- The Canal has a budget of 950,000 euros for 2024, a figure that places it as a top-level facility in Catalonia and which means an increase of 250% compared to 2021. The allocation for the last three years amounts to 2.6 million of euros.
- In two years, the equipment has supported 23 co-productions to which it has contributed almost 350,000 euros. Some of these proposals have already been seen at national and international festivals and theaters such as FiraTàrrega, Temporada Alta, Teatre Lliure and TNC.
- In the period 2022-2024, a total of 83 companies will have held short technical or artistic residencies, making use of the technical and human resources of the equipment.
- Around 18,000 people have come to the activities, actions and shows that El Canal has organized and hosted in the last three years, thus making the performing arts accessible to the community.
- El Canal promotes the construction of housing for resident artists and a new creation center in the discipline of circus in Salt.
- The Canal and Salt City Council are joining a European circus discipline project that will be presented in a few days in the municipality of Salt.
A year ago now, the Center for the Creation of Performing Arts – El Canal presented the new management plan that should mark the road map until 2025 for this space located in the municipality of Salt. A new direction to become a reference center in the creation and production of living arts in Catalonia, with a special focus on the most local artistic scene. A year later, the facility has established itself as one of the reference creative centers in Catalonia and as a new epicenter of the creation of live arts in the Girona regions. The demarcation is experiencing a moment of effervescence and the role of El Canal is helping the expansion of this Girona scene.
El Canal’s budget for the year 2024 is 950,000 euros, a high figure in the context of creative centers and which places it as a top-level artistic facility in Catalonia.
This figure represents an increase of 250% compared to the 2021 budget. And, if we add the budgets executed in 2022 and 2023 to the budget planned for 2024, the allocation rises to around 2,600,000 euros.
The achievement of this budget is the result of the clear commitment of Salt City Council and the establishment of partnerships with other administrations such as the Generalitat de Catalunya, the Diputació de Girona and Girona City Council.
A unique management model
One of the singularities of the center is the fluidity of its operation. Unlike other centers and administrations that also support creation, El Canal does not work through subsidies, thus saving artists and professionals the heavy burden of bureaucratic procedures and administrative control that often diverts the focus from the central: the creation The Salt center works through licenses to use the equipment for technical or artistic residencies, in the case of the Creative Spaces Program, or through private contracts, in the case of the Resident Companies Program. Both programs are open to public competition to ensure equal opportunities. For its part, the Production Support Program is established based on artistic criteria, due to opportunity and understanding with other creative centers, festivals or strategic national and international markets within the framework of El Canal’s objectives.
A new epicenter of the creation of living arts, with 83 residences in two years
In the last two years, El Canal has supported the production and creation of the performing arts through different programs. From 2022 to 2024, El Canal will have participated in 23 co-productions, to which it has contributed a total budget of 343,855 euros, with an average of 15,000 euros per project, a differentiating feature of the center, which is committed to co-producing fewer projects to promote greater professionalism .
After during the financial year 2022 – 2023 El Canal made a total of 9 co-productions, in this 2024 the center presents the resolution of two programs: the Co-production Support Program and the Resident Companies Program, which will mean a total of 14 new co-productions for this new financial year 2023-2024.
Of these co-productions, 66% are projects of companies from Girona counties and the remaining 34% are from Catalan companies, most of which have some connection with the Girona territory.
Of these 14 co-productions for the 2023-2024 financial year, 6 projects are part of the Production Support Program. The proposals are varied in terms of disciplines, as we can find everything from music with Momi Maiga, a well-established musician on the Catalan scene, to dance, with Eva Durban‘s inclusive dance company. The circus discipline is also added with PSM Collective‘s Ça Turne project and with Manel Rosés, circus artist, and his show Akri. On the other hand, we will also find established formations, such as the Cor de Teatre company, with 25 years of experience, as well as newer artists, such as the Malsai Produccions company and its show Calla, Judit, calla.
The remaining 8 companies have been selected from among the 78 projects that were submitted to the call for the Resident Companies Program, aimed at local, national and international artists and collectives with projects in the production phase. Among them, we find consolidated companies such as Cabosanroque with its project El castor que plorava, Societat Doctor Alonso with Hospital de campo or Monte Isla with the project Un cos sense talent. We also find projects from the world of circus such as QOROQ, from Kolektive Lapso Circk, and from movement and music such as Prosopopeia, from La Bella Otero. Finally, this program also includes the company Chez l’Amour with Un xai ha creuat el desert, KEBO (mapa de la pell d’un cos), from the company Vero Cendoya, and Teatre de l’Aurora with Sí sí sí.
By the end of 2024, there will have been 83 technical or artistic residencies in El Canal. Of these, 61 are part of the Creation Spaces Program, a program that offers companies short stays designed for specific uses (initial meetings, technical residencies or residencies to carry out adaptations of already premiered pieces, among others). This program is not endowed with financial participation, but it does offer logistical support and space, as well as technical support.
The companies that participate in the different programs of the center use the spaces of the center and all its equipment and technical material (light, sound, video, structures, etc.), and they also have the support of the specialized technical staff and the support in the positioning of projects.
A growing space, open to the community and the professional group
In addition to these programs, from 2021 to 2023, the equipment has also carried out 45 training support actions, working collaboratively with entities such as the Girona Theater Association, the ERAM University School , the Casa de la Música Show Technical School (ETECAM), the Aula Tradi de Salt or the Modern Music School of Girona, among others. On the other hand, with the aim of encouraging the creation of audiences and favoring community access to the performing arts, the center has hosted 78 activities and performances open to the public. In total, these actions and activities add up to around 18,000 participants.
Activities open to the public have formed part of the centre’s new programme. Under the name ‘Obert en Canal’, the equipment has given shape to this program where the companies residing in El Canal open their creative processes to the community of Salt and Girona, as well as to other interested professionals. The aim of this program, which is free and has been very well received, is to bring the artistic creation of the performing arts closer to the public from a new perspective.
As for the professional community, one of El Canal’s areas of work is drama. For this reason, this past 2023 the second edition of the Dramaturgy Days was organized, professional meetings with the aim of sharing questions, ideas, visions and doubts to analyze recent dramaturgy, rethink the dramaturgy of the present and imagine dramaturgy of the future The conference took place over two Tuesdays in November and revolved around the political theater of the future and the conditions of the profession of dramaturgy.
In recent years, investments have also been made that have allowed an improvement in the technical equipment of light, sound and video, the adaptation of the working space of the Kropotkin Room, the construction of a Rehearsal Room and the construction of an office space for artists and equipment workers.
With these actions, El Canal positions itself as a center of quality creation, which seeks to enrich the educational offer already present in Salt and Girona, which wants to offer the community of Salt and Girona a new way of entering the performing arts and , at the same time, as a new point of reference for the professional collective of the living arts.
Performances in progress
The intention of the equipment is to continue working to support artistic creation in the field of the performing arts based on 5 axes: production and support for production, support for creation, training, the creation of audiences and distribution support. The aim is to remain a key center of the ecosystem of facilities and initiatives in the performing arts sector in Girona and Catalonia, and to also have an international presence.
With this intention, El Canal has several actions in process.
On the one hand, the creation of accommodation for resident artists: the City Council of Salt will rehabilitate a house bequeathed by the artist Marta Font as accommodation for the artists who do residencies at the Center for the Creation of Performing Arts. This year, work will be done on the second floor to create a 132 square meter home that will allow a dozen artists who are in creative residency at El Canal to stay at the same time. This project will turn El Canal into one of the few creative centers in Catalonia that offer these services and allow 360-degree residences to be built. It will make artists’ stays more complete, promote coexistence between diverse artists, and make it easier for national and international talent to carry out residencies and link more with the territory of Salt, Girona and the Girona counties.
On the other hand, work is also being done to have a creative space for the circus discipline in the context of the Coma Cros Cultural Factory. El Canal, together with the Collective of Circus Professionals of Girona and the Ateneu Popular de Salt, have promoted the La Guixera Circus School. The aim is to bring this scenic discipline closer to the community. It was put into operation in the 2022/23 academic year and has a volume of registrations of around 110 participants in the 8 workshops of various techniques that are held. To give continuity to the School and encourage the creation of artistic circus projects, it is planned to enable the spaces of the Naus Guixeres managed by El Canal.
Local and international alliances
In addition to its own activity, the center collaborates with Festival Temporada Alta and Festival Z. El Canal also works with other Catalan creative centers such as El Graner, L’Estruch, Roca Umbert Fàbrica de les Arts, the Central del Circ i la Nau Ivanov, as well as strategic festivals such as FiraTàrrega, Trapezi Reus, Mostra Igualada and Fira Mediterrània, and centers for the creation of Catalan-speaking territories such as Teatre Principal, C.IN.E., Espai El Tub (Balearic Islands) and Andorran National Scene (Andorra). It also leases spaces for the activities and stage actions of educational centers in the territory (schools, institutes, universities, music and dance schools).
In the international field, El Canal has recently become part of the promoters of the “EKO – Pirineus de Circ” project, which has received funding from the European program Interreg VI – Spain-France-Andorra (POCTEFA). Several scenic and creative facilities from the Pyrenees regions participate and it has 14 direct partners from the territories of Catalonia, Aragon, the Basque Country, Occitania and New Aquitaine, and with a proposal for activities to be carried out in three years. The Catalan partners of the project are: El Canal de Salt, the Xarxa Transversal and La Central del Circ (APCC), while the French creative center La Grainerie is the leading partner of the project. This project will be presented at a press conference on March 6 in the same municipality of Salt with the other partners of the program.
