Utrecht decides to stop subsidizing certain events, including Dutch film festival

The Netherlands Film Festival (NFF) will not receive any subsidies from the municipality of Utrecht for the period of 2025-2028, the city announced on Wednesday. The municipal executive is taking over the advice the commission gave them, which has checked all the subsidy requests for "artistic quality, feasibility, and meaning for the city."

Besides the NFF, a few other organizations "with a great track record," like Tweetakt, Het Huis, Bak, and IMPAKT, will also no longer be subsidized. The municipality, which said the decision was painful, said the budget of 18,46 million was overcharged by more than 5 million euros.

"We understand the disappointment among the institutions whose applications we will not honor." Le Guess Who and the International Literature Festival Utrecht (ILFU), also established names, will receive a four-year subsidy because they wrote "inspiring plans." Furthermore, 24 new applicants will join the city's four-year Cultural Memorandum.

"There were a lot of high-quality, inspiring, and innovative applications submitted," said alderwoman for culture Eva Oosters. "The successful applicants together form a supportive, distinctive, and inviting cultural sector with emphatic space for innovation. And this is how we strengthen the cultural ecosystem, with both well-established parties and young makers and new initiatives that are subsidized."

Therefore, the municipality faces the cultural future of Utrecht with "hope and confidence" and looks forward to 2025 - 2028, "when we can see the plans of the cultural makers, stages, companies, festivals, and presentation places live."

According to the advice commission, some applicants were not able to convincingly sell their multi-year plans. In some cases, the commission was concerned about the plans' feasibility or critical of their artistic elaboration or the applicant's role in the city.

The judgments made by the advice commission led to a ranking in which the organizations that placed within the first 67 spots within the budget were given subsidies.

The institutions that missed out "can function well, receive good advice, and be of added value. However, compared to the other applicants who scored higher, this was not enough to be accepted within the budget."

IMPAKT director Arjen Dunnewind called the decision wrong, unjust, and dumb. He worries that the art disciplines of film, visual arts, and digital culture have been significantly undervalued.

He also said that he thinks Utrecht's only following the advice of the commission means that it misses a lot of perspective on what happens outside of the city. The IMPAKT director feels that the city should have an "open view" of what happens outside of Utrecht in a cultural area and should try to attract artists from outside the city.

Talent from Utrecht should also be able to grow at the national and international levels. According to Dunnewind, the current subsidy arrangement does not have enough space for that. "A very narrow-minded view of what culture can mean for a city. We are victims of this."