Arts OutWest is a service organisation rather than a funding body – but we do administer some annual small grants.
Over three decades we’ve seen these small seed funds make extraordinary arts projects happen, and support artists and communities in the Central West.
Arts OutWest Cultural Fund
From 2026 we offer the first Arts OutWest Cultural Fund microgrants.
The microgrants are supported by public and Arts OutWest donations to our Cultural Fund. See the announcement of the successful applicants in the stories below.
You can still DONATE to the fund to help provide these small grants across the NSW Central West.
Previously:
Country Arts Support Program (CASP)
- CASP was a long-running devolved funding program of the NSW Government, managed in the NSW Central West by Arts OutWest. More than 350 projects were supported over three decades.
- CASP has not been funded past 2025.
Restart Micro Grants
- In 2020 and 2023 Arts OutWest ran micro grants to support artists in the region in response to needs around Covid shutdowns and later flood and natural disaster (supported by additional NSW government funding those years).
See below for case studies of projects and activities supported in the NSW Central West by small grants from Arts OutWest.
Make sure you subscribe to our enews for announcements of future small grants.
news & case studies
Stories from activities and artists that have been supported by CASP, Micro Grants or other small grants coordinated by Arts OutWest.
An idea needs somewhere to begin. For Watershed Dance Collective, an Arts OutWest Cultural Fund Microgrant helped Let’s Fly take flight. DONATE NOW.
A bus trip to a remote church to hear music, a hall filled with art, a small community showing their creative side. Join them this October.
We caught up with Dianne Franks from Grenfell Artists Inc on how they’ve used their Arts OutWest Cultural Fund Microgrant and what the group is up to.
Workshops Sundays 5 July, 12 July, 26 July, 2 August.
The big drums will be out again for the Galari Lachlan Rivers Arts Festival in Forbes on Saturday 8 August – and thanks to an Arts OutWest Cultural Fund microgrant the community can learn to play them.
Orange Male Voice Choir presents a Choral Masterclass with Paul Jarman
Friday 19 June, 5pm – 9pm in Orange.
Celebrating 100 years, we asked OMVC what makes them sing.
The second of the projects supported in 2026 by the Arts OutWest Cultural Fund Microgrants is happening this weekend, 30-31 May at Hartley.
Music, print making, to film making and movement. Nine exciting new arts and cultural activities will be funded across the NSW Central West through the Arts OutWest Cultural Fund Microgrants
Donate on or before AusArt Day 23 October 2025 to make next years small grants program possible.
Shani Nottingham’s first workshop as part of her COWRA CREATES project saw Cowra community members coming to the Nguluway Room between Cowra Regional Art Gallery and Cowra Library to create beside each other. Post cards galore were created in amongst much community cheer.
Devised by artist Shani Nottingham, COWRA CREATES gives people of any age and ability the opportunity to create an artwork. It is a celebration and recognition of the rich creativity that is in our community. Look out for materials around Cowra and join in.
Central West regional artist Sam Paine has been expressively painting Tommy the dog from Henry Lawson’s story The Loaded Dog. It looks like he’s in full pooch swing with the bomb cartridge in his mouth.
The community-ran Parkes School of Dance are training the next generation of dance teachers through the DanceStep program.
Held over three locations in Lithgow, Mudgee and Rylstone March 15 and 16, the two-hour workshops offered playful and dynamic exploration of puppetry and movement.
In a project by Parkes Shire Council in the Marramarra Makerspace, textile artist Pippita Bennett led participants to create their own canvas mounted stitched miniature landscapes using naturally dyed and thrifted fabric.
From workshops to engage and grow local participation, to upskilling the next generation of dance teachers or bridging cultures with art making and music. From writing to music to visual art, CASP provided new opportunities for communities in the Central West.
Workshops in puppetry and in fibre arts, community postcard making, new outdoor art, youth podcasting, and music workshops with young women with disability. Seven small arts projects across the NSW Central West will share $17,000 in funding from the annual Country Arts Support Program (CASP).
Ten regional artists were mentored to develop organisational, programming and presentation skills to share their practices. These workshops enhanced wellbeing in the community in areas of disability, health, youth, schools and families.
The CASP funded Playback Kandos (2023) by Josie Cavallaro has been nominated in the Engagement Program category for a Museums & Galleries NSW IMAGinE Award.
This powerful and thought-provoking production brings together contemporary, historical, and ancient cultures in a profound dialogue exploring themes of reconciliation, peace, and reflection. It served as a centerpiece for the official commemorations of the 80th Anniversary of the Cowra POW Breakout.
The project upskilled artists to deliver workshops to community groups. Two artist/educators worked with ten artists to present workshops to enhance wellbeing in the community in areas of disability, health, youth, schools and families.
Grenfell Artists Inc recruited new and younger members and started a range of half price workshops to help these emerging local artists to help them discover new skills and explore new mediums.
2023: Feature Artists included the local Latin group Ally who have been sharing their skills in workshops across the Central West in the lead up to Harmony Day bringing the multicultural and general community together to experience and drum a beat and connect.
A workshop at Lithgow Transformation Hub, saw bandleader, saxophonist and educator Gai Bryant along with pianist, bassist and percussion musicians sharing their Latin music and drumming skills.
Artists and participants from Argentina, Australia, China, Japan, Mauritius, Mongolia and Venezuela painted floral inspired works of art.
When you’ve written a beautiful new musical, an expert musical eye (and ear) is an enormous help.
“The opportunity to meet other makers working in creative ways was a refreshing start to the year. All made possible by arts and cultural organisation the CORRIDOR project supported by a CASP grant through Arts OutWest and Inspiring Australia NSW” – Ken Hutchinson.
In 2024, eight arts activities across the NSW Central West will share $17,000 in funding from the NSW Government’s annual Country Arts Support Program (CASP).
From finding the voice of a building to reigniting a folk club. Bringing 80 year old music back to life. Creating ceramic vessels for emotions. Creating new art from just an audio description. Introducing young people to a lost skill. Turning a railway station into an art space. Playing the country’s largest instrument. Lunching with Banjo. Lighting up the night.
We allocated grants of up to $1000 for affected individuals, groups and businesses in the arts and creative industries focused on repairing, replacing or rebuilding equipment or infrastructure; or reactivating spaces or programs; to build engagement with audiences.
The feeling of cold clay over your hands is as soothing as the most expensive hand cream. The time to sit and push the sticky clay into shapes is a gift in itself.
October and November saw the final Country Arts Support Program funded activities for 2023 wrap up. So much creativity, play and joy in all of them.
“This workshop has expanded the numbers of people who are now attending on a regular basis. This workshop also gave young people the opportunity to explore the various aspects of an old craft. They were able to create a piece of
art that could be fired in their own oven at home.”
The project’s question: “Does a building have a voice?” aimed to draw out the social histories and contentions within the Foundations’ buildings, and experimented with different combinations of sound, voice and architecture.
Brenda Stace Chat has spent years salvaging defunct pianos and meticulously crafting them into wall-sculptures, part geometric abstracts, part ceremonial artefacts.
“Since the Covid lockdown I’ve been curious about the voice of the buildings,” said the project’s creator Gabrielle Bates. “I spent much time in isolation noticing all the creaks and noises in my home, and began to realise it had a song that I thought others might like to hear.”
“I was at The Wildflowers launch in the beautiful, cosy, rooms at the heritage Cowra Railway Station – it was a fantastic evening. Modest arts grants help individuals and their communities achieve such good things.”
“It is really important to us that all of our musicians are paid properly. 100% of the CASP grant combined with ticket sales, has allowed us for the first time ever to be able to offer a guaranteed fee to all of our performers.”
The weather was quite hot but under the very shady tree which covers the grassed backyard a very pleasant full day was enjoyed by a large crowd numbering over 250.
This twilight event will be a major drawcard for Grenfell. And even though it is aimed at reconnecting our community we hope it will also provide an economic boost for the town, in what is normally a quieter time of the year.
Performing newly rediscovered music composed by WW2 internee Max-Peter Meyer and performed by the ‘Dunera’ boys in 1941.
Hands-on workshops, live music performances, indigenous stories told with drone lighting, playful interpretations of museum collections. Ten arts projects across the NSW Central West will share $17,000 in funding from the NSW Government’s 2023 Country Arts Support Program (CASP).
The new Regional Landscape Prize launched at The Corner Store Gallery Orange in 2022, the winner, supported by the Country Arts Support Program received an artist-in-residence experience in Orange.
“What’s not to love? You climb a tower to access it – it is the largest instrument in the world.”
Creating a young potters group, to reinvigorate and utilise current equipment available at the Condobolin Community Centre. Years later it’s still going strong.
Attendees commented that whilst yarning, ‘I don’t need to worry about anything else’, ‘It was a fun, good yarn’, ‘yarning is calming’ and ‘this was a welcome earthing’.
Australian authors Annie Seaton, Fiona McArthur and Darry Fraser were guests for a 4-day literary weekend in Grenfell.
From film script development to using yarn to make social connections, nine arts projects across the NSW Central West will share $17,000 in funding from the NSW Government’s annual County Arts Support Program (CASP).
It’s hoped this project will raise awareness and enable recognition of the signs that friends, family members or residents may be struggling and how a community can offer support.
4 young artists worked with established artists as mentors to help develop creative ideas further, build skills and make a new artwork.
Julie’s project is a contemporary reinterpretation of the life of the much loved Lady Bushranger Jessie Hickman (1890-1936) who adopted many roles and disguises in her lifetime as a young, travelling circus performer and in later life as a bushranger in the Kandos/Rylstone region in the Central West of NSW.
The premier of the final collaborative artwork produced with internationally renowned environmental artist Mandy Martin, before her death in July 2021.
Micro Grant funded work named finalist in the CBAA Community Radio Awards: Excellence in Digital Media & Excellence in Innovative Programming and Content categories.
