Creative Grants UK: Funding for Creative Projects

Creative grants support individual practitioners, freelance creatives, collectives, CICs and small organisations. Most funders are explicitly cross-discipline — they care less about your medium than about the quality, ambition and audience of your project. Several funds are targeted: by region (e.g. Heart of Glass in St Helens, Wysing Arts Centre in the East), by community served (e.g. funds prioritising D/deaf, disabled and neurodivergent practitioners), or by activity (e.g. R&D, touring, residencies).

Project funding covers a defined activity with clear outcomes — exhibitions, performances, publications, recordings, residencies, films, commissions. The largest source is Arts Council England's National Lottery Project Grants (£1,000–£100,000).

Practice development funds time and space rather than a finished outcome — Arts Council England's Developing Your Creative Practice (DYCP), Creative Scotland's Open Fund for Individuals, and many foundation awards.

Awards and bursaries recognise existing practice with cash awards, often unrestricted. Examples: Paul Hamlyn Foundation Awards for Artists (£70,000 over three years), Jerwood Fellowships, Wellcome Trust public engagement awards.

Capital and infrastructure funding supports buildings, equipment and long-term capacity. Mostly available to organisations rather than individuals.

International and exchange funding supports cross-border collaboration — British Council Arts, PRS Foundation International Showcase, ACE International Activity within Project Grants.

Arts Council England — the largest public funder of arts and culture in England across all disciplines.

Creative Scotland, Arts Council of Wales, Arts Council of Northern Ireland — the equivalent national funders, with their own open funds for individuals and organisations.

Paul Hamlyn Foundation — Awards for Artists (visual art and composition), Ideas and Pioneers, and broader programmes for arts access.

Esmée Fairbairn Foundation — funds arts organisations doing ambitious work, especially around social and environmental change.

Jerwood Arts — early-career fellowships, development bursaries and partnership funding.

Henry Moore Foundation — sculpture-focused grants for artists, exhibitions and research.

The Elephant Trust — small unrestricted grants (typically £2,500) for artists and small galleries.

Wellcome Trust — public engagement and research funding at the intersection of arts and science.

British Council Arts — international collaboration, mobility and showcasing.

Match the funder, not the topic. The most-cited reason for rejection is applying to a fund whose remit doesn't match the project. Read recent funded lists.

Be specific about audience and benefit. "Wider audiences" is weak; "300 visitors across a four-week run, plus a schools programme reaching 80 Year 9 students" is strong.

Build the budget around real costs. Industry-rate fees, contingencies, line items rather than lump sums, and clear match funding.

Get a critical reader. A peer who has been funded recently can flag gaps faster than any guidance document.

Apply before the rush. Many open funds run on annual or rolling budgets — applying early in a cycle improves odds.

FundMyArt matches your project — whatever discipline — against reviewed UK and international funding sources. Instead of trawling funder websites and searching across dozens of newsletters, you describe your project once and get a scored shortlist of relevant grants with deadlines you can actually meet, plus AI drafting support against each funder's published criteria.