North Lanarkshire Council approves five year plan for arts and creative activities

North Lanarkshire Council has approved a new five year plan for arts and creative activities in the local authority area.

The council took its arts services team in-house three years ago and since then they have worked with various partners to promote and develop arts within communities.

Activities have included projects of varied sizes, from working with schools and the wider community to collaborations with local and national organisations.

Funding received from the University of Edinburgh in 2022 led to the delivery of Art Is Everywhere, a programme which emphasized providing access to the arts for vulnerable people, and this was the basis for the strategy.

Many different types of media were used in work with communities ranging from early years to the elderly and people in care, helping to address inequalities while developing the strategy.

The council is now seeking to deliver diverse activities across all of its communities, continue to address inequalities and bring people together while also ensuring any revenues generated through are reinvested into staffing and materials to promote further growth.

The arts team will work closely with other council services, real case studies will be used to promote the value of creative activity and will also support the council’s aim of carbon neutrality by 2030.

The team has been working with services such as schools, the restorative justice team and community education, and the council has is also one of five in Scotland to receive funding to support the REALITIES Project which aims to use the arts to support people with various issues, from homelessness or imprisonment to poor mental health.

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