Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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384. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht the amount of funding her Department has awarded to an Irish arts centre in New York (details supplied) in each of the past ten years, in tabular form; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [3987/17]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The remit of Culture Ireland, a division of my Department, is to promote and advance Irish arts worldwide thus strengthening Ireland’s cultural profile and global reputation. Strategic priorities include providing support for the international presentation of Irish artists and arts organisations, developing new and diverse international audiences and markets for Irish arts, and linking culture into the Government’s international promotion strategy in tandem with other relevant Government Agencies. In addition to the main funding programmes, Culture Ireland supports two key partners to promote Irish arts abroad – the Centre Culturel in Paris and the Irish Arts Center in New York.

The funding provided by Culture Ireland to the Irish Arts Center in New York supports Irish artists travel related costs. In 2016 my Department provided increased funding of €236,198 to enable an enhanced programme of Irish artists to be presented as part of 'I Am Ireland', Centenary year programme. I have now allocated €200,000 in funding to the centre for events planned for 2017.

In addition, capital funding of €1 million was provided by my Department for the development of the new Irish Arts Center in 2016. This capital funding will supplement private and US State support, including City of New York funding of $36.85m, State of New York funding of $3.65m and private funding $7.6m. My Department’s grant in December complements over €3m provided to date by the Government through the Emigrant Support Programme of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade as well as the support provided by the Office of Public Works in preparing the designs for the new Center. The new Irish Arts Center, when completed, will be a flagship venue which will offer a major platform for the coming generation of Irish artists and performers.

The additional funding which I have now provided will assist in ensuring that this flagship artistic Irish cultural venue is delivered on schedule by allowing site preparations to progress as planned.

The support provided over the past 10 years to the Center is set out a follows: