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Alliance for Arts + Culture launches BC Artist Registry

Calling all B.C. artists to be counted in the BC Artist Registry

Alliance For Arts + Culture

Calling all B.C. artists! We invite all British Columbian adults who are artists in any discipline to be counted in the BC Artist Registry. Whether your arts practice is your full-time or part-time career, or your avocational pursuit, you may join the Registry through our simple online form.

The Alliance for Arts + Culture is committed to serving the arts sector across British Columbia through advocacy, research, informational resources, professional development, networking and many other services.

The launch of a BC Artist Registry is part of a three-year strategic plan approved by the Alliance when its membership adopted a province-wide mandate in 2014. Based on examples set in Saskatchewan and other regions, the BC Artist Registry will help to advance the province’s cultural sector through quality research and advocacy.

Across the province, arts champions in municipalities and local agencies express the need to learn more about artists in their communities, but lack the channels to connect with those individuals.

The BC Artist Registry becomes an important tool for reaching artists directly, inviting their participation in surveys and other types of consultation.

Through collaboration with cultural associations, funders, arts service providers, and municipalities to promote participation through their networks, the Alliance and its partners can ensure that artists from all artistic disciplines and all regions across the province have the opportunity to be counted. Then, when a partner organization wishes to conduct a survey or consult with artists, the Alliance will have the mechanism to invite a ready group of participants through the BC Artist Registry.

“The long term goal is to build on basic informational tools, such as the census, to better understand the situation of artists in British Columbia,” said Rob Gloor, Alliance executive director. “For example, according to Statistics Canada, there are 25,000 artists in B.C., but that number only includes those whose primary source of income is their art. If their primary income is something else, such as teaching, the census does not count them as artists. Through the BC Artist Registry, we will have a platform to learn more about all artists in our province, regardless of how much their art contributes to their income.”

The BC Artist Registry uses a simple online form recording an artist’s name, contact information, and field(s) of artistic discipline.

Joining the Registry is free, and the personal information remains private and confidential. From time to time, artists on the Registry will be invited to participate in more detailed surveys or other consultations.

The Registry will be open for ongoing registration with no deadline, to ensure a growing resource for meaningful statistics and research in our province’s cultural sector.

Add your name to the registry. Artists from all disciplines are invited to add their names and be counted. It’s simple: visit allianceforarts.com/bc-artist-registry and complete the short online form.

Participation in the registry is free and your personal information is confidential.

The Alliance for Arts + Culture is BC.’s leading arts information aggregator and a resource to the arts, culture and heritage community.

Since 1986 we have advocated for our sector by monitoring public policy, synthesizing issues for our members, providing support, services and professional development, and representing the interests of artists and cultural workers.  Learn more at www.allianceforarts.com.