Join ArtsBuild Ontario for an information session on the Ontario Trillium Foundation’s Capital Grant on Thursday, January 25 at 2pm EST with Program Managers Hélène Duquette and Natalie Normand as we talk about OTF’s new grant investment framework, eligibility criteria, and other Capital Grant related questions.
Ontario Trillium Foundation Capital Grants provide funding to help organizations respond to the needs of Ontario’s communities.
Capital Grants help organizations:
Maintain or increase access to a program or service
Extend the life of a facility or space (updates to buildings or enhancement of spaces)
Purchase equipment
Improve a facility or space to make it more accessible
Ontario Trillium Foundation will be accepting applications for their Capital Grant stream, with applications available from February 7, 2024 until the deadline of March 6, 2024 at 5 PM ET.
2023 has been another busy year for ABO! Let’s look back at all the activities we did this past year.
In January we welcomed a new member to our team; Helena Ciuciura who joined as the Marketing and Community Coordinator at the beginning of the year to support our marketing, communications, and 44 Gaukel creative hub.
Creative Spaces Mentoring Network
In February, the ABO team traveled to Calgary for the Creative Spaces Mentoring Network 2023 Kick-Off Workshop in partnership with Calgary Arts Development and cSpace Marda Loop. We welcomed 34 participants from Calgary! We hosted the Ontario Kick-Off webinar in March also with 34 particpants,with projects ranging from visioning a new space to being mid-way through construction.
As the year comes to a close we are looking forward to the Wrap-Up webinars with both the Calgary and Ontario cohorts, to hearing from the pairs how the program has helped them develop as leaders in the sector, and to see where their projects are in comparison to the beginning of the program. We are excited to meet the new mentees from Ontario and Calgary in the new year.
The New Moon Dialogues touched on themes including uplifting the relationship to land, Indigenous sovereignty, and systemic barriers in developing Indigenous creative spaces.
The work of Paddling Upstream continued throughout the year as the ABO team hit the road to continue the conversations from the project’s initial travels in 2020. The Return to Community Gatherings focused on the Bundles of Knowledge in Paddling Upstream with the conversation self-determined by each community. The sessions revolved around the evolution of organizations and their spaces since the beginning of the project and their plans for the future. The gatherings were held with Aanmitaagzi in North Bay, Debajehmujig in Manitoulin Island, Agnes Etherington Art Centre in Kingston, and Friday Creeations in Temagami. We look forward to visiting the Woodland Cultural Centre in Brantford and Native Earth in Toronto in the new year. We will also be hosting an in-person workshop, The Ecology of Indigenous Creative Space & Allyship in March 2024. Subscribe to our e-news for registration details in January.
We partnered with STEPS Public Art for the Mentorship in the Arts Panel, a free virtual panel with Elle de Lyon, Bruno Canadien, Quentin VerCetty, and Bruce Pitkin in which we explored the importance of mentorship and the different types of mentoring seen in the arts.
We rounded out the end of the year with our sixth online auction in partnership with the KW Rotary Club. We had some amazing donations and thank all who supported us by donating and bidding on ABO’s items.
This busy year comes to a close with several exciting projects on the horizon in the New Year. ABO would like to thank all of the project partners, donors, and arts organizations that we have formed relationships with in 2023 for making this year an incredible success. And thanks to our network for your continued support. We wish you all the best this Holiday Season!
By purchasing items from our annual fundraiser, you can help support our work toward building and sustaining Ontario’s cultural infrastructure in communities across the province which includes over 3,000+ spaces!
With amazing experiences, luxury dining, and awesome arts and culture items, there is sure to be something for everyone! Check out items from our amazing donors:
Through your contributions to ArtsBuild Ontario’s auction items, we are able to benefit communities in exponential ways and continue to provide resources to support arts organizations in Ontario. Thanks to KW Rotary Club for the platform – keep bidding until November 18th at 10pm EST!
We are excited to announce our ninth year of ABO’s Creative Space Mentoring Network (CSMN)!
This program is provided to leaders in Ontario’s arts and cultural sectors who are responsible for some or all aspects of their creative spaces. If you are an arts professional and plan on acquiring creative space, and/or manage capital-related issues you are encouraged to apply.
Through CSMN, ArtsBuild Ontario (ABO) matches cultural leaders with experienced Mentors from the arts, heritage, or other relevant sectors. Once mentoring teams are confirmed, they will meet at the Kick-Off Webinar and afterwards begin meeting for up to three hours monthly over 12 months. Over the next year of the program Mentor/Mentee pairs will focus on developing skills and knowledge related to the Mentee’s priority areas.
ABO will train and support the mentoring teams so that they get the most out of the program by developing and providing:
A Kick-Off Webinar, Mid-Point Webinar, and a Wrap-Up Webinar
Resources & learning opportunities
Program support
If you are looking for a one-to-one learning opportunity with an experienced mentor providing knowledge and expertise in the scope of your project, apply to be a Mentee today!
The deadline to apply is Friday, December 15th, 2023 at 11:59 pm EST.
The Indigenous Creative Spaces Project (ICSP) began in 2019 with the goal of prioritizing Indigenous self-determination in cultural spaces across, what we now call, Ontario. The foundation of this project has always been to support Indigenous-led arts spaces, stepping away from Western artistic paradigms that predicate the design, operation, and governance of arts and heritage spaces, and make way for Indigenous autonomy and connection with the land.
Since the beginning, this project has been guided by an Advisory Circle and Co-Conveners, while supported by ArtsBuild Ontario. In 2020-22, we started the project journey with Community Gatherings and Legacy Stories. Community Gatherings brought together Indigenous artists, arts organizations, and community members across the province to speak about what is needed to seed and cultivate Indigenous creative spaces. In the Legacy Stories, we heard community members share lived histories and relationships to their current and future spaces.
These Community Gatherings and Legacy Stories formed the roots of Paddling Upstream. This document, compiled by Dr. Terri-Lynn Brennan, CEO of Inclusive Voices Inc., illustrates three years of project work, including over 35 hours, 700 pages of recorded transcripts, and 183 voices who contributed to this living document. Within this work, four key bundles became apparent, all within the umbrella of self-determination.
The bundles focus on Land; Individual, Family, and Community Health; Funding, Training and Mentorship; and Reciprocity.
This document is intended to give voice to Indigenous creators across Ontario and the depth of struggles and accomplishments in building and sustaining spaces for Indigenous artists. To learn more about the integral work that needs to be done in order to support the Indigenous arts ecology in Ontario, read Paddling Upstream here:
2023 marked the third year of the 
We hosted a number of webinars and workshops over 2023. In April we were joined by Tara Mazurk and Elizabeth Seip from 
