Overview
Future Generations Cymru would like to commission 4 artists or creatives to create work which responds creatively to the Future Generations Report 2025.
In April 2025, the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales, Derek Walker, will publish a significant report, the Future Generations Report. The report is produced every five years, one year before the Senedd election. It provides his advice to policymakers about what action is required to help Wales meet its long term-goals – the seven well-being goals as set out in the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act.
We believe that artists and creatives can use their skills and experience to shape the development and delivery of public services, to support innovation in all areas of public life. We are therefore looking for artists and creatives to create work related to the issues identified in the report.
About Future Generations Cymru
The Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act requires public bodies in Wales to think about the long-term impact of their decisions, to work better with people, communities and each other, and to prevent persistent problems such as poverty, health inequalities and climate change.
The Future Generations Report will be themed around the 5 missions of our strategy, Cymru Can. They are:
- Implementation and Impact: to ensure the Act is applied effectively and with ambition in a way that improves the lives of the people of Wales now and in the future.
- Climate and Nature: to ensure all Welsh public bodies achieve their net zero and nature positive goals by 2030. As a result, public bodies are leading action on climate change including adaption, in a way that reduces inequalities and maximises the benefits to people and communities across Wales.
- Health and Well-being: to facilitate a transformation in the way we keep people healthy, with a greater focus on prevention and the long term. As a result, public bodies are working together to tackle the root causes of ill health and address health inequalities.
- Culture and Welsh Language: to reinforce the positive impact of cultural well-being. As a result, public bodies are making the urgent changes needed to promote culture and creativity, enhance the fabric of communities, and promote multi-culturalism and the Welsh language.
- A Well-being Economy: to help transition Wales to an economy that puts people and planet first. As a result, governments at all levels, businesses, and communities are making this happen.
Cymru Can also includes other important areas of focus that cut across missions. One such area is food, as we recognise that equal access to affordable, healthy and sustainable food is critical to achieving the well-being goals, and that food inequality and food poverty are having a major impact upon communities.
We would like to commission artists who are inspired to engage with the issues raised in one or more of these areas. We are not expecting you to be an expert or to have all the answers – only to have an idea of how you could use your creativity to be inspired by the needs of future generations and by these missions, as a springboard for your own creative work.
We welcome perspectives which challenge and offer alternative ways of thinking based on real world experiences.
If you’re not sure where to get started, here are some questions to prompt you:
- Creating an economy for Wales that puts people and planet first.
- What would an economy that puts the well-being of people and planet first look like in Wales? What would it be like to be a citizen and/or an artist there?
- Can artists help shape the economic model of the future?
- Taking action on the climate and nature emergencies including adaptation, in a way that reduces inequalities and maximises the benefits to people and communities across Wales.
- How can the arts help involve people in collaboration around the transition to net zero, climate adaptation and halting biodiversity decline.
- Why are global responsibility and climate justice relevant to the people of Wales?
- Who is excluded from conversations about the climate and nature emergency and how can these voices be heard?
- How are culture and the Welsh language being affected by the climate and nature emergencies?
- Creating a Wales where everyone has an equal opportunity for a healthy life.
- What would a Wales which fully understands and operates on a social model of health look like? What would our public services look like?
- How can the arts help reduce loneliness/social isolation and address mental ill health?
- What is the role of creativity in addressing the links between our food systems, agriculture sector, supply chains, health, culture, Welsh language and identity?
- Creating a Wales which values cultural well-being as much as it values environmental, social, and economic well-being
- What is unique about Wales’ language and culture? What can we learn from them to respond to the challenges we’re facing?
- What is the role of culture in addressing social polarisation and fostering cohesive, inclusive communities?
The draft findings of the Future Generations Report will be shared with the successful artists in January to aid the creative process, but these prompts and the information provided above reflect our thinking and the issues being considered in the report.
What will you be asked to do?
- Have a short online meeting with Future Generations Cymru colleagues before you start to discuss your idea.
- Create work which responds artistically to the issues raised in the Future Generations Report 2025 and helps to communicate those to our different audiences, namely:
- People who work in public bodies that fall under the remit of the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act, and
- People who are interested in the work of the Future Generations Commissioner more broadly
Output
The Future Generations Report 2025 will take the form of an online accessible resource. The creative content can be delivered in multiple formats and artforms but must be documented in a digital form that can sit within or alongside this resource. For example, the content could be presented as:
- Animation
- Audio (up to 6 minutes)
- Video (up to 6 minutes)
- Text
Delivery formats and guidelines can be found in Annexe A.
The commissioned work, including video, images and text, will be used by the Office of the Future Generations Commissioner in publications, news releases, online, on social media and in other communications related to the mission of the organisation. Copyright of the work will remain with the artist.
The deadline to deliver the completed work is Monday 3 March 2025.
Fee
The commission for this work is £1,850, based on 5 days’ work at £270 per day and up to £500 for materials and expenses.
If you have any accessibility requirements, please let us know as we have separate budget available to support that.