Digital R&D Fund for Arts and Culture

The Digital Research & Development Fund for Arts and Culture is a partnership between the Arts Council England, Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and NESTA to support arts and cultural organisations across England who want to work with digital technologies to:

• expand their audience reach and engagement and/or
• explore new business models
  

The fund received 494 applications, of which 393 (seeking over £24 million in total) were judged eligible by the funding partners. This suggests that there is a high demand for digital R&D in the arts and cultural sector.

Each of the projects were selected because they will produce research and data that other arts and cultural organisations will value highly and, possibly, develop new products/services that can be used by other organisations. A key element of the fund is the partnerships between arts and cultural organisations, technology providers and researchers

The successful projects include:

• Battersea Arts Centre (BAC) working with Videojuicer and The Arts Collective
• Exhibition Road Cultural Group working with the Dickens Museum and Seren Partners 
• Imperial War Museum with Knowledge Integration and University College London
• London Symphony Orchestra with Aurora Orchestra and Kodime
• New Art Exchange with Artfinder
• Punchdrunk with MIT Media Lab
• The Sage Gateshead plus Manchester Camerata, Aurora, Berwick Maltings, Alnwick Playhouse and Durham Gala  with Videojuicer and Aframe
• Site Gallery working with Lighthouse and Caper 

The final projects were selected using these set criteria.

Following selection the projects participated in a Collaborative Workshop with shortlisted academic researchers and research firms.  Out of this process nine researchers were selected to work with the 8 projects including:

• Oxford University Consulting working with Battersea Arts Centre
• MTM London working with Exhibition Road Cultural Group
• Horizon at the University of Nottingham working with Imperial War Museum
• University of Salford and MTM London working with Imperial War Museum
• University of Salford working with London Symphony Orchestra
• Birmingham City University working with New Art Exchange
• University of West England, Bristol and University of Dundee working with Punchdrunk
• Cambridge University and Fusion Alliance working with The Sage Gateshead