Aardman, Bristol Old Vic and Balloon Fiesta demand city council abandons culture cuts View Image

More than 1,100 arts and culture champions, including many of Bristol’s globally famous heavyweights in the sector, have signed a strongly worded open letter to the city council opposing huge cuts to creative groups.

Leaders from Aardman, Watershed, Bristol Beacon, Bristol Old Vic, Arnolfini, and the city’s Balloon Fiesta are among those urging the local authority to abandon plans in its annual budget to gut all £635,000 from its Cultural Investment Programme (CIP) by 2029.

And it has now emerged that ideas from consultants commissioned by the council to identify replacement funding to plug the gap would generate only £225,000 annually after five years – about a third of the current

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