The Power of Culture

To mark the 10 th anniversary of the setting-up of the Hivos Culture Fund, the Indonesian theatre company Payung Hitam is coming to the Netherlands in June to put on a production with the Dutch Lunatics that was produced up in Indonesia in May. Artistic director Rachman Sabur was in the Netherlands for a few days to prepare the production.

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Hivos and NCDO are jointly supporting initiatives in the Netherlands that offer scope for the expression of visions and artistic works from non-Western cultures. To this end, on 20 December 2004 they signed a covenant that runs until 2006.

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The trade agreements made by the World Trade Organisation, including the GATS are oriented toward liberalisation of the global market. These agreements also apply to the cultural sector. This makes it increasingly difficult for countries to support their own artists and cultural institutions with subsidy funding or other measures.

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Vanessa Reed, Grants Manager at the European Cultural Foundation (ECF), reviews the first year of collaboration between Hivos and ECF in Sharing Interests, Pooling Funds, Making things happen...

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Starting at the end of July, Harare will be the site of the Zimbabwe International Book Fair (ZIBF). The book fair, whose 2004 theme is Voices: Dialogue Across Nations, has evolved to become the most important platform for African literature.

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Hivos has taken the initiative to establish a film fund for Central American and Cuban film productions. The fund is called Cinergia and is directed by Fundacine in Costa Rica.

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A new film festival is born: at the end of March some seventy Asian films will be shown in Amsterdam, divided over thirty programmes.

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During the conference with the theme Claiming Artistic Freedom, eight artists discussed their personal situations. HIVOS organized the conference in cooperation with the Winternachten festival..

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