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City budget eliminates funding for public art – Winnipeg Free Press

Posted on by Neons

For the first time in two decades, the City of Winnipeg has no plans to provide public art funding to the Winnipeg Arts Council this year.

Since its inception in 2004, the grant has provided $500,000 to the city's arts council for public art projects each year through 2018.

The preliminary budget for 2024 released last week allocated $0.

MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS FILE The Rooster Town Teapot sculpture by Jan August, found at Beaumont Station near the site of the Metis Rooster Town, is an example of public art in Winnipeg.

MIKE DEAL / FREE PRINT FILES

The Rooster Town Teapot sculpture by Jan Augustus, found at Beaumont Station near the site of the Metis Rooster Town, is an example of public art in Winnipeg.

Carol Phillips, executive director of the Winnipeg Arts Council, said the organization made presentations to Mayor Scott Gillingham and council members months before preparing the budget. In the previous multiyear budget, he said, the grant for public art would be halved to $250,000 in 2019, halved again in 2022 to $125,000, and eliminated entirely by 2024.

“We were very concerned and knew it was possible,” says Phillips. “Then the draft budget came out, and that was it.”

A spokesperson for the mayor's office said the preliminary budget would instead include a new downtown arts capital program “developed in response to requests from major arts institutions.” “The new $2 million in capital grants is a $500,000 annual fund to support capital projects led by major downtown arts organizations and institutions.”

The city also plans to deliver $4.6 million in funding to the Winnipeg Arts Council, fulfilling Gillingham's campaign promise to restore WAC funding to pre-pandemic levels.

According to Phillips, it's not just new commissions that suffer from a lack of funding for public art. Existing works also require care and maintenance. While money for public art is sometimes included in plans for other major capital projects, such as the Southwest Transitway, for example, “it's random and we never know if it's going to be there,” Phillips said.

“Currently, we do not know of any major new city capital projects that include public art. So the worst-case scenario is that the city of Winnipeg doesn't have a public art program that was a model for policy across the country 20 years ago.”

A city without public art is a city without character, Phillips says.

“It's a city that doesn't have access to the arts,” he says. “It's amazing to come across things like this and be amazed. Like it or not (public art) can be thought-provoking or simply beautifying. It can be a lot for a city and all cities around the world have taken advantage of this.