Organisations can apply for support to enrich their collections, better represent the UK’s diverse communities, make screen heritage available to the public and ensure that they have the workforce they need to deliver these aims.
Individuals can apply for grants to remove the obstacles to getting into the screen heritage sector or progressing their career once they’re in. The fund exists to support the UK screen heritage sector and to ensure that people, including under-represented groups, across the UK can access the support they need to develop their careers and skills.
The BFI’s National Lottery Funding Plan 2023 to 2026 allocates £7.9m of National Lottery funding over three years to the BFI National Lottery Screen Heritage Fund to help achieve these aims.
There are four funding strands:
- Project funding
- Organisational Skills funding
- Individual Skills funding
- Resilience funding – applications closed
About the fund
Through investments made by the BFI National Lottery Screen Heritage Fund we want to see:
- More people, from a wide and diverse range of backgrounds, engaging with their screen heritage
- Screen heritage collections becoming more reflective of the diverse communities of modern Britain
- An inclusive screen heritage sector workforce that is representative of our population
- A move towards reduction in the carbon emissions and broader ecological impacts of care for screen heritage collections
- Expanded outreach, and audience engagement including co-curation with local communities
- More resilient screen heritage organisations with clearly articulated, long-term plans for organisational sustainability and development
- Knowledge sharing and collaboration across archives and with broader cultural partners
- Strengthened capacity, resources and skillsets for collecting today’s moving image heritage
- Expanded ability to collect new moving image works (“contemporary collecting”)
Who can apply
Projects and Organisational Skills
Funding is available to support organisations that hold and operate a screen heritage collection and meet the parameters set out in the fund guidelines. Screen includes any moving image or audio-visual format but excludes paper or other static form, sound or music. Heritage means the preservation, conservation, cataloguing and making accessible that screen collection. The screen heritage activity may form the sole or a partial activity of an eligible organisation.
Your organisation must be a legally constituted organisation centrally managed in the UK:
- Charity or trust registered with the Charity Commission (including UK universities and colleges)
- Limited Liability Company registered at Companies House
- Community Interest Company registered at Companies House
- Combined or local authority or statutory body
- and must operate an archive, collection network or similar whose remit is to collect, preserve and/or make screen collections freely accessible to the general public (that is it must operate on a not-for profit basis)
Organisations that hold screen collections but that are primarily engaged in the distribution or exhibition of that screen content for profit are ineligible.
Individual Skills (bursary) funding
You can apply for a bursary if you:
- Currently work in the UK screen heritage sector, or can demonstrate your intention to work in it (for example, through detailing previous actions you have taken to seek work in the sector)
- Are eligible to work in the UK
- Are 18 years old or above
- Have a UK bank account
When we refer to screen heritage sector in our guidelines, we mean the preservation, conservation, cataloguing and making accessible, freely to the general public, the UK’s screen collection (which includes any moving image or audio-visual format but excludes paper or other static form, sound or music).
If you want to access training together with colleagues from the same organisation, you will need to apply for Organisational Skills funding.
More information and support
We can provide assistance to applicants who have access requirements and need some support in order to make an application. See Access support for BFI funding applicants.
Q&A sessions
We’ll be hosting online Q&A sessions for applicants who would like to know more about these programmes on:
- Tuesday 19 November, 10am to 11:30am
- Monday 16 December, 2pm to 3:30pm
- Tuesday 14 January, 2pm to 3:30pm
- Monday 17 February, 2pm to 3:30pm
If you’d like to join a session, email screenheritagefund@bfi.org.uk to register and we’ll send you a Teams link.
When you can apply
The BFI Screen Heritage Fund is open year-round, and applications are accepted on a rolling basis. Please read the fund guidelines in full before applying.
Applications are assessed as they are submitted. The sooner you apply, the sooner we can process your application.
Project and Organisational Skills funding
You can choose to either send us an Expression of Interest (EOI) first, which we will provide feedback on, or to complete a full application. We will confirm the receipt of EOIs within two working days and aim to review them within 10 working days. If your EOI indicates that your project is eligible for funding and you wish to proceed, you will then be required to complete a full application. We’ll complete an initial review of full applications and request any additional information we need within four weeks. We aim to take a decision within 12 weeks of your receiving your application. If we need additional information from you, it may take us longer to reach a decision on your application.
Project funding
Applications are now open.
Read the fund guidelines in full before applying.
Organisational Skills funding
Applications are now open.
Read the fund guidelines in full before applying.
Individual Skills (bursary)
If you are applying for a bursary to attend a training course, please complete your application to us no earlier than three months from when the course commences.
We aim to take a decision within six weeks of receiving your application. If we need additional information from you, it may take us longer to reach a decision. Make sure to allow at least eight weeks between your application date and the start date of your training or development opportunity.
Applications are now open.
Read the fund guidelines in full before applying.
If you have any questions or would like to discuss your project in advance of completing an application, please email: ScreenHeritageFund@bfi.org.uk
About BFI National Lottery Funding
Since the very first National Lottery draw in 1994, public support – raised directly through National Lottery ticket sales – has funded more than 670,000 projects, raising more than £46 billion for good causes.
As a recipient, it is important to publicly acknowledge the source of this funding throughout the lifespan of the project. Effectively communicating it is supported by BFI National Lottery funding ensures that those engaging with the work recognise the value and benefit of this unique Good Cause funding.
Therefore, if your application is successful, you will be responsible for prominently crediting BFI National Lottery funding and thanking National Lottery players.
As such, you are encouraged to ensure that elements of your project/s which have the potential to engage a broad public audience are capitalised on, in order to communicate this message. More details will be supplied once an award has been made.