Creative Europe

In general, Creative Europe requires that projects that receive funding have a European added value. To this end, cooperation with European partner organisations is a prerequisite. European added value means that a project develops solutions and puts activities into practice that do not only take place in one country or from which not only one country benefits, but rather several European countries. The actual design of the projects and funding differs depending on the respective sub-programmes and calls for proposals.

CULTURE sub-programme

The CULTURE sub-programme comprises four main funding areas: European cooperation projects, networks, platforms and literary translations.

The 'European cooperation projects' is the biggest and most visible funding area in the CULTURE sub-programme. Cooperation projects support the intensive cross-border cooperation between different cultural institutions from different countries that are eligible to participate in the programme. This funding area is open to all disciplines and topics within the cultural and creative sector, and projects can also be interdisciplinary in nature. The main formal criterion is that a cooperation project may only be applied for together with other European partner organisations.

As European associations, 'networks' represent a specific cultural sector in each case and ensure cross-border networking within a sector. Networks are composed of an applicant organisation (coordinator) and the members of the network. European networks are open for all cultural and creative sectors (except the audiovisual sector).

'Platforms' are consortia of a minimum of 12 cultural institutions from at least 12 eligible countries that facilitate the entry of emerging European talents into the European market and present them to a wide European audience (“business to consumer”) in a jointly designed programme. A platform comprises an applicant institution (coordinator) and its members.

Publishers or publishing groups can apply for the translation of book packages containing several works of fiction by European authors in the 'literary translation' funding area. Translations must be carried out from an official language of the countries participating in the programme into another official European language. This funding aims to distribute literary works in Europe as widely and transnationally as possible.

MEDIA sub-programme

The MEDIA strand of the Creative Europe programme supports the European audiovisual industries (films, series, gaming, etc.) to develop, distribute and promote European works, taking into account today’s digital environment. In addition, it encourages cooperation across the entire value chain of the audiovisual industry and at EU level in order to bring companies and European content to the world. MEDIA is divided into three clusters in order to be able to cover all segments of the audio-visual industry:

1. Content: The focus here lies on the dissemination of European audiovisual works as well as the cross-border cooperation among producers and developers.
2. Business: Funding in this cluster supports emerging talents along with promoting intra-sectoral exchange formats and the dissemination of content on a transnational scale.
3. Audience: The aim of funding in this cluster is to increase the visibility of European works.

Cross-sectoral strand

The cross-sectoral strand aims at fostering collaboration between different actors from all sectors eligible for funding by Creative Europe. It particularly aims to address the joint challenges faced by these sectors and to promote the development of innovative and digital solutions. At present, there are two funding areas for this purpose:

1. Creative Innovation Labs: Projects that develop digital solutions for the production, publication and dissemination of cultural content are eligible for funding.
2. This new funding area promotes media literacy, pluralism and media freedom in Europe.
   

In the last programme generation of Creative Europe, the following project ideas received funding, among others:

• A project campaigning for more female and gender-diverse musicians to perform at European music festivals and offering them performance and further training opportunities.
• A cooperation between four art centres from Germany, Lithuania, Hungary and Croatia, which develop joint exhibitions of contemporary art and also offer an artist-in-residence programme.
• A theatre project that creates opportunities for artists with and without disabilities to perform and that works towards greater inclusion in the performing arts.
• The collaborative development of film projects (series as well as animation, documentaries and feature films) by European production companies.
• Film festivals wishing to inspire the audience for the European film scene.

In principle, only legal entities are eligible to apply for funding for a project. These are for example:

• Associations
• Public institutions
• Companies
• Foundations
• Government departments

Dependent on the funding area, other restrictions may apply with regard to the possible activities and the thematic reference to the funding area. These restrictions must be obtained from the respective call for proposals. For projects in Creative Europe, it is necessary to have European partner organisations.

All 27 EU member states are eligible and in addition these Non-EU-countries.