With money too tight to mention since the Brandis years, arts organisations are coming up with more innovative and sequin-encrusted ways to gain philanthropic support. Melbourne Fringe Festival is pumping up the volume with a new keytar-infused triple threat video to “get your wallet active and make you more attractive”.
Making people feel good is the way to people’s hearts and, sometimes, to their wallets,” said Melbourne Fringe Festival CEO and Artistic Director, Simon Abraham. “We try to make people laugh, while also showing them the impact their donation will have.”
And you certainly don’t have to be rolling in it to make a difference. Last year an amazing 4,500 people made donations of $5 after seeing the Melbourne Fringe video, generating a significant amount of funding, so this year the festival is ramping it up again, with a new video.
Fringe directly supports more than 6,000 artists every year, but registration fees only cover around 70% of the cost of each event. Last year, over 350,000 people attended the Festival across 464 events.
In addition to running the Festival, Fringe supports artists year-round through a range of Artist Development programs such as Deadly Fringe, supporting emerging artists who identify as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander, and it’s continued relationship with artists with and without a disability who participated in the Compass mentor program in 2016.
This is in addition to its hard-core hands-on support to artists participating the Festival including artistic skills workshops, initiating a micro-grants program and the popular step-by-step info sessions.
“The times are turbulent, and who better to steady the winds than artists,” said Abraham. “Artists are our foundation-shakers, our world-shapers, our culture-makers. They’re the heroes we’ve all been holding out for. And Melbourne Fringe knows exactly where to find them – but great power and great responsibility don’t come cheap.”
The 2017 Melbourne Fringe Festival runs 14 September – 1 October. For more information, visit: www.melbournefringe.com.au for details.
Image: Simon Abraham and Friends in the new Melbourne Fringe video