More than half a million dollars will flow to First Nations-led arts and cultural projects across New South Wales under the latest round of Create NSW’s Creative Nations Project Funding program.

Eight projects will share $566,981 in 2025/26 funding, supporting more than 100 First Nations artists and arts workers. The investment backs initiatives designed to empower communities through truth-telling, cultural knowledge-sharing and intergenerational exchange.

Regional NSW was strongly represented, with six of the eight successful projects based outside metropolitan centres. Those regional initiatives will receive more than 80 per cent of the total funding allocation.

The funded projects span survivor-led exhibitions, digital cultural mapping, artefact-making workshops and leadership programs, as well as the activation of culturally safe spaces for storytelling and community connection.

NAISDA Advanced Diploma Jorja Burgess, echoing the future, Carriageworks 2025. Photo © Anthony Edgar

Among the recipients is Creative Futures: Shaping the Next 50 Years of First Nations Dance, led by NAISDA Dance College in partnership with BlakDance and Carriageworks. The initiative forms part of NAISDA’s 50th anniversary and will bring together national and international choreographers, cultural leaders and dancers for residencies, performances, research and a “symposium-in-action”. The project aims to develop and document culturally grounded frameworks to guide ethical collaboration and sustainable futures in contemporary Indigenous dance.

Other funded projects include Blak Circle Community Collective; Darky Deaves Art; Dharawal artefact-making workshops for intergenerational knowledge transfer (Gujaga Foundation Ltd); Marella: Voices from the Hidden Institution; the Telling Our Stories Freedom Ride Memorial Project; Wilgabah Cultural Site: Cultural Mapping Pilot Program; and the Yaala Leadership Program.

Create NSW Executive Director Kerri Glasscock said the program reflects the state’s “First Nations First” commitment, placing culture at the heart of communities. Dr Bronwyn Bancroft, chair of the First Nations Arts and Culture Artform Board, said the projects demonstrate a flourishing of Aboriginal creative practice across the state.

The next round of ACFP Project Funding opens in April 2026.