The Arts Council and Bord Scannán na hÉireann/the Irish Film Board have announced the recipients of the 2006 Documenting the Arts fund. Six productions have been offered funding with a total sum of €400,000 awarded.
Documenting the Arts is a documentary production fund. The scheme, jointly funded by the Arts Council and the IFB, aims to finance a range of arts-based projects that examine the diverse issues of art and culture in a contemporary or historical context.
The six selected projects were chosen from over 90 applications. They are:
Wildfire Films: €80,000 awarded for a film by Conor Horgan on the visual artist, Dorothy Cross, ‘Bursting into beauty’.
Donald Taylor Black: €70,000 awarded for a film about the photographer, ‘David Farrell - A history looking through’.
Straydog Films (Jackie Larkin and John O’Donnell): €70,000 awarded for a film about the Kilfenora Ceilí Band, ‘In the blood’.
Ciarín Scott: €70,000 awarded for a portrait of film-maker and Aosdána member, ‘George Morrison – Pioneer of Irish cinema’.
Trish McAdam: €70,000 awarded for a film about the work of actor Donal O’Kelly, ‘What am I doing here?’
Dara McCluskey: €40,000 awarded for a portrait of Dundalk troubadour, Jinx Lennon, ‘Noisemaker’.
The funds awarded can be used collectively as a full production budget or as seed money to help finance a larger budget.
Speaking today, Séamus Crimmins, Arts Policy Director at the Arts Council, said: “Our wish in the Arts Council is to support cultural cinema, the individual artist and organisations that work to maintain the distinctive voice of Irish film within the global framework. We are pleased to collaborate with the Irish Film Board in this partnership which aims to get some of the finest work of Irish documentary film-makers on the screen.”
