A Cultural Olympiad for everyone - Blog Archive - 2012 Olympics

Our vision

Jude, Chair of Culture, Ceremonies and Education11 March 2008

We have reached a very exciting stage in the development of our plans for the Cultural Olympiad - a four-year festival of culture and creativity that officially begins in September after Beijing has handed over to London and runs through to the end of the

This month we open our doors. Through a network of Creative Programmers around the country we will be able to respond to ideas and proposals from all kinds of large and small organisations wishing to participate in the Cultural Olympiad. This is a first. No other Cultural Olympiad has opened to everyone to participate on such a scale. And we are introducing a new official 'Inspire mark', which means that those selected projects can be really part of the Games.

The process of building up the programme will begin this year, with at least some events planned for this autumn; it will then develop in pace and scale as we move towards 2012 itself.

We are currently planning a public launch over the weekend of 26 - 28 September this year, to promote the start of the four year Cultural Olympiad programme, announce the large-scale ‘signature’ creative projects and begin to spread the word about the Cultural Olympiad to the public.

So what are we looking for? We want to showcase inspirational ideas. We are looking for projects in London and the whole of the UK. We want to discover surprising, exciting, brand new projects, events or activities which are inspired by London 2012: projects which reflect our core values and promote excellence and innovation. They can be about the broadest definition of culture.

Whilst London 2012 is not itself a funding agency, I am pleased to say that we have started to forge a number of strategic partnerships with funding partners who are earmarking budgets for a range of projects linked to London 2012. So far, these include The Legacy Trust, Arts Council England, Youth Music, Museums, Libraries and Archives (MLA), UK Film Council, BBC. And more will be coming forward in the coming months as the programme develops.

If you are interested in taking part or you think there is someone in your organisation who would like to know more, we are here to assist.

You can find general information on the criteria and contact details for our Creative Programmers in the Cultural Olympiad section of this site.