On Sunday, November 3, the 8th Sybren Hellinga Art Prize was awarded to visual artist Vytautas Kumža.

Visitor numbers at Dutch museums increased by 1 million visits to 32 million in 2018. This means that museum visits have grown by 37% since 2013.

A working group of freelance curators is active within Platform BK; a collective established by and for freelance curators in the Netherlands.

The annual Paradiso Lecture organized by Kunsten '92, this year on August 26, was about the Fair Practice Code. This was initiated by young artists and creatives (under the coordination of Kunsten '92), to improve working conditions and future prospects in the cultural and creative sector.

In the arts and culture sector, there is currently a lot of talk about skewed labor relations and the poor income position of artists. Copyright (author's right and neighbouring right) is also important for creators in this context.

This year BK-information is again media partner of the TENT Academy Awards, the annual competition for the best graduation films of art academies. With the TENT Academy Awards, TENT Rotterdam aims to stimulate and recognize young audiovisual talent.

The recently released report Recommendations on Open Data in the Cultural Sector by the Language Union Digital Heritage Committee answers what the conditions are for institutions to be able to release their collections and collection data as open data so that what is digitized is optimally usable and reusable.

"When we meet on important issues, when we make important decisions, us together, but also in our own companies, we always put an empty chair there. That is the chair for the people who are not here yet, for the future generations. The chair of the future." - Jan Terlouw, from his fairy tale for...

The programs for the March 21, 2018 municipal elections are currently being written. Kunsten '92 has therefore produced flyers, for inspiration, for municipal councillors and aldermen with the aim of including heritage and culture prominently in the election programme.

On June 22, 2017, artist-in-residence organizations met at the Tetterode complex in Amsterdam. The aim was to elaborate on About Impact and Value, a recent study by Platform BK on the position of small artist organizations working within the context of small and medium-sized cities in the Netherlands.

This year BK-information is again media partner of TENT's TAA awards. With these awards, TENT Rotterdam aims to stimulate and recognize young audiovisual talent. TAA has a national and international focus and shows audiovisual work by graduates of Dutch art academies and this year that of art academies from Norway.

The creative industry sectors (like the ICT sector) are contributing substantially to the economic recovery of the Dutch economy. This is evident from the Creative Industry Monitor 2016 published this spring by IMMovator, network for the cross-media sector.

With the new design program Heritage and Space, the Stimuleringsfonds voor Creatieve Industrie aims to connect past and present in a sustainable way. The program (2017-2018) gives an extra boost to cooperation between the design and heritage sectors and engages designers in current issues at the intersection of climate, energy, space and heritage.

With the 2016 Annual Report, the Mondriaan Fund concludes both the calendar year and the 2013-2016 cultural planning period. In the Annual Report, the Fund provides accountability by comparing set goals and results; by core objective and by specific contribution.

Last month Kunstenbond and Platform BK opened the 'Meldpunt atelierbeleid', a digital mailbox where artists in the Netherlands can share good and bad experiences about studio policy.

More than two hundred renowned artists, including Anish Kapoor, Kader Attia, Olafur Eliasson, Steve McQueen, Tracey Rose, Ugo Rondinone and Defne Ayas (artistic director Witte de With, center for contemporary art) have united in the collective Hands Off Our Revolution.

A list of the hundred most important living Dutch art collectors was also compiled in 2017. The collectors included in the list have a collection consisting on average of many hundreds of works and a value of at least 600,000 euros.

As of January 1, 2017, the artist fees guideline was introduced in the Netherlands, an initiative of BKNL (Beeldende Kunst Nederland). The guideline applies to exhibitions without a sales purpose and aims to professionalize the contract practice between art institutions and artists.