Youth Arts

Artform Definition

The Arts Council of Northern Ireland believe that Youth Arts is about the entitlement of all Children and Young People to participate in a diverse range of arts-led cultural opportunities in safe and enabling environments.

Youth Arts should be taken in the broadest possible sense and should include participative arts and work created for Young People as audiences.

Youth arts refers to a whole range of creative activities, involving children and young people up to the age of 25 years, both in and outside of formal education settings. Youth arts can take place, any time, anywhere, with almost any one, and with any kind of art form or creative activity. It could be poetry slams, street dance, circus skills, drama, fashion design, film, graffiti, music, Dj-ing, Vj-ing, craft, opera, hip hop – almost anything goes.

The Arts Council recognise Youth Arts as a valuable artistic process in itself and also as a contributor to growing all aspects of professional arts practice.

Underpinning the artistic work that the Arts Council supports is the view that the arts need to be recognised as central to the effectiveness of future policy for Children and Young People across all dimensions; educational, social and economic.

The Arts Council seeks to stimulate exchange, connection, collaboration and revision among all those including Young People with a vested interest in the development of the arts for Children and Young People up to the age of 25 years.

Publications and Information

Safeguarding Policy (PDF)

Children and Youth Arts - Examples of Successes Achieved in 2009-2010 (PDF)

The Education and Training Inspectorate - Creative Youth Partnerships 2004-2006 (PDF)

ETI Interim Report on Creative Youth Partnerships (published 2005)

Creative Youth Partnerships - Code of Practice for Child Protection (published 2004)

Arts Council of Northern Ireland Web Site – Useful Links – Youth Arts.

Artform Policy Document (PDF)

Child Protection Best Practice Guidelines (PDF)

Current initiatives

• The Arts Council has a dedicated Youth Arts news section and Youth Arts Gallery on the ACNI web site.
  
  
• Youth Arts Sectoral and Individual Client meetings are set to continue providing a structured and focused platform for information exchange in relation to current and planned arts activity with young people.
  
  
• A PDF report "State of the Arts" and an accompanying DVD is now available on the Arts Council web site. The report and DVD reflect the views and opinions of young people relevant to their experience of the arts and culture. Young people are at the heart of creativity and it is essential that their views are taken into account. The report and DVD describes a phase in the working partnership between the Arts Council and the Youth Council for Northern Ireland, begun in November 2005.
  
  
• Good Practice Guidelines relevant to Child Protection for Arts Sector Organisations are available on the Arts Council website, click here. These Guidelines have been developed by the Volunteer Development Agency through a Business Support Lottery award.
  
  
• We fund a wide range of youth arts activities, through both Revenue and Lottery resources which are aimed at unlocking young people’s creativity in both the formal education and out of school learning environments.
  
  
• A small working group has been established to explore the development of a Youth Arts Network for Northern Ireland.
  
  
• A series of training programmes have been delivered free of charge to the Arts Sector covering issues of Child Protection practice and policy.
  
  
• The Arts Council has commenced a review of the current Youth Arts Policy , this work in progress will lead to the development of a new Policy for Youth Arts for the period 2012 to 2017.

• In partnership with DCAL the Arts Council will  undertake a  piece of action research to test criteria used by the Education and Training Inspectorate when making judgements about the quality of provision  provided by organisations working with young people .
  

Contact Us

Further information on any of the Council’s funding programmes and/or its strategic interests in Youth Arts may be obtained from:

Gavin O Connor
Arts Development Officer (Youth Arts)
Arts Council of Northern Ireland
MacNeice House
77 Malone Road
Belfast. BT9 6AQ
Tel: 028 9038 5239
Email: goconnor@artscouncil-ni.org

Relevant Links

Arts Council of Northern Ireland Youth Arts Gallery

Arts Council of Northern Ireland Youth Arts Events

Creative Youth Partnerships

National Youth Arts Programme (ROI)

Community Arts Forum

Voluntary Arts Ireland

Arts and Disability Forum

EUnetART

Youth Council for Northern Ireland

English National Youth Arts Network

Practice

Arts Council useful links (Youth Arts)