The interview was conducted with Nadzeya Haretskaya, ArtPower Belarus representative, Deputy Director of Belarusian Council for Culture.
ArtPower Belarus is an EU-funded cultural support programme implemented by the Danish Cultural Institute in partnership with the Belarusian Council for Culture. Its core mission is to safeguard Belarusian civic space through culture and the arts.
They support independent Belarusian cultural and artistic initiatives by strengthening their role and capacities as democratic change-makers. In practice, this means supporting projects that enhance the quality and visibility of Belarusian culture, connecting creators and audiences on both sides of the border, developing professional networks, improving working conditions for cultural actors, and supporting their integration into the European cultural space.
This program was created thanks to ongoing advocacy by its partners, who highlighted the importance of culture in supporting democratic change within EU policies and cooperation. Because of this, culture is now seen as a key priority for support.
How can art and culture keep civic space alive and open up more public dialogue in Belarus?
Nadzeya Haretskaya: “In the Belarusian context, culture is not only about heritage preservation or artistic expression. It is also one of the few spaces where society can continue to reflect, connect, and imagine itself beyond authoritarian control.
Art and culture help sustain civic space because they preserve language, memory, values, and the ability to speak to one another across borders, generations, and experiences. They create common ground for public dialogue not only among Belarusians in exile, but also between people inside the country and those outside it. In a fragmented and repressed environment, culture often remains the most accessible platform for trust-building and for maintaining a sense of shared belonging.
At the same time, the situation in Belarus makes it clear that authoritarian regimes not only understand the power of culture — they fear it.”
Artists, cultural institutions, memory work, and independent media are among the first targets of repression precisely because culture shapes identity, resilience, and democratic imagination. In this sense, supporting culture means supporting civic resilience, public dialogue, and, ultimately, the foundations of a democratic future.
Looking back at the first edition of the program, are there any projects or collaborations that particularly stood out to you? What made them memorable?
Nadzeya Haretskaya: “Looking back at the first edition of ArtPower Belarus, we could highlight several different layers of impact. Some of the most important initiatives we supported were those implemented inside Belarus or involving participants based in Belarus. For obvious security reasons, many of them could not be made public, but for us they were extremely important because they demonstrated that cultural life inside the country continues despite repression and isolation. It is also important to note that scale and visibility did not always go hand in hand: some of the smallest projects were fully public, while some of the largest initiatives could not be disclosed at all.
There were highly visible public projects that reached broad audiences and showed the scale and diversity of independent Belarusian culture from opera, theatre, film, music, and visual art to media, publishing, and education.
These projects were memorable because they did not simply produce cultural content; they created spaces for meeting, reflection, solidarity, and visibility.
One of the most strategically important outcomes was the emergence and strengthening of professional associations, networks, and sector-based communities. We see this as long-term infrastructure work: not only supporting individual creators, but also helping cultural actors organise, cooperate, and represent themselves more effectively.
More broadly, the first edition of the programme supported 140 projects and mobility opportunities, including 83 creative projects and 57 mobility grants. It also helped launch an art management school, two major studies of the cultural sector, a series of analytical reviews, and the ongoing work of the Resource Center and Guest Space. This combination of direct project support, mobility, research, and ecosystem-building is what made the first edition particularly meaningful. 79 more projects have already been supported within the current edition of the ArtPower Belarus programme.”
What kind of impact does this type of cultural funding have both for the individual artists involved and for the wider Belarusian cultural ecosystem?
Nadzeya Haretskaya: “For individual artists and cultural actors, this kind of funding provides much more than short-term financial support. It creates opportunities to continue working professionally, to experiment, to travel, to present work internationally, to build partnerships, and to remain visible in a situation where many have lost institutions, infrastructure, and access to audiences. For many participants, ArtPower Belarus was also a way to regain a sense of continuity, dignity, and connection with a wider professional community.
For the broader ecosystem, the impact is structural. Cultural funding helps maintain and rebuild networks, institutions, and professional standards. It enables collaborations across countries and sectors, connects Belarusian creators with European partners, and strengthens the long-term infrastructure needed for independent cultural life to survive and develop.
It is also important to underline that we do not see this support as limited to projects in exile. One of its major values is that it helps maintain links between Belarusians inside the country and outside it between creators, communities, and audiences on both sides of the border. In this sense, cultural funding does not only support artistic production; it helps preserve the continuity of Belarusian civic and cultural space itself.
At the same time, demand still far exceeds available resources. We would like to especially acknowledge and thank the European Union for its consistent support of Belarusian culture and civil society. This trust and partnership have made it possible not only to implement the first edition of the programme, but also to continue and expand this work in its next phase. Belarusian culture is not a peripheral issue, it is part of Europe’s democratic resilience and an important element of the country’s future.“
