Regulations Concept Funding (Application deadline: 05.02.2024)

Please Note! This is a translation of the valid regulations and is meant only to help in the orientation and understanding of those, for whom German is not a first language. Only the regulations in the original German version apply. There is no guarantee for the correctness and completeness of any translated information.

01. The concept funding supports multi-year conceptual projects that have a thematic or aesthetic continuity over several productions. The projects and productions can come from any area of the performing arts and must be planned for a period of three consecutive years (2024, 2025, 2026).

02. Applicants must have been professionally active for many years in the field of the independent performing arts (including performance, drama, dance, musical theater, puppet and object theater, theater in public spaces, contemporary circus or cross-genre) and have experience with regular productions and guest performance activities in at least two federal German states. The overall concept and its realization must be the responsibility of one artist or one artistic team and be largely carried out by them.

03. Applicants must be based in and work primarily in Germany.

04. All the included productions must entail at least five performances in Germany, including the premiere; artistically justified deviations from this condition must be outlined in the application.

05. Applicants must be in a position to ensure the proper management and to provide proper evidence of the use of the funding.

06. The application must be submitted using the relevant online form at https://onlineantrag.fonds-daku.de/start by 05.02.2024 (application deadline). A complete application includes:

• a detailed description of the concept (including a detailed presentation of the artists/group and previous artistic productions as well as a detailed description of all 3 project/year plans. These can be either three new productions or two new productions and one strategic-organizational project),
• the necessary co-financing approvals (see points 16 and 17),
• if own funds are indicated, proof of own funds (bank statement) and,
• a cost and financing plan in the form provided by the Fonds Darstellende Künste on its website and in accordance with the provisions of points 12 to 21 of these regulations.

07. An application shall be deemed to have been submitted on time if all documents (see point 06) have been uploaded to the database of the Fonds Darstellende Künste and submitted by 11:59 p.m. on the day of the application deadline at the latest. Late or incomplete applications cannot be considered.

08. The basis for the approval, disbursement and accounting of funds is a project funding agreement within the meaning of No. 12.5 of the Administrative Regulations on Section 44 of the "Federal Budget Code" (BHO). The "General Auxillary Conditions for Project Funding" (ANBest-P) are constituent in the project funding agreement.

09. There is no entitlement to funding. A prerequisite for the disbursement of funding is the annual conclusion of a project funding agreement for a project or production. Payment will be made on the basis of an updated cost and financing plan for the project or production in question for the year in question.

10. In the case of funding, the approval periods are as follows

2024: expected 01.04.2024 to 31.12.2024

2025: 01.01.2025 to 31.12.2025

2026: 01.01.2026 to 15.10.2026

11. Three complete where-used lists (source and disposition statements) for the respective approval periods must be submitted by the following deadlines:

For the year 2024: 28.02.2025

For the year 2025: 28.02.2026

For the year 2026: 15.11.2026

12. The prerequisite for a concept funding is the existence of a balanced cost and financing plan for the three-year concept project.

13. The cost and financing plan must include the calculation of the individual projects or productions (in years) in addition to the overall financial plan.

14. The Fonds provides three consecutive years of concept funding with a minimum of €150,000 and a maximum of €240,000 in total.

15. The possible amount of funding that can be applied for from the Fonds Darstellende Künste in each of these three years is between a minimum of €50,000 and a maximum of €80,000.

16. At least 75% of the total amount applied for to the Fonds must be co-financed by public funding bodies already approved at the time of application.*

17. In the first two funding years (2024 and 2025), a co-financing sum of at least 75% of the amount applied for to the Fonds must also be secured in the respective funding year from approved public funding bodies.*

18. Applications without sufficiently secured funding (see points 16 and 17) by 01.02.2024 cannot be considered at the board of trustees’ annual meeting on the concept funding.

19. Personnel and material expenses are eligible for funding in accordance with the General Auxiliary Conditions for Project Funding (ANBest-P). A cost and financing plan for a production may include up to seven performances immediately following the premiere.

20. VAT deductible in accordance with Paragraph 15 of Germany’s Value Added Tax Act (UStG) is not eligible. Ongoing non-project-related material and personnel expenses are also excluded.

21. Proposed fees must be based on the recommended minimum fees for the independent performing arts.**

22. The following are not eligible for the concept funding: theater and production houses, festivals, revivals and revisions/adaptations of already performed or past productions with similar content.

23. Funding is excluded if projects or productions or parts thereof have already begun before the funding decision by the board of trustees of the Fonds Darstellende Künste, i.e., if expenditures have already been incurred or contracts concluded.

24. An application to the Fonds Darstellende Künste excludes any co-financing of the project being applied for by another funding institution that allocates federal funds. This applies, among others, to the Federal Cultural Foundation, the Capital Cultural Fund, the Sociocultural Fund, the Federal Agency for Civic Education, the Dance Pact, in most cases the Goethe-Institut and co-production funding by the National Performance Network (NPN).

25. Artists/artist groups can only receive a concept funding every 5 years. Applications can therefore only be submitted by artists who have not been among the recipients of the concept funding program of the Fonds Darstellende Künste since 2019.

26. The funding is linked to the underlying concept in terms of content and timing; in the event of any deviations, the board of trustees must be consulted again and funding may be terminated prematurely. The requirements for fulfilling the purpose of the funding must be met over the entire period, organizationally, structurally and financially.

27. A proper source and disposition statement for the first and second project and/or productions that receive the concept funding is a prerequisite for subsequent funding.

28. Artists/artist groups who receive a concept funding from the Fonds Darstellende Künste may not apply for production funding from the Fonds during the term of the funded project until they have submitted a complete and final source and disposition statement.

These regulations apply from 11.12.2023 and are subject to change.

Berlin, December 11, 2023

Fonds Darstellende Künste e.V.

Board of Directors and Management

* In this program, public funds are defined as funding from German municipalities or federal states in direct or indirect form.

** Recommendation of the Bundesverband Freie Darstellende Künste e.V. for a minimum fee for the independent performing arts in Germany for 1.) professional groups with compulsory insurance in the Künstlersozialkasse (KSK): €3,100 per month / €715 per week / €140 euros / €310 per performance. For 2.) professional groups for which social security via the KSK is not possible: €3,600 per month / €830 euros / €165 per day / €360 per performance. The Fonds Darstellende Künste also recommends an in-depth examination of ver.di's initiative on basic fees for self-employed creative professionals.