Culture connects

The NRW KULTURsekretariat is a public, intercommunal cultural grants initiative of the 21 major cities and a regional association in North Rhine-Westphalia. Since 1974, it has been initiating and hosting, in collaboration with the communal partners and a whole array of cultural institutions, frequently cross-media projects, festivals and programme series in the areas of theatre, music, visual arts, new media and literature. Furthermore, it also focuses on intercultural and cultural history projects. As an internal and external dialogue partner, it also pursues the task of promoting and steering cultural-political processes and discourse within the association network to expand cultural competence through seminars and conferences, with particular emphasis on topics such as culture and school, or work and age. Since 2009 the NRW KULTURsekretariat has been working with different member cities and the Ministry for Family, Children, Youth, Culture and Sport of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia on the coordination and management of International Cultural Relations.

The NRW KULTURsekretariat is financed pro rata by the communes (current annual contribution: approx. 17,000 euros). Its project resources are predominantly provided by the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, and, in the case of individual projects, from further public and private partners. In all, the member cities have approx. 2.3 million euros available for projects in 2012.

The NRW KULTURsekretariat comprises a team of permanent employees and freelancers who organise and coordinate the programme work in close collaboration with the individual cultural partners – accompanied by work committees, selection committees, advisory committees and juries. A regular conference with the heads of departments from the member cities approves the budget and the programme (Chairman: Prof. Georg Quander, Cologne; Deputy Chairman: Jörg Stüdemann, Dortmund).