Caption : John McColgan, US Envoy to Northern Ireland Declan Kelly, Paul Brady and Stuart McLaughlin of Business to Arts, at an advocacy event in support of the Derry-Londonderry City of Culture 2013 bid hosted by Mason Hayes+Curran. Photo by Robbie Reynolds

Business to Arts CEO, Stuart McLaughlin and Economic Envoy, Declan Kelly gathered a number of prominent members of Ireland’s business and arts communities at an event hosted by Mason Hayes & Curran to call for support for the Derry-Londonderry City of Culture 2013 bid. The City is currently one of four finalists competing for the inaugural title.

Derry-Londonderry was one of 29 cities to submit an application in 2009 to host the first UK City of Culture which will take place in 2013. The purpose of the competition is to build on the success of Liverpool’s year as European Capital of Culture 2008, which has had significant social and economic benefits for the area. Derry-Londonderry, Birmingham, Norwich and Sheffield are the final four shortlist entries. Final bids will be made by the cities on May 28 2010.

Following the support expressed from Taoiseach Brian Cowen for the Bid, Declan Kelly is calling on the business and arts community to become champions and advocates for Derry-Londonderry in its Bid to be named UK City of Culture 2013, which will have a positive impact on the island of Ireland.

To read more about the bid, go to City of Culture 2013.

Irish Distillers Pernod Ricard, AIB, An Post and Ulster Bank are just some of the leading businesses set to be recognised at the prestigious Allianz Business to ArtsAwards ceremony and luncheon at The Irish Museum of Modern Art on May 24 2010.

For the 19th year, the award sculpture has been commissioned by Dublin Airport Authority, and this year was designed and created in porcelain by the award-winning Cork artist Nuala O’Donovan.

The award categories cover a wide range of partnership areas from sponsorship to using creativity in the workplace, and from commissioning to corporate social responsibility awards which highlight community initiatives and demonstrate how the business and arts community can foster creativity to pave the way for Ireland’s recovery.

Within the Highly Commended projects, initiatives from Pfizer, taxback.com, the HSE, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Accenture among others are also set to be acknowledged. Involving children in the arts through education is a feature of many of the winning and highly commended projects.

The art-forms celebrated cover festivals, visual arts, music, film and literature and in the current climate, businesses looking more and more to providing opportunities for access to the arts by bringing arts out onto the streets for anyone to experience.

Speaking at the announcement of the winners, Brendan Murphy, CEO of Allianz said, “These awards demonstrate yet again the contribution and creativity in both the business and arts community, and its importance to our economic and cultural recovery. As Ireland Inc starts on the road to recovery, it looks to the creativity of our artists to help inspire and in many respects lead the way to economic renewal and recovery at both a local and national level.”

Stuart McLaughlin, Chief Executive of Business to Arts, congratulated all the winning and highly-commended projects. “This year’s entries clearly demonstrate that business and arts organisations are working harder to establish goals for their partnerships and ensure quality engagement with all stakeholders. The Jury Panel applied stringent criteria in their deliberations to select the projects that they’re recognising this year, and we’re enormously grateful for the attention they gave to the task.” Read more…