Organisers of the Biennale of Australian Art say securing funding from the City of Ballarat is a must if the inaugural festival is to go ahead in 2018.
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Councillors will vote on whether to allocate $195,000 of funding towards BOAA at Wednesday night’s meeting. Of the funding BOAA organisers are requesting $170,000 in cash assistance and $25,000 of in-kind assistance, which includes access to council-owned spaces.
Organisers anticipate the event would have an economic impact of almost $10 million should it be given the green light, almost double that of the 2016 Archibald Prize exhibition.
BOAA artistic director Julie Collins said while the response from the Ballarat arts and business community to the six-week event had been overwhelmingly positive since its unveiling last year, council’s support was crucial to the festival being a success.
“Ballarat over the last five years has made a lot of progress in arts and culture and now's the time for an event like this,” Ms Collins said.
BOAA is also looking to acquire $50,000 from the state government and $500,000 from Canberra to get the event up-and-running.
City of Ballarat mayor Samantha Mclntosh said while council was “exceptionally supportive” of the arts, all events spending needed to be looked at closely given the tight budget imposed by rate capping.
“There’s been great events like White Night which have shown that Ballarat is capable of hosting big events really well, but we need to be very mindful of our spending,” Cr Mclntosh said.