Within the latest edition of the European Festivals Association’s project Europe for Festivals, Festivals for Europe (EFFE) Serbian festivals have a chance to receive the EFFE Quality Label and thus find their place on the European festival map.
Also, Serbian festivals are now eligible for awards and festival organisers are invited to apply for those awards, as stated at the presentation held at the EU Info Centre.
“22 Serbian festivals already received the label within the previous cycle 2015-2016. I hope the new cycle would bring at least as many labels as the previous one to Serbia,” Deputy Head of the EU Delegation to Serbia Oskar Benedikt said at the presentation held at the EU Info Centre.
Benedikt noted that Serbia was a country of festivals, adding that the fact that the festival scene is lively in Belgrade and the rest of the country is one of the country’s great advantages.
According to him, it is important not to leave the culture in Europe behind in these critical times as it may serve as a link connecting all the other sectors.
Partner organisation ArtLink acts as a contact point for the Western Balkans to which festivals from Serbia, FYRM, BiH, Montenegro and Albania may send their applications no later than 17 February.
ArtLink representative Jovanka Visekruna Jankovic said that Serbia was the only non-EU country whose festivals had already received EFFE Label. She added that within this new cycle those festivals will be eligible for 12 European awards.
“The Label increases not only networking and mutual cooperation among festivals, but also their visibility and brings them closer to sponsors and donors,” she said, adding that the project is not giving any preference to well-established festivals, but keeps the door open to smaller, more local ones as well.
All of them, however, have to meet three criteria: apart from their artistic commitment they need to be involved in their local communities; have an international outlook; and develop their audiences.
As Dimitrije Tadic Head of the Creative Europe Serbia Desk put it, the project is aimed at audience development given that the level of attendance at cultural events has seen a dramatic drop.
According to him, the goal of the project is to encourage European culture to act in unison in the face of ever-increasing global, namely American and Asian, competition.
Learn more about the project and apply at: effe@artlink.rs and www.effe.eu
Further information is available in the presentation of EFFE
