Culture|Shift (previously known as the Creative City Strategy), Vancouver’s new Culture Plan for 2020-2029, provides a framework with strategic directions and actions to align and increase:
- Support for art and culture
- Champion creators
- Build on our commitments to Reconciliation and Equity
- Introduce bold moves to advance community-led cultural infrastructure
- Position Vancouver as a thriving hub for music
Culture|Shift includes recommendations and actions from the following reports:
Review the 2020-2021 Culture|Shift progress report
This report details the progress we've made to support and promote arts and culture in Vancouver since we've launched the plan.
The traditional, unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓ əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səl̓ilwətaɁɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples make this place unlike any in the world. Diverse people from across the world have imbued Vancouver’s cultural landscape with the qualities, landmarks, and stories that make our city recognizable and distinct. Culture|Shift acknowledges that this landscape is critical to our shared economic prosperity, social cohesion, and sense of environmental responsibility.
Engagement
Culture|Shift represents the voices of a diverse cross-section of people, and places a particular focus on the voices of historically underrepresented communities (including Indigenous, racialized, disabled, deaf, low income, and LGBTQ2+ groups who organized City-funded Host Your Own Engagement meetups) to achieve a more accurate and inclusive representation of Vancouver.
From 2017-2019, Staff engaged with 3,000 Vancouverites in-person and had approximately 4,000 virtual touchpoints. Partnerships with the local Nations helped to develop leading-edge work to prioritize and advance their cultural presence across the city.
Learn more about our Culture|Shift collaborations and partnerships
Read the news release Vancouver amplifies support for arts and culture through new 10-year plan
Strategic directions and goals
Blanketing the City in Arts and Culture
The subtitle Blanketing the City in Art and Culture is a concept generously bestowed by Musqueam weaver and graphic designer Debra Sparrow to reflect these Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh lands and waters. In her own work, Debra is dedicated to blanketing the city with the beauty and strength of Salish culture, of which blankets are the foundation.
The subtitle underscores the critical importance of telling the truth about Vancouver’s colonial history and working with the local Nations to address colonial erasure and ensure that their voice and presence are woven throughout Vancouver’s cultural ecology.
It is an inclusive vision illuminating the role culture plays in shaping place and a shared sense of belonging for all people on these Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh lands.
