Aberdeen arts venue at risk of closure after council funding rejection

The creative director of a theatre in Aberdeen has said it is at risk of closing due to a lack of funding.

Eve Nicol, who took over as creative director of Aberdeen Arts Centre in February, said the failure to secure funding for “essential refurbishment” has put the venue in “jeopardy”.

The local authority’s finance committee rejected an application by Castlegate Arts, the charity that runs the venue, for a share of a £2.3m pot awarded to the city from the UK Government’s Shared Prosperity Fund.

Castlegate had applied for £170,000, in part to stop sound bleeds from one space to another, which would have enabled the arts centre to schedule more than one performance at a time.

Speaking to the Aberdeen Press & Journal, Nicol said: “By not achieving the funding, it means that we will be in a position of stasis rather than growth.

“And it’s just how long that stasis is going to be sustainable for. Because there will be a tipping point where it becomes unsustainable.”



She added: “We are finding that more and more doors are getting closed to us, so our opportunities are getting smaller and smaller.

“And with each door that closes, the creative lives of the people of Aberdeen are getting put into more and more jeopardy.”

Aberdeen City Council’s finance convener, Alex McLellan, said the venue “did not tick” all the UK Government criteria for the funding.