Crowd-sourcing site to fund arts projects

 TOM HUNT DomPost - 12/04/2012

DIRECT APPROACH: Duncan Sarkies, left, and Stephen Templer have produced a podcast, Uncle Bertie's Botanarium, and are using crowd sourcing to fund it.Photo - ROSS GIBLIN/FAIRFAX NZ

Arts projects struggling to get funding are turning to crowd sourcing in a bid to get their projects up and running.

The Arts Foundation is launching a new crowd-sourcing website to help artists source donations, which the donors are then able to use for tax kickbacks.
Crowd sourcing – generating private funding online – has already proven successful for Wellington film-maker Taika Waititi, who managed to distribute his breakout feature film Boy in the United States using it.
In the US, crowd-sourcing site kickstarter.com is expected to raise US$150 million ($184m) this year for arts projects – US$6m ($7.3m) more than federal government arts grants.
The Arts Foundation will today announce Boosted.org.nz, which will allow arts projects to be crowd sourced, with donations able to be deducted against tax.
"We expect to create literally thousands of philanthropists for the arts, albeit mostly at modest levels," Arts Foundation executive director Simon Bowden said.
"In the world of crowd funding every dollar counts. We believe that many donors who initially give small amounts to projects on Boosted will be able to give more in the future."
While he did not expect Boosted to surpass the $35.7m funding handed out by Creative NZ last year, he hoped annual donations would reach $3m early on.
Donations would be made to the Arts Foundation, a charitable trust, making them tax deductable.
Full story at stuff.co.nz