The Connections Through Culture grants programme is designed to nurture fresh cultural partnerships between the Asia Pacific region and the UK. These grants are instrumental in supporting new ideas and collaborations from artists and cultural organisations at any stage of development.

The grants supported in this round of Connections Through Culture programme have focused on two distinct areas: diversity and inclusion and addressing climate change. The collaborative efforts across borders and artistic disciplines will lead to new thoughts and ideas created to address global challenges.

The grants support new connections, exchanges, and collaborations. These grants help build long-term relationships and collaborations between artists, cultural professionals, creative practitioners and art and cultural organisations, hubs, networks, and collectives.

2024 Grant Recipients: China

Diversity After Dark

UK: Troi Lee, Deaf Rave
China: Xiaoshu Hu

Diversity After Dark is an inclusive nighttime event celebrating community diversity through art, music, and culture. Featuring a Deaf DJ, sign language DJ workshops, and the UK’s Deaf Rave team, it highlights the talents of the Deaf community and fosters inclusivity. With a focus on sustainability, this “green” event champions environmental protection and creates a welcoming space for learning, sharing, and celebrating the richness of our differences.

 

Echoes of Deaf History: Deaffest Short Film Screening and Criticism Seminar

UK: Deaffest
China: Garrison Gou, Alice Hu

Deaf films reflect the history of the Deaf community and promote accessibility, yet they often lack effective academic attention. Our project aims to re-screen several historically significant short films from Deaffest with sign languages and hold corresponding film criticism seminars. Our goal is to establish a new discourse system in the field of film criticism—Deaf cultural criticism—to help the public understand and discern genuine Deaf films.

Intellectual Heart Theatre Company

UK: Blue Apple Theatre
China: Beijing Body On&On Cultural Exchange Centre 

Beijing Body On&On is collaborating with the Blue Apple Theatre and the Beijing Rongai Rongle Family Support Centre for Persons with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities to establish the first art project of a Chinese theater troupe on inclusive performing arts for individuals with learning disabilities. In preparation, Body On&On has organized empowering workshops for youth with mental disabilities in Beijing. 

Rubbish Music x Beibei Wang x Shanghai West Bund Theatre

UK: Rubbish Music, Beibei Wang 
China: Shanghai West Bund Theatre

Rubbish Music (Iain Chambers, Kate Carr) and percussionist Beibei Wang, in collaboration with Guo Qiong (Shanghai West Bund Theatre), will create a new immersive concert and waste music workshop, to develop the concept into a full theatrical proposal. The group will research attitudes to waste recycling in Shanghai, making recordings at waste-processing plants and creating a storyline exploring the life cycle of discarded objects. 

Afternoon Histories (working title)

UK: The Common Guild
China: Rockbund Art Museum, Shanghai

Peng Zuqiang’s multi-channel film installation is concerned with the nature of image-making and the ways in which cultural, historical and political narratives are shared and disseminated. The installation explicates a partial history of 8.75mm film stock: a film format unique to China and manufactured between the 1960-80s for the purpose of image circulation. It will be presented concurrently in solo exhibitions in Glasgow and Shanghai.  

 

The Art of Making Zines: Transnational Grrrl Power Unleashed

UK: Lu Williams
China: Ye Funa (叶甫纳)

The Art of Making Zines: Transnational Grrrl Power Unleashed is a collaborative exchange between Essex-based Grrrl Zine Fair CIC and Beijing-based artist Ye Funa. It centres around feminist and queer zine-making and distribution. The project aims to foster cultural exchange and understanding between minority communities in China and the UK, using zine-making as a medium to explore and share unique perspectives and creative expressions.

 

The Music of Nie Xiaoqian

UK: Surge Forward Music and Arts 
China: Chongqing Sanyusanxun Cultural Communication Co Ltd

This project will further develop the cooperation of Chonqing Sanyusanxun Cultural Communication and Surge Forward Music and Arts, building on its 2024 collaboration on Nie Xiaoqian, a new immersive opera at theXiang Jiang Theatre. For this project phase, the organisations will develop and present a music concert from Nie Xiaoqian in Changsha, mixing Western and Eastern traditions and compositional styles.

Water System Project : Studio Voltaire Residency

UK: Studio Voltaire
China: Cao Minghao and Chen Jianjun 

Water System Project is a long-term artistic collaboration by Chinese artists Cao Minghao and Chen Jianjun, developed through research, dialogue, and various forms of collaboration. The project focuses on site-specific ecological realities that are often overlooked by the wider public. In 2025, it will be presented in the UK for the first time during the artists' residency at Studio Voltaire in London.