Call to Present Cultural Project Proposals to the Dominican Commissioner of Culture

Call to Present Cultural Project Proposals to the Dominican Commissioner of Culture
New York, September 12, 2014

Tne Dominican Commissioner of Culture in the United States is issuing a call for the cultural community of Dominicans residing abroad to present cultural project proposals to be submitted through his office to the Ministry of Culture of the Dominican Republic.

To this end, the Commissioner of Culture, Mr. Carlos Sánchez, will hold a meeting on Monday, September 15th, at 7 pm, in the Commissioner’s office, located at 541 West 145th Street, 2nd. Floor, near the intersection with Broadway in Manhattan.

“We are inviting cultural managers, artists, playwrights, writers, and all the members of the Dominican cultural community, to present their cultural projects”, Sánchez said. “It is important that our community be included in the Call for Cultural Projects 2014, an initiative of the Minister Culture, José Antonio Rodríguez, and, to that end, we need the community to submit their proposals so that they are subject to evaluation and possible approval”, he said.

The National Call for Cultural Projects seeks to create mechanisms that contribute to the viable exercise of cultural rights provided for in the Constitution of the Republic and the National Development Strategy 2012-2020, which will be implemented between 2014 and 2016, corresponding to the current administration, said the coordinator of the Vice Ministry of Institutional Development, Mr. Carlos Santos.

The proposals that are selected will be part of a portfolio that can be financed with funds from the National Budget, from external cooperation and/or from mixed sources, including budgets for the cultural sector of local governments and the private sector, which is intended for the planning of cultural activities.
  
According to the rules of the call, proposals aimed at encouraging the production, promotion, training, dissemination and artistic research in various areas or lines of action will be considered.

Among these axes are: Cultural Infrastructure, Entrepreneurship in Cultural Industries, Cultural Heritage, Cultural Tourism, Arts and Literature, Participation and Social Inclusion, Food and Public Art.

Of the ten proposals submitted last year through the Commissioner, the Ministry of Culture approved three: “Formación Academia de la Danza Folklórica Dominicana (Dominican Folkloric Dance Academy Training)”, submitted by folklorist Ricardo Ureña; “Trinitaria siglo XXI (Trinity XXI Century)”, presented by the director of Teatro Las Tablas, Yolanny Rodríguez and cultural journalist César Romero, of the Duarte Institute. Also, the project “Fomento carnavalesco y cultural dominicano en Nueva York (Promotion of Dominican carnival and culture in New York)”, presented by Víctor Joel Brujan, of the Dominican Carnival Union.

The Dominican Commissioner of Culture, Mr. Carlos Sánchez, described as a “cultural revolution” the adoption and implementation of cultural projects, “because they mean a democratization of the budget of the Ministry of Culture”.

“The approval of these projects for the geographic area of ??the United States, will benefit the Dominican community residing abroad and the cultural workers who submitted these projects, because they will have the resources to expand its area of action” Sánchez said. “This week, a delegation from the Ministry is coming to New York to train the winners on everything related to cultural projects and to provide them with the necessary funds for their implementation”, he said.