Today, the Plateia – Association of Performing Arts Professionals issued a statement expressing concern over persistent delays in the dissemination of funding results, which “promote a precarious system, creating instability and insecurity for hundreds of arts professionals.”
The association pointed out that “for yet another consecutive year, the results from the Project Support and Simplified Support programs are not being released in time for supported projects to start their activities within the schedule proposed by the DGArtes [Directorate-General for the Arts].”
Competitions in Visual Arts, Music and Opera Internationalization, Creation and Edition, Programming, and the Simplified Procedure for 2025 were expected to open by the end of December last year. However, they opened on January 15, closing on February 26.
According to the opening notices, in the case of the Simplified Procedure, Visual Arts, Music and Opera; Creation and Edition, and Programming contests, “projects should be executed within a maximum of 18 months, from July 1, 2025, to December 31, 2026.”
For the Internationalization competitions, “projects should be executed within a maximum of 18 months, from September 1, 2025, to February 28, 2027,” and “eligible project expenses may be executed between July 1, 2025, and February 28, 2027.”
The Plateia stated that although activities may begin as of July 1, “as of today, July 7, 2025, the provisional results have not yet been communicated.”
On June 20, DGArtes announced on its official website the provisional results of the Internationalization contest, and a public consultation period is currently underway.
The Plateia indicated that “as a consequence [of the delays in releasing the results], a delay of several months is anticipated before contract execution and payment.”
The six competitions planned for 2025 have a total value of 13.35 million euros, an unchanged figure from the competitions launched in 2023 for 2024 execution.
The Visual Arts competition has an allocation of 2.33 million euros, the Music and Opera competition 3.37 million euros, Internationalization 1.035 million euros, Creation and Edition 4.015 million euros, Programming 1.910 million euros, and the Simplified Procedure 690,000 euros.
When these amounts were disclosed, the Plateia described the fixed amounts as “particularly concerning,” given the increasing diversity in the Portuguese artistic scene, the rising number of applications each year, and the high number of projects that go unfunded, despite being eligible and receiving scores indicative of their unequivocal quality.
In their statement today, the association referenced previous increases in funding allocations, asserting that this “has not corrected the underfunding of these policies, let alone kept pace with the healthy growth of the artistic sector, which sees more professionals, increasingly capable and diverse projects, playing a fundamental role throughout the national territory.”
Therefore, it called on the Ministry of Culture and DGArtes for “an increase in funds,” and also for “technical team reinforcements and enhancements in management and application assessment tools, to address this chronic issue of delays in the announcement of contest results.”
The Plateia also highlighted another issue regarding the delay in the launch of the new edition of the support program for the Network of Portuguese Theatres and Cineteatros (RTCP), which, according to the DGArtes Annual Declaration, should have commenced by the end of May.
The RTCP Support Program is allocated 24 million euros for 2026 to 2029 (six million per year), the same amount set forth in 2021 for the 2022-2025 cycle.
Currently, the RTCP includes 96 cultural facilities, 38 of which are supported for programming between 2022 and 2025.
The RTCP was established to address regional disparities and foster “territorial cohesion in access to culture and arts across Portugal.”
