We’re reaching out to the wider world and asking people to just give what they can – it could be as little as US$5 (EC$13.50) – that may seem small, but if 1000 people give $5, we already have $5,000. If 500 people give $10, then we have another $5000 and so it goes on. This is our ‘Crowd Funding’ Campaign – you can find it on www.indiegogo.com/projects/summer-of-the-arts.
You may still feel that such a small contribution will not make a significant impact…so why bother? Well, it’s not just the money value of the donation that is important – it goes FAR beyond that:
First, any size donation demonstrates that there is interest from a wide number of people and this allows us to show other donors – corporate, government and funding agencies, that if they put their money in our projects, it will have a big impact because people are engaged in our work, they’re watching what we do and interacting with us – this directly helps CDF to raise more funds.
Through crowd funding we can also build a network – a gathering of people who share common interests in arts and culture – practitioners; consumers; developers; promoters – everyone whose life or work is touched by arts and culture.
This enables us to connect with people who can also give ‘in-kind’ – it may be a key connection in a community; a place for rehearsals; materials; promotion – it all goes a long way towards enabling the work of CDF and the growth of arts and culture as social development tools and viable options for careers.