors like:

• The extent to which their professional profile and networks are affected.

• Opportunities for international collaboration.

Impact Statement 4: The arts and cultural infrastructure and creative economies of the
UK, cities and target countries are strengthened through investment and collaboration.
This includes factors like:

• Changes in policies, working relationships, professional networks and partnerships of

specific sectors.

• Impacts on the cultural infrastructure of a geographic area.

Impact Statement 5: The UK’s international reputation is enhanced through experiences

of arts and culture contributing to our cultural relations and soft power approaches. This
may include factors like:

• Media profile of activities.

• Influence of UK professionals in networks and partnerships.

• An increase in ‘touch points’ between the sector at the transnational level.

This framework of impact statements is a useful structure to consider the evidence

assembled in this work as it is retrospective and largely qualitative. Future work on impact
will benefit from the implementation of the proposals in the report, including the use of
Social Network Analysis which would systematically capture the kind of evidence that is
dealt with in this report.

7.4 Evidence and European Capitals of Culture

The Impacts 08 research programme conducted a study on the economic, environmental,
social and cultural impacts of Liverpool 2008 under five impact themes:

• City image and reputation

• Cultural participation and access

• Cultural and creative vibrancy

• Economic and tourism development

• Cultural governance and leadership

The research identified two inter-related impacts that are of particular relevance when
considering Creative Europe. Cultural networks were strengthened and improved through
engagement with Liverpool 08, and culture became more important in cross-sectoral
policy development. The work has led to an ongoing research programme (Impacts 18)
which has further developed the initial approach, as well as development at the European
level that led to a research framework for ECoC consisting of six themes and associated
indicators:

24
• Cultural vibrancy and sustainability - with a focus on the commissioning of new artistic
work and the establishing of new artistic collaborations.

• Cultural access and participation - with a focus on the scope of activity, attendances
and associated audience profile.

• Identity, image and place - with a focus on press and media exposure, and perceptions
of ECoC.

• The philosophy and management of the process - with a focus on the scale and
composition of income and expenditure.

• European Dimension - with a focus on the amount of European cross border

cooperations and the impact on perceptions of Europe-ness of citizens.

• Economic impacts - with a focus on the visitor economy.

7.5 Evidence and Soft Power

The impacts of Creative Europe at the European level include elements of ‘soft power’ in
that they pursue and promote the work of the EU and the policies of the European
Parliament. Evaluating the impact of soft power can be synthesised as:

a. Sharing the UK arts and creativity internationally. This heading refers to a broadening
of the appeal and enhancing the brand of the UK to a wider international public as well as
developing relationships and trust with key influencers abroad. 


b. Fostering collaboration and networks. This includes developing sustainable

collaborations between artists and other cultural and creative practitioners as well as the
organisations and institutions that they are connected to.

c. Research and Development. This includes the development of capacity and good
practice on the one hand and stimulating culture’s contribution to social change,
innovation and knowledge exchange on the other.

d. Trade and investment. The expansion of markets for UK companies, stimulation of

direct and partnership investment and improved trade relations. 


25
8 Assessing the impact of Creative
Europe in the UK
8.1 The context
The ongoing requirement to consider impact suggests that CEDUK should adopt a small
number of high level outcomes for the evaluation of international arts and creative work,
and should work with other key cultural investors to align evaluation practice. This will
increase the authority and influence of evaluation findings as well as minimising the
administrative burden on client organisations.

8.2 Internationalising Culture

Impacts in this area include:

• Understanding of professional practice and administrative requirements in other

countries.

• Involvement in international networks and partnerships and increasing the influence of

UK practitioners.

• International mobility and exchange, and reaching international markets.

• Raising the profile of UK’s cultural and creative industries and supporting international
relations.

• The impact on the UK had the funding not been received.

8.3 Innovation, Research & Development

Impacts include:

• The creation of new content and IP along with the commissioning of new work and
establishing new artistic collaborations.

• The development of new business models, experimentation and the piloting of new
approaches.

• Responding to change, including the digital shift, inter-disciplinarity and cross-sectoral

working.

• Knowledge exchange, research and evaluation within the sector along with culture’s
contribution to research and development generally.

26
8.4 Skills and Capacity
Impacts include:

• Cultural professionals develop their knowledge, skills and networks.

• Improving the employability of professionals across the sector.

• Stimulating capacity and professional know-how through co-production and

collaboration.

• Strengthening organisational capacity, including cultural governance and leadership.

• The development of technical infrastructure and administrative processes.

8.5 Audiences and Cultural Impact

Impacts include:

• Expanding audiences for international work in the UK and for UK work abroad.

• Deepening audience engagement through educational and outreach initiatives.

• Improving the quality of cultural activities and outputs, and leading and influencing
developments in practice. Learning from best practice elsewhere.

• Showcasing of UK work along with increasing international visibility and promotion.

8.6 Social impacts

Impacts include:

• Creating professional opportunities and pathways for young people and people from
under-represented or marginalised groups.

• Connecting international artists and culture with local communities, and promoting
understanding of other cultures.

• Supporting social integration and tackling inequality through cultural activity. Stimulating
the cultural and creative vibrancy of locales.

8.7 Economic impacts

There are both direct and indirect impacts:

• Direct impacts relate to increases in output, increased employment, and increased

investment.

• Indirect impacts include areas like growth in the visitor economy, a contribution to trade
relations and enhancing national brands.

27
9 Evidence of impact
9.1 The Mid-term Survey of Creative Europe impacts in the UK
Two online questionnaires were sent to over 3,000 contacts held by CEDUK resulting in a
response rate of around 20%. There were 242 Culture survey responses spread across
the UK and 378 MEDIA survey responses with the majority from London based
organisations. 172 respondents had successfully applied for Creative Europe funding.

The results were consistently positive about the impact of Creative Europe. Around 80%
of respondents supported continued participation in, and the priorities of the Creative
Europe programme, with a similar proportion indicating the programme had been
involved with the growth of their organisation or business. The programme was critical to
securing additional investment, internationalising organisations and securing international
networks, and stimulating new partnerships and collaborations.

Creative Europe has also proven to be an effective development platform for both
expanding into international markets and for internationalising programmes in the UK.
The programme lends credibility to participants when it comes to securing investment,
and in forming partnerships and co-productions. It also supports innovation including
start ups, new business models and kick starting careers.

Creative Europe support for skills and professional development translates into career
development and sectoral growth, and participation in the programme has also directly
benefited the capacity and skills of organisations.

9.2 Creative Europe in the UK 2014-15 - MEDIA sub-programme report

The report provided a breakdown of the first two years of the Creative Europe MEDIA
sub-programme impact in the UK. The UK received €28.5m MEDIA funding: €16m in
grants to support 82 UK companies and 53 UK cinemas in the Europa Cinemas network,
and €12.5m in investment to support the distribution of British films in other European
counties.

Over half of the direct income awarded to the UK went to film and TV producers or video
games developers. 16 UK production companies received funding, with the animation
sector in South West England performing particularly strongly. Creative Europe
development funding led to the production of several critically acclaimed films (e.g.
Brooklyn, High Rise and Carol). A number of case studies demonstrated how the funds
enabled development and enhanced production value thereby increasing competitiveness
in the international market place (e.g. shooting in real locations). It also afforded
producers the time to experiment at the start to be able to get the project right.

28
UK producers benefited from €5.9m of direct funding for television programming across
18 productions led by UK companies and 3 led by other European companies. This
represents 23% of the overall Creative Europe funding for this area of work. Six video
games producers received funding of over €0.625m with beneficiaries emphasising the
importance of this work in the early stages of production and the resulting impact on the
quality of the work.

The sub-programme also funds distribution through four strands (selective, automatic,
and digital distribution, and sales agents). Eleven UK distributors received €1.2m of
funding to release 31 European films in the UK. A further €0.7m was allocated in the UK
through the Automatic Distribution Fund, which allows distributors to be more
experimental with the films they launch in the UK market. Across Europe this scheme
allocated €35m, of which a quarter of the funds benefited UK films. Three UK distributors
received funding for VoD amounting to €1.8. Three sales agents were allocated a total of
€0.44m to enhance their performance in selling European film.

The sub-programme also supports training, markets and industry events. Nine UK
training providers were supported and four industry events received funding. Case
studies and testimonials from participants point to a range of direct benefits to the UK’s
industry professionals. Two UK film festivals received funding (out of a total of 80 across
Europe) and 53 UK cinemas were supported as part of the Europa Cinemas network of
around 900 independent cinemas across Europe.

The UK performed particularly well in relation to funding for film literacy and audience
development, receiving almost a quarter of the €1.9m of available funds in 2014. This has
enabled UK organisations like the BFI and the Scottish Documentary Institute to be at the
leading edge of developments in this field.

9.3 The Impacts Workshops

CEDUK organised two impact workshops with Creative Europe beneficiaries in
September 2017, in Manchester and in London, organising findings under the headings:
innovation and skills; economic impact; prosperity / influence / attraction; audiences and
cultural impact; internationalisation and networks.

Impacts on innovation and skills were wide ranging. Digital developments figured strongly
in relation to skills development, training, and the dissemination of culture. The
development of new business models and international exchange were also associated
with up-skilling of staff. There were particularly strong impacts on the skills and
employment prospects of young artists and creative professionals.

29
Direct economic impacts were identified in a number of areas, beginning with new
investment partnerships, fundraising opportunities, and income streams. The increased
visibility and credibility of participating organisations had, in some cases, a direct impact
on their ability to attract partners and investment. Co-productions reduced risk while new
international markets were tapped through showcasing, longer term planning and the
scaling up of work.

Creative Europe has had a major impact on the visibility of UK organisations.

Internationalising and improving the quality of work has directly expanded and diversified
audiences in the UK and abroad. UK organisations have become more established in
networks and partnerships that has in turn led to more opportunities for them, and for the
artists and practitioners which whom they work.

Social impacts arose both through the strengthening and wider dissemination of the work
of socially engaged companies and the challenging of preconceptions around inclusion.
Examples included impacts on the cultural diversity of work, gender equality,
opportunities for young people and work around the environment. There have been
impacts at policy level, through creating new community partnerships, as well as through
diversifying activities and programming for UK practitioners and audiences.

9.4 CEDUK Collaborate Day

CEDUK brought together over 100 creative and audiovisual professionals to debate the
value of international working. This also gave a platform for Creative Europe project
participants to share their experiences of working with Creative Europe. Participants
pointed to the direct impact of Creative Europe on stimulating and supporting European
collaboration and international partnerships. Furthermore, the ‘family’ of EU funding
streams (including H2020 and Erasmus +) were seen as providing organisations with
pathways to align their priorities with the EU.

The day revealed strong support for the impact of Creative Europe in stimulating and
supporting cross-sectoral and interdisciplinary working at a time when this is becoming
ever more important, and pointed to projects that include education, science and
research, sometimes involving Higher Education partners. Creative Europe was seen as
both creating space and time for productive partnerships to develop as well as an
accelerant for projects once established. Participants commented on how the programme

worked as a ‘birthplace of ideas’. A number of concerns were voiced about UK

organisations not being eligible for Creative Europe funding in the future, particularly in
relation to a loss of influence and market position abroad, and reduced creative ambition
in the UK.

30
9.5 Case Studies & Testimonials
CEDUK produced a range of case studies in 2017 that revealed a range of positive im-
pacts arising from participation in the Creative Europe programme. The impact of Cre-
ative Europe on the careers and employability of practitioners was a recurrent theme. This
occurs in relation to core competences and in acquiring new skills, such as outreach or
education work. Transnational mobility prepared staff and artists to work internationally,
and partnering with producers or peers abroad created market opportunities. Career pro-
gression is evident in some cases as a direct result of participation in the programme.
Creative Europe projects have created new targeted opportunities for disabled practition-
ers, young people, and refugee artists. One artist commented on how the local market for
his work was created through his work in a Creative Europe project.

The quality and breadth of programming in Europe and in the UK has also benefitted from
participation in Creative Europe projects. The application of new technologies has opened
up new markets, as has the involvement in networks and collaborations across Europe.
Participants point, in some cases, to the long term benefits of being connected to similar
operators in their field, particularly where UK companies can work to transfer good prac-
tice abroad and vice versa. There have also been notable impacts at community level
through connections with international artists and new approaches to programming.

Creative Europe has supported the strengthening of the UK cultural and creative indus-
tries in a number of ways. The most obvious route is where a relatively modest project
becomes a platform for a more ambitious initiative such as a large scale Cooperation
Project. The ‘stepping outside of familiar structures’ has also led to less dependency on
core donors and has provided a credible platform for new funding partnerships. Projects
also lead to stronger local partnerships, with Higher Education links particularly refer-
enced, as well as the development of communities of practice. The understanding of dif-
ferent international operating environments has contributed to partnership development,
and the understanding of different business models has strengthened resilience.

9.6 Economic impact

Creative Europe attracts investment from both inside and out of the UK, creates new
funding partnerships and offers high levels of additionality. According to Creative Europe
Desk UK, in 2014 and 2015, the UK received grants totalling €40 million amounting to 13
percent of Creative Europe’s budget of €319 million for those years. The DCMS has
published figures on the direct grants and indirect funding provided by Creative Europe
and its predecessor for the years 2013 to 2015. These are produced in the table below.
The DCMS explained that “indirect funding in the MEDIA sub-programme relates to
awards to non-UK distribution companies distributing UK films in foreign markets” and
noted that “in the culture sub-programme all awards are direct grants to UK led projects”.

31
Creative Europe Funding for the UK

Year MEDIA Direct Grants MEDIA Indirect funding Culture

2013 7,688,041 6,118,515 4,825,000

2014 9,289,292 7,775,310 5,880,208

2015 6,677,272 4,745,231 5,451,385

Creative Europe has an impact on overall sectoral output. Whilst there has not been any
exact measurement of impact on GDP, there is evidence that Creative Europe funding has
increased output. The funding has resulted in increased penetration and therefore output
for British films resulting in firms being able to grow and increase employment. Between
2014 and 2016, Creative Europe supported distribution of 108 films in over 30 countries,
generating over 53 million cinema admissions. Assuming €7 per admission, this resulted
in €371 million, and a portion of this comes directly back to the UK. There is also
evidence of increased Investment. Creative Europe funding proved critical in helping
secure additional funding both from the UK and from outside the UK. MEDIA sub-
programme beneficiaries in the UK were able to leverage match-funding worth five times
the amount of their Creative Europe grant from 2014 – 2016. This amounted to €108m of
additional funding.

Leverage in the UK MEDIA beneficiaries

Year Total Grant Amount Total Value of Projects € Total amount leveraged
Awarded € against the grant €

2014 9,215,684 70,614,789 61,399,106

2015 6,201,012 25,881,445 19,680,433
2016 5,592,072 32,562,115 26,970,043
Total 21,008,767 129,058,349 108,049,582

Grants received by organisations in Europe to help distribute UK films

Maximum Grant Total Value of Project € Total amount leveraged

Awarded € against the grant €

MG Costs 5,544,207 25,387,206 19,842,999

P&A Costs 12,806,489 37,438,774 24,632,285

Total 18,350,696 62,825,980 44,475,284

This suggests that Creative Europe funding is able to to stimulate additional investment,
attract additional overseas investment in to the UK, create new funding partnerships and
offer a high level of additionality.

32
Based on the co-financing figures provided by the Executive Agency, Creative Europe’s
Culture sub-programme beneficiaries were able to leverage match-funding worth 83% of
the amount of their Creative Europe grant, taking all sources of match income into
account.

Maximum Grant Total Value of Projects € Total amount leveraged

Awarded € against the grant €

Total 15,068,502 27,540,429 12,471,927

10 Conclusions
10.1 Internationalising Culture
• International partnership development, co-production and collaboration is a feature of
many of the UK Creative Europe partnerships. This includes establishing production
partnerships that function independently of Creative Europe. There has, in some cases,
been a sharing of costs and risk on new productions that makes them feasible. In some
cases new international partnerships form around participating organisations as well as
the partners themselves.

• Culture sub-programme beneficiaries emphasised the value of international mobility and

exchange. Four fifths of CEDUK survey respondents pointed to Creative Europe being
effective in internationalising staff and their organisation. The centrality of transnational
exchange, dialogue and mobility had transformative impacts on perceptions of different
countries and cultures at a local level, and within professional sectors.

• A significant minority of respondents to the CEDUK Culture survey are members of a

European Network supported by Creative Europe and of these, four fifths indicated that
membership addressed the needs of both their organisation and the wider UK CCS.

• There are many examples where UK partners involvement in Creative Europe led to their
expansion into international markets as well as internationalising programmes in the UK.
Artists have been offered performances around the world as a result of project work.

• Creative Europe funded market events have been attended by around half of the MEDIA
respondents increasing access to collaborators, buyers and financiers.

• Project durations of up to 4 years have allowed for the fulfilment of the complete cycle
of project development, production and international distribution and have also
translated into opportunities for new investment partnerships and project initiatives.

• Consultation reveals a range of ‘soft power’ impacts, including: the overcoming of

barriers to transnational working and the establishing of trust between partners; longer
term projects translating into deeper and more sustainable international links; and
increasing the credibility and capacity of UK organisations to work internationally.

33
10.2. Innovation, Research & Development
• Creative Europe markets and events have been the trigger for co-productions, pre-sales
and distribution deals. This has had positive impacts on the quality and innovativeness
of the work of organisations, and has in some cases scaled up work to a level where
innovation is possible.

• Projects provide a platform for artists to create work for, and present work around
Europe. Artists are being commissioned by other partners to create work as a result of
projects. The impact on artists and ‘start up’ companies can be dramatic, such as work
produced for festivals being seen by 200 promoters across the world.

• The focus on knowledge exchange, learning and research in many projects has directly
improved the work of UK organisations and developed R&D skills in their staff teams.
Higher Education collaborations have had impacts that extend beyond the initial project.

• The Creative Europe focus on responding to the digital shift is present in a number of
UK projects that have developed new or enhanced approaches to digital technology.
The research revealed strong support for the impact of Creative Europe in stimulating
and supporting cross-sectoral and interdisciplinary working at a time when this is
becoming ever more important, and pointed to projects that include education, science
and research.

• Projects have allowed for the testing of new business models and given partners the
ability to take creative risks, along with the preparation time and development funds to
improve the quality of scripts, productions or other creative products.

• Projects have new approaches to resilience and reducing core donor dependency,
including ‘stepping outside of familiar structures’. Learning from other business models
has also supported resilience and diversifying of operations and markets.

• Strengthened links with Higher Education concerning student placements, PhD

candidate participation, and collaborative approaches to programme presentation have
all developed business practice.

• Work with young producers and artists has included partnering them with producers to
strengthen their business model and to help them beyond the life of the project.

10.3 Skills and Capacity

• The research indicates that most Creative Europe projects have a positive impact on
skills development. Some projects have training and skills at their heart, but almost all
project partners experience up-skilling impacts. Skills related to digital activity figure
strongly due to the amount of projects that include digital developments.

• There are many project examples where skills and professional development have
directly translated into employment, business development, and project opportunities.
This includes specialist technical production skills development and innovative
techniques. In some cases the professional development of key staff has directly
improved their careers, including up-skilling to meet the project management and

34
 administrative responsibilities of the project. Some training has included academic and
research methods for incorporation into working practices.

• UK partners have been involved in projects that acted as incubators in the sector and
led to the start up of new projects and the kick starting of careers. Consultation
revealed particularly strong impacts on the skills and employment prospects of young
professionals and artists, improved their employability in a very competitive labour
market.

• A quarter of MEDIA respondents to the CEDUK survey have undertaken some form of
Creative Europe-funded training since 2012 and nearly all said the training enabled them
to meet potential collaborators (94%) and enhance their skills and knowledge (91%).

10.4. Audiences and cultural impact

• Creative Europe projects often directly impact on the quality of the artistic or creative
work involved. This is achieved through the international mobility and exchange
involved in producing the work. It also results from additional production resources and
time for the development of work. There are many examples of projects where
international markets were tapped through showcasing, longer term planning and the
scaling up of work.

• Projects have delivered work in previously unreachable locations and helped partners to
locate and present work in the optimum venues. The digital dissemination of work is a
feature of some UK projects, including reaching people that can’t go to the theatre. The
development of new digital and technical audience pathways features in a number of
projects.

• Projects have included audience involvement in the whole project process, including
rehearsals, to deepen the audience relationship. In the case of smaller companies
projects have enabled them to deliver audience development training and to analyse
audience segmentation.

• Projects have broadened perceptions of the value of inclusive practice across the
sector, including targeting of the LGBT community in one project.

• Projects create new opportunities to present work to potential promoters and have
diversified and enhanced programming for UK audiences. Projects have introduced
audiences and participants to cultural institutions from communities they had not
engaged with previously.

• Producing work that is meaningful to audiences in more than one country has proven
possible in some projects, and the inclusion of youth exchanges and residencies into
programming deepens cultural impact.

• Internationalising and improving programme quality has directly impacted on audience

size and expectations. The biannual music competition in York is now internationally
recognised and attracts entrants from around the world as a direct result of Creative
Europe investment.

35
10.5 Social impacts
• Projects have created professional opportunities and pathways for young people and
people from under-represented or marginalised groups, including targeted opportunities
for disabled practitioners, young people, and refugee artists. Projects have also led to
stronger local partnerships, with Higher Education links particularly referenced, as well
as the development of communities of practice.

• Social impacts arose through the strengthening and wider dissemination of the work of
socially engaged companies and one UK company pointed to how Creative Europe
projects had challenged preconceptions around inclusion. There have also been
impacts at policy level, through creating new community partnerships at regional level,
as well as through diversifying activities and programming for UK practitioners and
audiences.

• Priorities for Creative Europe in 2018 include promoting positive values around diversity,
civic engagement and international links, and UK organisations could be expected to
take a leading role given the country’s leadership and innovation in relation to socially
engaged practice. For example, in 2016, UK organisations led Refugee Integration
Projects that made up a quarter of the funding call’s overall budget.

• Projects’ impact at the local level also occur through the development of successful
creative partnerships with other local artists, the creation of a market for work with local
presenters, and the introduction of refugees and migrants to local cultural institutions.

10.6 Economic impacts

• Creative Europe has had a significant positive impact on output and employment for UK
partners. The majority of Creative Europe beneficiaries consulted state that Creative
Europe funding had been effective in growing their business or organisation. The
projects have helped some UK partners to scale up their operations, improve
infrastructure and develop talent.

• Organisational resilience is supported, extending, for example, to business expansion

and plans for a new venue. Full cost recovery in projects also makes a net contribution
to an organisation’s resilience.

• The credibility and profile of working internationally provides a platform for new funding
relationships and gives companies confidence to talk to investors.

• Four fifths of MEDIA TV Programming beneficiaries said their award helped to maximise
the project’s international market potential, and 95% indicated that the funding helped
complete the financial package allowing their project to go into production.

• Over half (52%) of MEDIA beneficiaries and two thirds (68%) of Culture beneficiaries
responding to the CEDUK survey stated that Creative Europe funding proved critical in
helping to secure additional investment.

• 59% of Culture and 41% of MEDIA respondents to the CEDUK survey secured
additional funding from UK sources as a result of their Creative Europe award, and 51%
and 33% respectively attracted investment from outside the UK.

36
10.7 The impacts of not participating in Creative Europe
• Many UK beneficiaries of Creative Europe funding thought that had participation not
been possible their position would be fundamentally different today, and in some cases
at every level of their organisation.

• Organisations would have lagged behind in new approaches and best practice in
production, marketing, dissemination and administration.

• A number of individual artists and producers would have not developed markets for
their work abroad.

• UK organisations and cultural leaders would have much less international influence as
their current roles in networks and partnerships would not have developed.

• Smaller organisations would have been particularly badly affected as they are
dependent on Creative Europe for the capacity and pathways to international working.
They have also benefitted from the credibility of international partnerships in securing
new investment and markets in the UK.

• There are concerns that UK students will not be eligible to join European initiatives and
ensembles, and future events, such as a major conference in 2020, will now not be
hosted in the UK. There will be no UK partners in the some subsequent project
proposals arising from some existing partnerships.

• A number of partners voiced concerns over the loss of mobility for staff and artists, and
the associated risks to projects and their core business.

• Partners are worried that additional administration and bureaucracy will be a barrier to
international collaboration and exchange. Smaller companies feel they will be
disproportionately affected.

• Some projects would simply not have been feasible at all without Creative Europe
funding. This applies to some projects that will go on to be self-sustaining and also
projects that will be embedded as transnational networks.

Loss of access to Creative Europe funding will be detrimental, especially to smaller

organisations whose international work relies heavily on EU funding. More generally, there
is widespread concern that barriers to ease of movement will effect touring. A recent Arts
Council England study found that around three quarters of respondents thought this
would impact negatively on their future touring work within the EU, and a similar number
that it would affect their UK based productions by reducing their ability to bring artists
and organisations into this country. UK organisations consulted for this report also
pointed to other concerns including increased administrative burdens, a loss of influence
and market position abroad, and reduced creative ambition in the UK.

37
11 Future priorities
11.1 Introduction
The Creative Europe programme has proven to be an asset to the UK’s cultural and
creative industries. A wide range of organisations, businesses, professionals, academics
and artists have directly benefited from investment and UK participation in projects.
Almost 90% of creative professionals support the continuation of UK involvement in
Creative Europe and when necessary, a successor scheme. This position was confirmed
in the research and interviews conducted for this report.

The current position is that UK organisations can continue to apply for the forthcoming
Creative Europe MEDIA and Culture sub-programme calls until December 2020 and that
successful Creative Europe applicants from the UK can receive funding until the end of
their projects. Looking to the future the findings of this reports suggests that a number of
priorities should be considered.

11.2 Priorities
• UK organisations should be encouraged to play a full part in Creative Europe until the
end of the current programme in 2020. Particular attention should be given to smaller
scale organisations.

• Continuing to liaise and align UK investment and projects with Creative Europe will
provide a platform for UK organisations and professionals to work with colleagues
throughout Europe, to influence developments and to contribute at the European level.

• The design of a successor programme that provides a project fund for international
partnerships of up to 4 years in duration. Such a fund could support UK organisations
to be a partner in projects based in other countries to lead their own initiatives.

• The needs and approaches of cultural and audio-visual organisations are different, so
continuing to offer a more technically specified range of grant opportunities to the latter
is recommended.

• A successor scheme should be future facing, be aligned across the CCS and across the
four nations of the UK, respond to increased demand for transnational projects, and
focused on the priorities of potential applicants rather than institutions.

• Any future scheme or schemes should have a simple framework of a small number of
priorities or principles that could also be applied beyond Europe and can be adopted
across institutions.

• The scheme should to commit to transparency of evaluation and quality of commentary

to applicants. Implementation should be supported by a mechanism committed to
diversifying take up of the scheme.

38
Appendix A - Surveys of UK Impacts
A1 Introduction
This section summarises the findings of the Mid-term Survey of Creative Europe impacts
in the UK, that brings together surveys of both the MEDIA sub-programme and the
Culture sub-programme. A summary of the key points that emerged from the surveys in
included in the appendices. Two online questionnaires were sent to over 3,000 contacts
held by CEDUK resulting in a response rate of around 20%. There were 242 Culture
survey responses spread across the UK and 378 MEDIA survey responses with the
majority from London based organisations. 172 respondents had successfully applied for
Creative Europe funding. Creative Scotland also conducted a survey in 2016 that elicited
188 responses of which 78 had received EU funding.

A2 The impact of Creative Europe

The results were consistently positive about Creative Europe.

• Over four fifths of survey respondents supported continued participation in Creative

Europe and were broadly supportive of the direction and priorities of the programme.

• A similar proportion stated that Creative Europe funding had been effective in growing
their business or organisation.

• Four fifths of MEDIA TV Programming beneficiaries said their award helped to maximise
the project’s international market potential and 95% indicated that the funding helped
complete the funding package allowing their project to go into production.

• Over 90% of Culture sub-programme beneficiaries pointed to benefits in partnership

development, including co-commissions and collaborations.

• Over half (52%) of MEDIA beneficiaries and two thirds (68%) of Culture beneficiaries
responding to the survey stated that Creative Europe funding proved critical in helping
to secure additional investment.

• 59% of Culture and 41% of MEDIA respondents secured additional funding from UK
sources as a result of their Creative Europe award, and 51% and 33% respectively
attracted investment from outside the UK.

• Culture sub-programme beneficiaries emphasised the value of international mobility and

exchange. Four fifths of survey respondents pointing to Creative Europe being effective
in internationalising staff and their organisation.

• A significant minority of respondents to the Culture survey are members of a European

Network supported by Creative Europe and of these, four fifths indicated membership
addressed the needs of both their organisation and the wider UK CCI.

39
• A quarter of MEDIA respondents have undertaken some form of Creative Europe-
funded training since 2012 and nearly all said the training enabled them to meet
potential collaborators (94%) and enhance their skills and knowledge (91%).

• Creative Europe funded market events have been attended by around half of the MEDIA
respondents and, of these, the great majority related how participation increased
access to collaborators, buyers and financiers.

A3 Creative Europe as a development platform

Respondents commented on how effective Creative Europe was as a developmental
platform, and pointed to a wide range of benefits, including:

• Expansion into international markets as well as internationalising programmes in the

UK.

• Credibility, and a good platform to secure investment from other sources.

• Scaling up of operations, including talent and infrastructure development.

• International partnership development, co-production, and collaboration, including

establishing production partnerships that function independently of Creative Europe.

• Incubation and start up of new projects, and kick starting of careers.

• The testing of new business models and ability to take creative risks, along with the
preparation time and development funds to improve the quality of scripts and
productions.

• Fulfilment of the complete cycle of project development, production and international

distribution.

• Skills and professional development that has directly translated into employment,
business development and project opportunities.

• Creative Europe markets and events have been the trigger for co-productions, pre-sales
and distribution deals.

A4 The process
The survey results were also supportive of CEDUK across the full range of activities
employed to support Creative Europe participation. This ranged from a high level of
satisfaction with CEDUK support and advice to the quality of content and organisation of
CEDUK activities. One respondent also pointed out that more opportunities to research,
meet, and network with organisations in other countries would strengthen applications.
Despite the satisfaction with CEDUK support there were some reservations about the
technical nature of the application process, which some applicants found off-putting. The
length of time from application to decision was also queried.

40
Suggestions for change or improvement were mostly about increasing the accessibility
and reach of the programme, including a focus for children and young people,
encouraging diversity of beneficiaries and participants, and improved support for new
entrants and smaller companies. The Mid-term Survey results are compelling, but present
a stronger body of evidence around the impact of the MEDIA sub-programme than the
Culture sub-programme. The Culture sub-programme supports a more diverse range of
organisations and projects. With this in mind a supplementary process of consultation
was carried out in November 2017.

A5 The Creative Scotland survey

The findings of the 2016 survey were consistent with the later Mid-term Survey.
Respondents had worked with partners in 14 countries: Bulgaria, Denmark, Estonia,
Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Netherlands, Portugal, Romania,
Spain and Sweden. Key survey findings included:

• European Funding is highly valued by those who received it. In particular, respondents
very strongly agreed that the involvement in EU funded projects opened up new
networks and involved new partnerships.

• There were concerns about the future travel and free movement of people, including:
the ability to travel for work or practice; the commissioning or recruitment of EU based
artists; increased costs and administration for programming international artists;
international collaboration within the EU. Many of these respondents highlighted the
high level of EU travel they currently undertake as part of their work or practice. 


A6 Creative Europe in the UK 2014-15 - MEDIA sub-programme report

The report provided a breakdown of the first two years of the Creative Europe MEDIA
sub-programme impact in the UK. The UK received €28.5m MEDIA funding: €16m in
grants to support 82 UK companies and 53 UK cinemas in the Europa Cinemas network,
and €12.5m in investment to support the distribution of British films in other European
counties.

Over half of the direct income awarded to the UK went to film and TV producers or video
games developers. 16 UK production companies received funding with the strength of the
animation sector in South West England performing particularly strongly. Creative Europe
development funding led to the production of several critically acclaimed films (e.g.
Brooklyn, High Rise and Carol). A number of case studies demonstrated how the funds
enabled development and enhanced production value thereby increasing competitiveness
in the international market place (e.g. shooting in real locations). It also afforded
producers the time to experiment at the start to be able to get the project right.

41
UK producers benefited from €5.9m of direct funding for television programming across
18 productions led by UK companies and 3 led by other European companies. This
represents 23% of the overall Creative Europe funding for this area of work. Six video
games producers received funding of over €0.625m with beneficiaries emphasising the
importance of this work in the early stages of production and the resulting impact on the
quality of the work.

The sub-programme also funds distribution through four strands (selective, automatic,
and digital distribution, and sales agents). Eleven UK distributors received €1.2m of
funding to release 31 European films in the UK. A further €0.7m was allocated in the UK
through the Automatic Distribution Fund, which allows distributors to be more
experimental with the films they launch in the UK market. Across Europe this scheme
allocated €35m of which a quarter of the funds benefited UK films. Three UK distributors
received funding for VoD amounting to €1.8. Three sales agents were allocated a total of
€0.44m to enhance their performance in selling European film.

The sub-programme also supports training, markets and industry events. Nine UK
training providers were supported and four industry events received funding. Case
studies and testimonials from participants point to a range of direct benefits to the UK’s
industry professionals. Two UK film festivals received funding (out of a total of 80 across
Europe) and 53 UK cinemas were supported as part of the Europa Cinemas network of
around 900 independent cinemas across Europe.

The UK performed particularly well in relation to funding for film literacy and audience
development, receiving almost a quarter of the €1.9m of available funds in 2014. This has
enabled UK organisations like the BFI and the Scottish Documentary Institute to be at the
leading edge of developments in this field.

42
Appendix B - The Impact Workshops
B1 Introduction
CEDUK organised two impact workshops with Creative Europe beneficiaries in
September 2017, in Manchester and in London. The results were organised under five
headings:

• Innovation and skills

• Economic impact

• Prosperity/ influence / attraction

• Audiences and cultural impact

• Internationalisation and networks.

Participants commented on a number of positive impacts of being part of Creative

Europe projects that can be summarised as follows:

B2 Innovation and skills

Project / Partner Comment

Literature Across Literary translation skills and digital dissemination of literature

Frontiers

Yorkshire Dance Artistic innovation in programming and creative process

Centre Trust

Pilot Theatre Use of transnational creative forums for training connected to producing theatre
for the digital age

PRS Foundation Upskilling connected to new business models and processes

Village Underground

Candoco Dance International exchange and training to develop artists skills

Company New approaches to choreographic research

Village Underground Training in academic and research methods for incorporation into working
practices

Gravity & Levity Specialist technical production skills development and innovative techniques

Crying Out Loud New approaches and techniques for evaluating artists progress and development

Aerowaves Development of young and emerging writers through intensive work with
Springback Academy international professional cohort

East London An innovative approach to skills development with young and emerging creative
Makerspace professionals, directly linked to employment potential
ACTIONDOG

43
B3 Economic impact
Project / Partner Comment

Candoco Dance New funding partnerships between public and third sectors.
Company New opportunities to present work to potential promoters.

PRS Foundation New income streams for participants and their companies.

Arts Admin Scaling up of work through new markets for work and longer term planning.

ACTIONDOG New fundraising opportunities, including public sector and crowdfunding.

Sadler’s Wells Match funding leverage to create more productions and work that directly
translates into more jobs.
Sharing of costs and risk on new productions that makes them feasible.

Aerowaves Artists offered performances around the world as a result of performing in Spring
Springback Academy Forward. New markets and increased sustainability.

B4 Prosperity/ influence / attraction

Project / Partner Comment

Gravity & Levity The knowledge exchange involved in coming together for the application and
project has benefited the overall prosperity and visibility of the organisation.

Candoco Dance The evaluation model of the project created a resource/tool that was widely
Company disseminated across the sector.
Increased the profile and influence of the smaller partners through collaboration
with larger and more established partners.

Shubbak Festival The project created a platform that supported Arab artists to continue to work and
develop their careers in collaboration with UK organisations.

PRS Foundation The creation and widespread dissemination of a developmental manifesto.

Impacting on gender equality through policy development.

Sadler’s Wells Challenging preconceptions around age and disability and increasing
opportunities. The theatre sector increasing social role and influencing policy.

Aerowaves The project has resulted in many other organisations approaching Aerowaves to
Springback Academy be a partner.

Arts Admin Working collaboratively with international partners has created a more influential
voice concerning arts and environment.

The National Centre The work has increased the international credibility and the national influence of
for Early Music the Centre.

Yorkshire Dance One of the few local arts organisations managing to work internationally which is
Centre Trust proving to be a strong asset to the wider international agenda of public bodies,
and particularly the city of Leeds.

44
Project / Partner Comment

Night of Festivals The joined up communications effort across the international partners had a
(ArtReach) bigger impact than would have been achieved by each partner working
independently.

Literature Across The development of expertise in cultural leadership influenced developments in

Frontiers (Aberystwyth Wales and the UK.
University)

B5 Audiences and cultural impact

Project / Partner Comment

Candoco Dance Broadening perceptions of the value of inclusive practice across the sector.
Company

Gravity & Levity Audience involvement in the whole process, including rehearsals, deepening the
audience relationship.

Arts Admin Delivering work in previously unreachable locations.

Locating and presenting work in the optimum venues.

Sadler’s Wells The digital dissemination of work to people that can’t go to the theatre.
Enhanced cooperation with European partners.

Village Underground The project finally enable the company to deliver audience development training
and to analyse audience segmentation.

Shubbak Festival Diversifying and enhancing programming for UK audiences.

Aerowaves Developing authoritative voices for dance in the wider cultural sector.
Springback Academy

ACTIONDOG Involving university and the local community in the project and programme.

Pilot Theatre Producing work that is meaningful to audiences in more than one country.
Youth exchanges and residencies into the programme for cultural impact.

The National Centre Internationalising and improving programme quality directly impacting on audience
for Early Music size and expectations.

Literature Across Impact on programming and particularly the internationalisation of the sector in the
Frontiers (Aberystwyth UK.
University)

Yorkshire Dance New pathways to audiences and targeting of LGBT community.

Centre Trust

45
B6 Internationalisation and networks
Project / Partner Comment

Pilot Theatre The project led to keying into other networks (like IETM).
This led to work with projects showcased in South Africa and an invitation to the
Commonwealth Games in Australia.

Literature Across Linking with the literary translation network has led to to opportunities for UK
Frontiers (Aberystwyth authors and translators.
University)

Yorkshire Dance Participation in the Aerowaves network led to Creative Europe funding and long
Centre Trust term investment in productive international relationships.

PRS Foundation The project partners and associate festivals intend to work together on
international projects in the future.

Candoco Dance Growing a network of organisations working exclusively with disabled people in
Company each partner country with particular success in Italy.
Developing cross-cultural capacity building through networks of professional
inclusive organisations.

Sadler’s Wells A sharing of best practice and new networks to produce new work.

Gravity & Levity The process of preparing a project application has already led to a much wider
global network and increased international profile.
Cooperation has already resulted in external creative projects between
international partners.

Arts Admin The development of an international network of cultural organisations involved in

environmental issues.

46
Appendix C - CEDUK Collaborate Day
C1 The event
CEDUK brought together over 100 creative and audiovisual professionals to debate the
value of international working. This also gave a platform for Creative Europe project
participants to present their experiences of working with Creative Europe. The event took
place in Rich Mix (East London) in July 2107. The key points raised relevant to the current
and future relationship between the UK and Creative Europe were:

C2 The content
Creative Europe (and other EU programmes) offers UK organisations a multi-lateral
engagement with potential partners throughout Europe and globally. Projects help
organisations to overcome barriers to, and deal with the mechanics and administrative
requirements of international working. Projects can also be global gateways leading to
relationships and collaboration elsewhere in the world. There were comments about work
with Japan, South Korea and Mexico in the discussion.

Creative Europe stimulates and provides for cross sectoral and inter-disciplinary
relationships that are increasingly important, such as: education, science research, Higher
Education, digital platforms and engagement. Projects have also, in some cases, given a
voice to young people. Participants commented on how the Programme enables young
people to travel, expand their skills, develop their careers, enhance communication
abilities, and discover new methods.

Creative Europe is recognised and endorsed by a broad range of stakeholders. This both
supports cross sectoral working and lends credibility and influence to participants. It also
means that partners can develop work that reflects the globalised context of audiences.
Creative Europe “touches on the entire eco-system of European film globally”, stimulating
innovation, investment and new business models.

Creative Europe is part of a ‘family’ of EU programmes that include Horizon 2020 and
Erasmus +. This means that participants can align their plans and development priorities
with their engagement with the EU. The focus on innovation, skills and training in Creative
Europe also supports participants in strengthening their own organisation and business
model. The application process itself can act as an ‘accelerator button’ for partners in
moving forward their development plans.

47
The programme creates the space and time that allows people from participating projects
(including artists, administrators, stakeholders and participants) to develop dialogue,
partnerships and exchange. This fosters international citizenship and our capacity to
contribute on issues like climate change and migration. Projects have included training
and development for staff and participants to support their ability to act in these thematic
areas.

Learning about different structures, systems and ways of thinking is helpful in both
improving work in the UK as well as operating internationally. The focus of Creative
Europe on partnerships is a particularly effective approach to this kind of knowledge
exchange. It also leads to unexpected collaborations and partnerships. Forums and
workshops have been ‘the birthplace of ideas’ and have also addressed sectoral gaps.

Projects can be up to 4 years in duration and finance can cover the entire process:
development to production to distribution to promotion to evaluation. Progression is also
possible through applications for a subsequent phase, and European Networks can also
consolidate the work of networks.

Participants voiced a number of concerns about the impact of the UK no longer

participating in Creative Europe. There is already some impact in terms of organisations
being removed from project leadership roles. It is also anticipated that a reduction in HE
enrolment from the EU27 will have a knock on effect to some UK partners. Participants
thought that the consequent net reduction in investment will reduce creative ambition,
and that increased bureaucracy around work permits and visas will disadvantage smaller
and mid scale organisations. It is also anticipated that more challenging UK films may be
considered to be too much of a risk by European distributors.

48
Appendix D - Case Studies &
Testimonials
D1 Introduction
CEDUK produced a range of case studies in 2017 and this has been supplemented in the
preparation of this report. The case studies revealed a range of positive impacts for UK
partners that will be organised using the proposed impact framework of the British
Council’s recently published report into evaluation.:

D2 The impacts
Impact Statement 1: The development of social outcomes of targeted individuals which
contributes towards greater social inclusion and social engagement.

Project / Partner Comment

Journeys Festival The introduction of refugees and migrants to local cultural institutions and those
International institutions responding with new programming ideas

Live Music Now Music Across Borders

ISIS Arts - Corners of The ISIS Arts designed the local project focus to be on coalfield areas where
Europe Europe is considered as remote. The impact of bringing artists from elsewhere in
Europe to work in these areas was considerable, particularly in relation to a
recognition of shared values.

Candoco Dance The project stimulated inclusive work across Europe, demonstrating that inclusive
Company - Moving work was of the highest quality, and to create a fair representation of disabled
Beyond Inclusion artists.

Centre for the Moving The project trains young people to be film programmers. This led to a notable
Image - The Crossing increase in the number of young people at screenings, as well as developing the
Lines Project partners ability to work effectively with young people.

Impact Statement 2: Cultural professionals develop their knowledge, skills and networks.

Project / Partner Comment

Curated Place The project delivered the transnational mobility of composers, artists, producers
and musicians to experience collaborative culture.

London International LIFT is part of four cooperation projects. In 2016 2/3 of its programme was
Festival of Theatre supported through Creative Europe through four different projects.
(LIFT) LIFT believes that working in partnerships reduces the risk and enables greater
risk taking

49
Project / Partner Comment

National Dance The Point in Hampshire indicated that preparing externally facing bids of scale
Network (NDN) forces them to sharpen their thinking.

ISIS Arts Professional development of key staff that has directly improved their careers.
Involvement of Erasmus+ students through placements. (The Digital Platform
Coordinator began work with ISIS through this route).
A wide breadth of impact across the whole ISIS team and the pool of freelancers
they work with.

Journeys Festival The creation of a market for his work with local presenters, such as Portsmouth
International Theatre Royal and Portsmouth University.
The development of a successful creative partnership with another local artist and
connections with a wider circle of artists.

Live Music Now Skills development of participants led to employment and opportunity (one
Scotland - Music example was a viola player who is now employed by LMN. Expanding musicians
Across Borders skillsets (education, working with people with dementia and outreach working)
improved their employability in a very competitive labour market. For example
these skills were key to a clarinettist securing a position with the BBC
Philharmonic Orchestra.

The Place - Pivot Dance worked with young producers, artists and audiences- partnering them
Aerowaves & Pivot with producers to strengthen their business model to help them way beyond the
Dance life of the programme. This has resulted in their performing in 3 European
countries, including showcasing in festivals and international residencies . This
has been key in the development of this early stage of his career.

Dundee & Angus Students benefited from mobility and residencies abroad, as well as linking to
College - ‘SYMBOLS - artists based abroad. The project supported interdisciplinary and cross
Culture of Death & departmental working at the College. Staff members developed their practice
Cultural Life’. through working with colleagues from other countries.

Impact Statement 3: Arts and cultural organisations in the UK and target countries raise
their profile, showcase UK arts and increase the economic value of their partnerships
contributing towards UK’s influence and attraction in the World.

Project / Partner Comment

Curated Place The project has shown 120 original works and enabled 10 composers to work
through international collaborative relationships.

Made@EU Made at EU’s aim is to remove existing barriers for wide use of digital fabrication
technologies amongst European Creatives. 3D printing and scanning have
opened up new production and distribution opportunities.The project has created
education materials, development workshops, residency programmes, exhibitions,
and an online platform for craft promotion.

Journeys Festival Aspex Visual Arts Trust developed new partnerships across sectors that supports
International a growth strategy. The project created a critical mass of local impact that raises
the overall reach and profile of the work.

ISIS Arts Hosting of the annual Culture Action Europe conference in Newcastle supported
international connectivity and this is particularly important in areas outside of
London. In this case it also led to stronger national relationships with bodies like
the Creative Industries Federation.

50
Project / Partner Comment

The National Centre The primary impact has been national profile. NCEM involvement in European
for Early Music partnerships has lent weight to their status as a national organisation not based in
London.

The EUBO Mobile The project linked 10 EMBA members located throughout Europe. This led to an
Baroque Academy overall increase in international working, including a new initiative with Quebec
that was an indirect consequence of the project.

Candoco Dance The UK is considered to be a leader in professional inclusive arts and it has been
Company - Moving useful to learn about the challenges of working in other countries. Most of the
Beyond Inclusion benefits will be in the longer term arising from the relationships developed with
audiences and presenters, the building of networks and the training of artists.

Village Underground - Consistent and longer term engagement with Creative Europe projects and
Creative Lenses networks instils the confidence and skills to be better at your job and to take
advantage of the opportunities for transnational working that arise. It also allows
for influence abroad in areas where the UK leads, such as multi-cultural
approaches to culture.

Impact Statement 4: The arts and cultural infrastructure and creative economies of the
UK, cities and target countries are strengthened through investment and collaboration.

Project / Partner Comment

Curated Place Of 6 new music commissions, 4 have been transformed into touring digital work. It
connected a fragmented cultural landscape. The aim is now to incorporate more
partners and the organisation is leading an application to become a large
Cooperation Project.

The European Union The benefits is that they have met and continue to meet 9 other partner
Baroque Orchestra organisations which has lead on to other collaborations.

National Dance Yorkshire Dance stated this is an almost unique source of funding for the
Network (NDN) expansion of artistic partnerships,

ISIS Arts New approaches to resilience and reducing core donor dependency, including
‘stepping outside of familiar structures’.
Increased credibility and a platform to diversify funding. For example the project
directly led a new funding partnership with the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation.

The National Centre An increase in programme quality creating an expanded and loyal audience for
for Early Music early music. Strengthened links with conservatoires and universities (Royal
Academy, York and Huddersfield universities) concerning student placements,
PhD candidate participation and collaborative approaches to programme
presentation.

Creative Carbon Part of the project, Green Tease, was continued as a national programme to build
Scotland - The Green a community of practice and now work works in a number of major cities as well
Art Lab Alliance as rural towns like Hawick.

The Fence - Crossing Learning from other business models and approaches, such as the French partner
the Line running an integrated operation that includes two restaurants. Understanding the
different policy and operating environment in different countries has contributed to
establishing new international partnerships.

The Place - The project manager has also directly transformed his practice through working
Aerowaves & Pivot with Creative Europe, developing learning about contextual approaches to
Dance audience development to a UK situation.

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D3 Culture for Cities and Regions
Culture for Cities and Regions is a European Commission initiative funded by the Creative
Europe programme to support cities and regions in making sound investments in culture.
The project started in January 2015 and ran until September 2017. The aim was that that
cities and regions involved in the project place culture at the heart of their territorial
development strategies to achieve long lasting results that will be widely shared and
showcased widely in Europe. The key themes of the project were:

• Culture and the creative industries for local economic development and urban
regeneration

• Cultural heritage as a driver for economic growth and social inclusion

• Culture for social inclusion, social innovation and intercultural dialogue.

The project involved 15 thematic visits and 70 case studies including a number of UK
studies. The case studies include a number of UK initiatives that have the potential to
develop as a Creative Europe project (mostly Co-operation Project potential), including:

• Edinburgh Museums Alive - Cross-sectorial cooperation (Health and Social Care) has
resulted in capacity building at different levels for the organising team itself, and also
improved the skills and knowledge in working with older people.

• Culture on your Doorstep - The aim is to engage local residents with quality cultural
activities that are relevant and accessible in local neighbourhoods. It is based on a
model that has been shared with other cities in the UK and Europe, as there is potential
for a similar approach to be taken by other local authorities.

• Creative Industries: Support for Growth: “Dundee: pushing for growth through creative
industries” - Collaborative working and networking stimulate a dynamic creative
ecosystem and enterprise education encourages young talents to launch their own
creative start-ups.

• Beyond the ECoC year: strategic planning for lasting impacts - Enhancing transparency
and planning to help in securing investment, and cementing trust among partners and
potential investors.

• High House Production Park: inspiring vocations and delivering skills for success -
HHPP is raising Thurrock’s profile in the creative sector in the UK and internationally.
This is key to securing further investment. The aim is to expand the cluster of creative
businesses and nurture an ethos of collaboration between park tenants and the wider
community.

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Appendix E - Interviews
E1 Consultees

Consultee Organisation Project

Cathie Boyd, Director Cryptic Sonica Festival

Joanne Bushnell, Director Aspex Journeys Festival International

Clymene Christoforou, Director ISIS Arts Corners Project

Kate Deans, Culture Officer, CEDUK

Scotland

Mijos Dhana Jidos Reality Journeys Festival International

Cherry Fricker, The National Centre for EEEMerging

Early Music

Richard Heason St Johns Smith Square EUBO Mobile Baroque Academy

Carsten Hermann, Conservation Historic Environment

architect, advisor and researcher Scotland

Gemma Lawrence Creative Carbon The Green Art Lab Alliance

Scotland

Joanne Lyons Candoco Dance Moving Beyond Inclusion

Company

Carol Main, Director Live Music Now

Scotland

Jonathon Meth, Curator The Fence Janus Culture Project

Natalia Michalska Artist Journeys Festival International

Eddie Nixon, Head of Theatre The Place Aerowaves, Humane Body, Pivot Dance,
European Dance House Network

Luke O’Shaughnessy, Project Opera Vision Opera Vision

Manager

Lol Scragg, Project Lead, Dundee & Angus Symbols

International & Commercial College
Projects

Amélie Snyers Village Underground Creative Lenses, Trans Europe Halles,

Liveurope

Michael Walling, Founder Border Crossings Culture Programme 2009

Christina Wigmore, Business & Soft Touch Arts Journeys Festival International
Strategic Director

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E2 Introduction
Consultation with a range of beneficiaries of the Creative Europe Culture sub-programme
was carried out by face to face and skype interviews. The aim was to capture the full
range of impacts of Creative Europe beyond the institutional framing of the key
stakeholder agencies. Creative Europe remains wedded to outcomes that are qualitative
and operate at the European level. The mechanisms focus on the mobility of practitioners,
international collaboration and partnerships, and inter-cultural dialogue. The list of
consultees is contained in the report appendices.

54
E3 The interviews
a. Joanne Bushnell, Director, Aspex Visual Arts Trust
Aspex is a small contemporary art gallery in Portsmouth that focuses on giving artists
opportunities at the beginning of their careers. The gallery’s international experience was
limited to two pop-up projects in the Venice Biennale. However, Aspex have worked on
an Interreg 2 Seas Project with partners in France and Belgium and an Interreg project
called ‘PONToon’ with the Faculty of Creative and Cultural Industries at the University of
Portsmouth, developing digital tools to support the employment of young women.
Participation in Interreg has provided a good grounding for the ‘significantly simpler’
Creative Europe programme. It also demonstrated how artist exchanges can lead to
ambitious projects and commissions. Aspex are now at the point in their growth where
they see participation in Creative Europe as an opportunity to deepen their international
connections and they welcomed the chance to be involved in the Journeys Festival
project. This began in a small way in 2016 and developed into a larger role this year,
including hosting the launch of the festival.

Impacts have included:

• The creation of new local partnerships across sectors.

• New international connections in Italy.

• Presenting local artists in Europe.

b. Clymene Christoforou, Executive Co-Director, ISIS Arts

Involvement in Creative Europe has had a major impact across the ISIS Arts team and
they would not be connected to Europe through, for example, Clymene’s current Board
membership of Culture Action Europe. This engagement has a range of impacts. At local
and regional level the hosting of the annual Culture Action Europe conference in
Newcastle supported international connectivity and this is particularly important in areas
outside London. In this case it also led to stronger national relationships with bodies like
the Creative Industries Federation. It also directly benefits participating artists from the
UK who almost all go on to further transnational work.

The most recent and ambitious ISIS Creative Europe project is Corners of Europe. Staff
members play key roles in its delivery: Matt Pickering is the Digital Platform Coordinator;
Clymene the Local Coordinator; and Sharon Bailey the Digital Engagement Programme
Coordinator. The ISIS Arts designed the local project focus to be on coalfield areas where
Europe is considered as remote. The impact of bringing artists from elsewhere in Europe
to work in these areas was considerable, particularly in relation to a recognition of shared
values. The project deliberately created spaces and mechanisms to stimulate local
conversations. The practical impacts of being involved with the project have included:

• New approaches to resilience and reducing core donor dependency, including ‘stepping
outside of familiar structures’.

55
• Increased credibility and a platform to diversify funding. For example, the project
directly led a new funding partnership with the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation.

• Professional development of key staff that has directly improved their careers.

• Involvement of Erasmus+ students through placements. (The Digital Platform

Coordinator began work with ISIS through this route).

• A wide breadth of impact across the whole ISIS team and the pool of freelancers they
work with.

• Project duration of 4 years translates into opportunities for new investment partnerships
and project initiatives.

c. Majid Dhana, Jidos Reality

Majid was part of the Journeys Festival International Project, a Creative Europe funded
project produced by UK based company ArtReach that received and award of €200,000
as part of the 2016 call for Cross-Sectoral Refugee Integration Projects. He is a poet who
was originally from Zimbabwe and has been based in the UK for 14 years. He uses his
own experiences of the immigration process to explore refugees experiences and to
support the integration of migrants and refugees, working with them and with people in
the communities where they live.

The impacts of the project were:

• The development of a successful creative partnership with another local artist and
connections with a wider circle of artists.

• The creation of a market for his work with local presenters, such as Portsmouth Theatre
Royal and Portsmouth University.

• The introduction of refugees and migrants to local cultural institutions and those
institutions responding with new programming ideas.

d. Cherry Fricker, Events and Operations Manager, The National Centre for Early Music
The involvement of The National Centre for Early Music (NCEM) involvement in the
Emerging European Ensembles (EEEMERGING ) project arose from its Director’s position
as Board member of the REMA European Early Music Network and associated
conversations with peers around Europe who wanted to work together. The Centre had
previously been part of an EACEA funded festival in 2013 and EEE began in 2014. The
project involves hosting residencies, a young musician competition, new approaches to
audience development and business models, and attracting young musicians to early
music. Each partner has a lead specialism and NECM’s is education, working with a local
school. The project is a platform for an impending Large Scale Cooperation project
application. The involvement of NCEM has been guaranteed by the partners regardless of
the status of the EU and UK relationship. There are concerns about the practicalities of
musician’s mobility to and from the UK in the future. The project has had an evaluating
partner as part of the activity programme. Impacts include:

56
• The primary impact has been national profile. NCEM involvement in European
partnerships has lent weight to their status as a national organisation not based in
London.

• The biannual music competition in York is now internationally recognised and attracts
entrants from around the world.

• The recognition of, and means of addressing, the skills gap between UK and ensembles
elsewhere in Europe.

• An increase in programme quality, creating an expanded and loyal audience for early
music.

• Staff development, including project management capacity and administration.

• An expansion of European collaboration and European relationships that will be

sustained regardless of future UK and EU relations.

• Strengthened links with conservatoires and universities (Royal Academy, York and
Huddersfield universities) concerning student placements, PhD candidate participation
and collaborative approaches to programme presentation.

• Progression translating into creative employment and market development figuring in

the project currently under development.

e. Richard Heason, Director, St John’s Smith Square

Richard is a Board member of the REMA European Early Music Network and The EUBO
Mobile Baroque Academy (EMBA) is a Cooperation project that addresses the unequal
provision across the European Union of baroque music education and performance in
new and creative ways and is currently based in London. The project is deeply affected
by Brexit plans and is relocating to Antwerp in 2017. This means that the project
administration will relocate and the use of UK instrument tutors will be curtailed as well as
a loss of work for UK musicians and cessation of education work. This particularly applies
to freelance musicians. A live streaming project of work at St John’s Smith Square has
also been put on hold. There are concerns that UK students will not be eligible to join the
orchestra and future events, such as a major conference in 2020, will not be hosted in the
UK. There will be no UK partners in the subsequent project proposals. This is a significant
change in approach as the UK has been a driving force in the development of the
network, and even though the UK remains technically eligible to participate in Creative
Europe projects, potential partners are now hesitant. There are also concerns that the
concert programme of St John’s Smith Square will also be hit by difficulties to freedom of
movement for artists.

The impacts of Creative Europe have been:

• An overall increase in international working, including a new initiative with Quebec that
was an indirect consequence of the project.

• Networking as EMBA has 10 members located throughout Europe.

• Development of the skills and confidence to work internationally for both administrators
and musicians.

• Involvement in, and influencing of, new areas of practice and professional development.

57
• The development of new digital and technical pathways to audiences.

f. Gemma Lawrence, Creative Carbon Scotland

Creative Carbon Scotland (CCS) were part of the Large Scale Cooperation project ‘The
Green Art Lab Alliance’ (2013 - 2015). CCS began as an Associate Partner but migrated
into a full partnership role, managing tasks for the project as a whole, including organising
the final project meeting in Glasgow’s Tramway. This meeting was opened up to local
professionals to build capacity and partnerships. Gemma was heavily involved, attending
three international meetings and working with 15 international professionals with similar
specialist interests, which was personally validating.

Impacts included:

• Validation of national and local initiatives and professional approaches of participants in

an emerging field.

• Raised the national and international profile of a ‘young’ organisation (CCS).

• Supported other strategic initiatives, including Glasgow’s bid to become a European

Green Capital.

• Direct professional and skills development for the CCS team. This included ‘spin-off’
activities such as Gemma’s participating in a week long residency programme in
Abruzzo. It also included up-skilling to meet the project management and administrative
responsibilities of the project.

• The Scottish project element included ‘Green Tease’, which continues as a national
project.

• Ongoing international collaboration, including an arts and sustainability residency with

the Maastricht partner in 2016.

g. Joanne Lyons, General Manager, Candoco Dance Company

Candoco are lead partner on the ‘Moving Beyond Inclusion’ project that brings together
six inclusive dance companies and presenters from across Europe. The aim was to
stimulate this area of work across Europe, to demonstrate that inclusive work was of the
highest quality, and to create a fair representation of disabled artists. Candoco is the
leading dance company working with disabled and non disabled people in Europe and
the other partners are less experienced and smaller in scale. This had an immediate
impact in that initial plans for a 4 year project were reduced to 2 years as the smaller
partners could not commit to the more ambitious timescale. This meant that the
production end of the project was removed. However, Joanne is clear that Candoco have
learnt as much from the partners as they learnt from Candoco around topics like buildings
and physical access, and communications and website access. The UK is considered to
be a leader in professional inclusive arts and it has been useful to learn about the
challenges of working in other countries. Most of the benefits will be in the longer term
arising from the relationships developed with audiences and presenters, the building of
networks and the training of artists. Candoco have found the project administration and
reporting quite onerous. The company is also concerned about mobility as most of their

58
dancers are from other European countries and there is a high level of mobility in
contemporary dance.

Impacts of the project include:

• The immediate commissioning of one company to work with disabled artists in a major
Italian production.

• Artists being commissioned by other partners to create work.

• The small scale project successfully piloted a model that will now be developed into a
more ambitious project.

• The partners are now linked to major networks and the associated opportunities
through the raised profile and credibility that comes with being part of a Creative Europe
Project.

• There has been a high level of learning and knowledge exchange between the
companies and their key staff.

• The project has increased the pool of artists that companies like Candoco can use.

h. Carol Main, Director, Live Music Now Scotland

Live Music Now Scotland (LMN) is part of a UK-wide network with branches in other
European countries. Carol is Director of Live Music Now Scotland and Live Music Now
International Development (UK). There is an ongoing international focus in their work with
current collaborations in Germany, Austria, Italy and Ireland. There will be a LMN
international conference in Paris in 2018. Live Music Now Scotland has been interested in
developing and leading a Creative Europe application but limited capacity makes it
difficult to devote the resources required.

A project based organisation dependent on annual funding applications is a difficult

platform to prepare Creative Europe applications from. So LMN ‘hangs on to the coat tails
of other organisations’ to participate in Creative Europe projects, particularly the
European Federation of Youth Orchestras and the European Music Council. Live Music
Now Scotland is actively engaged in cultural diplomacy, working closely with the Scottish
Government on events with Estonia, Ireland and Bulgaria. This work is devised to further
LMN’s core purpose. For example, a visit to Brussels related to Scottish Government
links to the Estonian presidency of the EU included three concerts in international
schools. In Ireland, the cultural diplomacy events have led on to work to establish a LMN
Ireland operation based on a nucleus of 5 venues and with Scottish Government support.
A Scottish Government showcase event in Paris has led to the establishment of a LMN
branch in France and ongoing exchange of musicians. LMN Scotland is very dependent
on young musicians from the non-UK EU 27 and there are concerns that reductions in
student numbers from these countries will impact on future quality and sustainability. The
impacts of Creative Europe supported work have been:

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• Skills development of participants leading to employment and opportunity (one example
was a viola player who is now employed by LMN.

• Expanding musicians skillset (education and outreach working) that improves their
employability in a very competitive labour market. For example these skills were key to
a clarinettist securing a position with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra.

• Specialist training in areas like working with people with dementia.

• Creating the relationships and confidence to initiate projects. One participant went on to
form an ensemble with Spanish and UK musicians.

• Raising the profile of LMN in Europe leading to opportunities for development.

i. Jonathon Meth, Curator, The Fence

Jonathon has been part of two Creative Europe projects. The first project was 10 years
ago but there are still impacts occurring as a result. The project began to take form after
he attended his first European network meeting, an IETM meeting in Vienna, attended by
around 500 professionals and wondered how he could involve UK playwrights in
European theatre. Birmingham hosted a subsequent IETM meeting and this provided an
opportunity to discuss and develop the Janus project, a a one-year playwright exchange
and translation programme that successfully applied to the EACEA Culture Programme.
This modest initiative is now a network involving 50 countries with upcoming meetings
happening in Cairo and Sofia. The Culture Programme funding acted as incubation
investment for a project that is ‘de-centred’ and does not require institutional support.

The latest Creative Europe project, Crossing the Line, is a Small Scale Cooperation
Project involving three companies specialising in work with learning disabled people.
These established companies had never had the opportunity to work with their peers and
a strong bond was created between that led to invitations to festivals and to tour work. It
also led to wider transnational collaboration with, for example, Quebecois directors. A
Large Scale Cooperation Project with 7 companies is now being planned. Jonathon
emphasises the importance of a programme with priorities that give applicants clarity of
purpose, but the space to devise their own high level outcomes.

Impacts include:

• The UK partner, Mind the Gap, is now much better prepared to work transnationally.

• Learning from other business models and approaches, such as the French partner
running an integrated operation that includes two restaurants.

• Understanding the different policy and operating environment in different countries has
contributed to establishing new international partnerships.

• A progression route that enables partners to develop, reflect and grow before
embarking on another project.

• The professional development of project staff.

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j. Natalia Michalska, Multi-Disciplinary Artist
Natalia worked with Majid (see note) on the Journeys Festival International project in
Portsmouth. She first became involved through her involvement in the ‘look up’ project
initiative that became part of ‘Journeys’. She worked with 11 refugees and asylum
seekers as part of the project and found the lead partner’s capacity to organise spaces
and to mount major outdoor exhibitions made a big impact in local engagement and
profile of the work. This led to a critical mass and profile, with local journalists becoming
excited about the work. However, she was not aware of the Creative Europe connection
when working on the project. Natalia appreciated the opportunity to pursue a multi-
disciplinary approach and to explore the use of new technologies in her work. She gained
new experience and skills and this has led to a new partnership project with a university
in the UK, and to her refreshing creative links with practitioners in Germany working with
VR and augmented reality.

Impacts included:

• Creating a critical mass of local impact that raises the overall reach and profile of the
work.

• New partnerships that have matured into new project opportunities.

• Introducing audiences and participants to cultural institutions from communities they

had never engaged with previously.

• The development of professional skills.

• The confidence and appetite to pursue further international collaboration.

k. Eddie Nixon, Head of Theatre, The Place

The Place has been involved in a range of Creative Europe Projects dating back to the
Culture Programme that preceded Creative Europe, including the European Dance House
Network, Aerowaves, The Pivot Project and Humane Body. This translates into being part
of a Network with 17 partners and a €4.5m budget as well as a Small Scale Cooperation
project. One project is on its second tranche of funding. As a consequence of this depth
of involvement in Creative Europe the programme has had a major impact on the
organisation. The key impacts have been in three areas:

• The Place has achieved a status and visibility that has directly led to inward investment,
access to international markets and sectoral growth.

• Organisational and staff development has benefited both from direct involvement in
delivering the projects, and participation in training and placement project activities.

• The impact on artists, including ‘start up’ companies has been dramatic. In the case of
the Aerowaves Project work produced for festivals is seen by 200 promoters across the
world.

The Place can identify long term impacts on the sector as a result of Creative Europe,
pointing to how involvement in the Aerowaves project transforming one company from
staging 5 performances a year to 70 performances across 20 countries. Eddie has also
directly transformed his practice through working with Creative Europe, developing
learning about contextual approaches to audience development to a UK situation.

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Pivot Dance Pivot worked with young producers, artists and audiences; partnering them
with producers to strengthen their business model to help them beyond the life of the
programme. Joseph Toonga, a young choreographer based in London and with a
fledgling dance company had not toured outside of the UK prior to being involved in the
Pivot Dance Project. This has resulted in their performing in 3 European countries,
including showcasing in festivals. This exposure has led to the company being appointed
to international residencies and has been key in the development of the early stage of his
career. Impacts include:

• The resilience and capability of The Place has been strengthened through participation
in Creative Europe projects

• The career development of dancers and choreographers has directly benefited, and
emerging companies have found new markets.

l. Luke O’Shaughnessy, Project Manager, Opera Vision

Opera Vision involves opera houses in 30 countries (that includes 2 third country houses)
and is dedicated to the streaming of opera productions straight to computers and devices
at no charge and with no sign up requirement. It builds on a previous 3 year Large Scale
Cooperation project, Opera Platform, that involved 15 partners between 2014 - 2017. The
impact has been substantial. For example La Monnaie reported audiences for the
production of a UK work (Thomas Adès's Powder Her Face) of 6000, but 79000 people
viewed it on-line. Komische Opera Berlin were initially cautious, only offering up archive
material, but the response meant that they now stream opening nights and 3 or 4
productions in seasons. 70% of overall views are European and these are proportionate
to EU demography. Two UK based companies are involved, The Royal Opera House and
Welsh National Opera. UK aspirations around new terms and conditions have had limited
success, but the project has enabled UK productions to be screened. Elsewhere the
initiative has sometimes run into resistance from broadcasters, or exploitative fees from
publishers but has been able to work around these issues. The project and subsequent
learning and development across the opera houses would not have been possible without
Creative Europe support.

Impacts include:

• Each live stream develops audience for opera. The streaming audience is many times
larger than the capacity of the opera houses that make up the partnership.

• The EU appreciates the soft power implicit in a project that has reached 3 million
people, of which 10% were in North America.

• One partner commented on how streaming has developed the dramatic skills of the
performers as they learn to respond to the camera.

• The expansion from fifteen partners in the first project to 30 in the second demonstrates
how streaming is now being widely used through the project.

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m. Lol Scragg, Project Lead, International & Commercial Projects, Dundee & Angus
College
The college worked on a project with 6 partners from throughout Europe called
‘SYMBOLS - Culture of Death & Cultural Life’. The project aimed to strengthen knowledge
and public awareness around cemeteries and funerary arts as a part of European cultural
heritage and memory. The approach brought together the performing arts, heritage and
digital innovation. The college is currently involved in 6 EU projects involving Creative
Europe, Interreg, and Erasmus +, but not Horizon 2020. The College were not lead
partner, but the project did impact across both staff and students, with 5 members of
staff directly working on the project. The College is working on a Small-Scale
Cooperation Project application to Creative Europe. Lol considers that, while Creative
Europe has had a major impact on him and the College, it is difficult to identify
measurable impacts. He points to how each project builds traction and capacity for
further development. The impacts of the project were identified as follows:

• Promoted awareness of the potential for collaboration and of Creative Europe among
those working in the creative technology and digital sector.

• Established a reputation for international working so the College is now approached to

be a partner in projects, including projects outside of Europe.

• Students benefited from mobility and residencies abroad, as well as linking to artists
based abroad. The project was a platform for subsequent Erasmus funded activity.

• The project supported interdisciplinary and cross departmental working at the College.

• Staff members developed their practice through working with professional artists from
other countries.

• There were benefits in the local community through collaboration with the College.

n. Amélie Syners, Village Underground

Village Underground have been involved in the network Trans Europe Halles for 9 years
and this has had a direct effect on Amélie’s professional development through
participating in staff exchanges, networking and workshops. She comments that
‘everything changed’ for her career as a result and she is currently project managing the
UK partner end of a 4 year Creative Europe Cooperation project Creative Lenses, which
focuses on the development of new business models for cultural organisations. Village
Underground is also part of the Liveurope Project that supports concert venues in their
efforts to promote up-and-coming European artists. This project has 14 partners and a
wide reach across Europe. Amélie comments that this consistent and longer term
engagement with Creative Europe projects and networks instils the confidence and skills
to be better at your job and to take advantage of the opportunities for transnational
working that arise. It also allows for influence abroad in areas where the UK leads, such
as multi-cultural approaches to culture. She also points out that the Creative Europe
mechanism only directly communicates with participating organisations and there are
issues about visibility with the wider public and within organisations where only a small

63
number of staff might be involved in the project. Her one reservation about the
programme is the level of administration and reporting, which could be simplified.

Impacts include:

• Establishing a productive link with HE through the University of the Arts involvement in
the project.

• Professional development through training as a researcher as part of the project.

• Professional and skills development associated with the project management and
administrative role.

• Provided resources for an overdue organisational development process that would not
otherwise have happened.

• A diversification of programming that creates more opportunities for artists and widens
audience reach.

• Organisational resilience extending, in the case of Village Underground, to new venue

plans.

• An ongoing benefit from activities from being part of a network that receives long term
funding to support activity across the membership.

o. Christina Wigmore, Business & Strategic Director, Soft Touch Arts

Soft Touch Arts are a small grass roots organisation that use arts, media and music
activities to make positive life changes for disadvantaged young people by supporting
them to develop creative, social and employability skills. They have not directly applied to
Creative Europe as it was beyond their capacity but are currently working on an
employability project funded through the European Social Fund. Soft Touch Arts are a
partner in the Journeys Festival International project supported by Creative Europe and
that brings artists from elsewhere in Europe to work in Leicester, where they are based.
The company’s role is at the community level, connecting with local your people who are
refugees and asylum seekers. The working process was new to them as they would
normally engage with young people in project design, rather than implementing work
directed through an organisation (The Journeys Festival). The company felt that impacts
were curtailed through this approach and their contact with the visiting artists was very
limited. The impacts included:

• Full cost recovery, so a net contribution to the organisation’s resilience.

• The value of creative work and being part of a large scale event for their cohort of young
people.

p. Michael Walling, Border Crossings

Border Crossings was part of a two year project, RE-ORIENTATIONS, in 2009/10 with
partner in China, India, France and Sweden. Each partner contributed to the production
as well as the dissemination of the work. A piece was devised in China, directed by
Michael and performed in the Shanghai Expo prior to touring in Sweden and running in
London for three weeks. The performances were accompanied with education work. This
was a pivotal project for Border Crossings who went from a small scale operation with

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intermittent support, to an established organisation with financial support from major
stakeholders, beginning with support from the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation as a direct
result of the project. While there were administrative challenges the company are very
positive about the project and are working on a Creative Europe application with some of
the partners for 2018. The project directly led to further international work. In 2013 the
Shanghai Dramatic Arts Centre co-produced another show with Border Crossings. This
project (‘Consumed’) included an ambitious education programme with school pupils in
China using online communications and linked to the UK venues education work on the
impact of digital communications on personal relations. Work with the Swedish partner
also continued with the support of Erasmus funding. The project impacts included:

• The artistic and organisational development of all of the partners. For example, in
Border Crossings 21st anniversary publication,the actors Song Ru Hui and Tony
Guilfoyle talk about how the project impacted on their professional development and
changed their perceptions of how to make theatre.

• The credibility and profile of working internationally and in the Expo was a platform for
new funding relationships and growth. It also gave the company confidence to talk to
investors.

• The project funding translated into a much stronger company and a production that
attracted new audiences, with an education programme that involved London’s Chinese
population.

• A dramatic impact on the personal and professional development of key staff through
working with organisations in five countries. This was complemented with a genuine
shift of awareness around working internationally.

• The work made a major impact on participants and audiences. One tutor working in
China reported how the work ‘opened up students to new ideas and dialogue’ like no
other project she had ever done.

q. Cathy Boyd, Director, Cryptic

Involvement in European networks and the Creative Europe programme is a core part of
the company’s activity. A key element is Sonica Festival. Creative Europe support is
essential and In 2017 there will be 13 projects in 16 cities in 7 countries. The impact of
the project is most noticeable for new and emerging artists who have the opportunity to
premier their work. Cathy is on the Board of IETM and is consequently aware of a range
of Creative Europe projects that involve IETM. Two of these applications have involved
Cryptic, but Cathy has observed that some potential partners are now hesitant to involve
UK companies. There are two primary concerns. Cathy considers that the loss of access
to Creative Europe funds combined with projected reductions in UK arts funding will have
a dramatic impact on the work of companies like Cryptic. Secondly, without mechanisms
to sustain relationships with European partners the likely increased administrative
burdens for mobility of artists and artistic goods will present a formidable barrier to
international collaboration and exchange.

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