Sky Arts is offering five young artists £30,000 each to fund their work for a full year as part of the Sky Arts Ignition: Futures Fund – in association with IdeasTap. We’ve just announced the two winners of round one, and now we’re on the lookout for three more talented artists to fund.

Sky Arts recognises that there’s an incredible amount of young talent in the arts today, but finding a way to get your work made is an ever-present challenge. The Futures Fund is designed to help bridge the gap between formal education and becoming a working artist.

Whether you want to direct a piece of theatre, choreograph a new dance piece, write a novel, record an album, create a sculpture or produce a live art performance, Sky Arts will give you the time and money to make it happen. We’ll also pair you with a mentor from Sky to help you develop your networks, skills and knowledge in the arts and the commercial sector.

The Sky Arts Ignition: Futures Fund is open to individual artists working in visual art, theatre, performance art, film, music, dance or literature.

To apply, you must be an IdeasTap member aged 18-30 by the closing date, 24 February 2012, and either be a citizen of the UK or Ireland or have been resident in the UK or Ireland for the last five years. Either way, you must currently be living in the UK or Ireland to apply. It’s free to become an IdeasTap member and just takes a few minutes. – sign up here.

Tell us how the Sky Arts Ignition: Futures Fund bursary can help take your work to the next level and you could be in with the chance of receiving one of three £30,000 bursaries, as well as an opportunity to showcase your work on Sky Arts – be it on TV, online or on demand.

Three winners will be selected during this round of funding.

The Sky Arts Ignition: Futures Fund is part of the Sky Arts Ignition Series, which seeks to collaborate with six arts organisations over the next three years in the creation of brand new works, and further expanding Sky’s support of the arts in the UK and Ireland.

For advice on how to create a successful application, visit the Sky Arts judging: Top tips article.

About Sky Arts

Sky is the only broadcaster in the UK and Ireland with channels dedicated solely to the arts, with 48 hours of the best arts content from around the world across Sky Arts 1 and Sky Arts 2 daily.

Sky Arts also seeks to connect with culture on the ground, creating and collaborating with the best of the arts in the UK and Ireland to bring new experiences to life. For more information on Sky Arts, please visit www.sky.com/arts.

Download the terms and conditions and the application form.

Applications close at 5pm on Friday 24 February 2012. Please do not leave it to the last day to apply – we are expecting a very high volume of applications, so if you experience technical difficulties or have any questions we may not be able to help you at that late stage. The deadline is final and we will not accept applications by any other means.

For details visit:

http://www.ideastap.com/Opportunities/Brief/6305b58b-81f6-4598-87b0-9fa400dc118e#Overview