CONCLUSION OF ACTIVITIES
The Lockdown Collection (TLC), the intended three-week long initiative to raise funds for artists during South Africa’s first and historic Covid-19 lockdown in March 2020, has announced that after over thirty months of ongoing fundraising, the time has come to conclude the project.
Aligned with the general global cessation of enforced Lockdowns, the TLC Founders and Team concur the relevance of Lockdowns has diminished and that whilst the unprecedented events of the past years of the pandemic should be remembered and artistically captured, it’s unnecessary for the theme and project to persist beyond its time.
However, the ongoing urgency of artists requiring support has certainly not diminished and if anything, increased since those early Covid days. To that end, the Fund that TLC established, The Vulnerable Artist Fund (VAF), administered by Artist Proof Studio, will remain open and active.
It is the hope that this Fund continues to be replenished by any further sales from works related to the various Collections/editions of the TLC as well as ongoing independent grants and charitable donations. The intention of the Fund will be to continue assisting artists, providing grants for basic needs as well as to help students with education in the visual arts.
A 3 week to 3 year Project.
From inception to launch, The Lockdown Collection took just 48 hours to go public. Conceived and actioned by a remote team of volunteers with a vision to put in place a way of capturing history through visual arts and thereby finding a mechanism to fundraise for artists.
What was planned as a single Collection - a single live-online sale of works by 21 artists - received such overwhelming support and momentum through its ground-breaking format and lightning speed-to-market, that TLC was willing and able to continue its work throughout 2020 and beyond.
Dissemination of Funds:
Since inception, and through the above projects and initiatives, TLC has paid out over 636 grants – an amount of almost R3 000 000 to date - from its Vulnerable Artists Fund (VAF) to recipients across South Africa.
The initial flow of funds was used to send 530 grants to artists who applied and where it was clear that the pandemic had had an instant and major impact on earnings and therefore living and working conditions. R1 590 000,00 was paid out in grant support. These grants were to help artists buy basic essentials and assist them to keep working on their craft, hopefully securing them future revenue when lockdowns ceased.
A total of 128 bursaries from sales of the William Kentridge prints totalling R1 334 000,00 were paid in later phases of fundraising (2021 & 2022) to visual arts students to assist them to keep up their tuition fees at multiple art institutions around the country, as government aid was not easily - or at all - on hand.
The initiative also donated R250 000 immediately after the initial Collection was auctioned in April 2020 to the official President’s SA Solidarity Fund, for the benefit of all South Africans in need.
R295 000,00 has been paid out directly to participating artists who sold works through various Collections, assisting them generate income at a time so difficult to do so.