Deadline extended: 2022 BASA Awards in South Africa

After being held for two years online, the BASA Awards are planning a return to a live event. The awards seek to celebrate ingenuity, adaptability and mutually created value aligned to BASA’s core mandate of cementing and celebrating partnerships that champion arts and business. The call is open to projects that have been created through partnerships between artists and businesses that define these values of collaboration and intersection.

To submit entries, applicants should first register here before 20 June.

Projects that harness all creative mediums are eligible for entry, including music, visual arts, dance, theatre, physical performance, architecture, fashion and design, as well as any other form of arts, culture and creativity. Where sponsorship of a project, event or organisation has been shared, each of the sponsoring companies may enter.

There are eight categories open for entry into the BASA Awards, which are adjudicated by the awards judging panel and audited by Middel and Partners: 

• Community Development Award – Recognising NPO/NGO/CBO/PBO support for arts and culture projects enhancing their communities, whether through education, skills development, contributing to livelihoods or employment, tourism, or other growth opportunities at a grassroots level.
• Corporate Social Investment Award – Acknowledging vital support for arts and culture projects enhancing their communities, from medium to large businesses (i.e., with more than 50 full-time employees and over R40m annual turnover) as part of their wider CSI/CSR strategy.
• Beyond Borders Partnership Award – Awarded to a partnership that builds brand reputation and audience for both partners across borders, through a project showcasing South Africa to the rest of the continent and/or overseas, or bringing international or intercontinental arts projects to South Africa.
• First-time Sponsor Award – Awarded to a sponsor supporting the arts for the first time, regardless of size, budget, whether it is through CSI, marketing, HR, B-BBEE or other.
• Innovation Award – Celebrating the most innovative, cutting-edge and progressive partnership that served all partners’ purposes effectively. These breakthrough projects and partnerships should demonstrate great creativity, originality, reinvention, new methodologies or technological/digital innovation.
• Long-term Partnership Award – Recognising outstanding initiative and commitment to the arts over a longer-term period (at least three years) as an integral part of the sponsor’s strategy. The value to the art project, the broader community and the sponsor must be apparent.
• Sponsorship In-kind Award – Acknowledging a sponsor giving quantifiable and impactful non-monetary support to the arts. This may be through the in-kind provision of equipment, materials, media or PR support, space, transportation or travel, or any other products or services, as opposed to monetary sponsorship.
• SMME Award – Awarded for vital support given to the arts by a micro, small or medium enterprise with up to 250 hundred full-time employees and an annual turnover of no more than R100m.

Note: In addition, one or more Special Awards may be presented at the discretion of the BASA board of directors in recognition of remarkable contributions by either an individual, business or organisation to the sustainability of South Africa’s arts.

Rules and eligibility

• There is no entry fee.
• Entries must be submitted via the online entry platform – no hard copy or email entries will be processed.
• No incomplete entries will be processed.
• The BASA Awards do not work on an external nominations process. One of the partners needs to enter to nominate their partnership, and while the entry may be completed by either party, it must be endorsed by both partners.
• The sponsorship/partnership must have taken place between 1 January 2021 and 31 December 2021; this includes long-term or ongoing sponsorships current during that period.
• Where sponsorship of a project, event or organisation has been shared, all sponsoring companies are eligible for entry.
• A separate entry should be submitted for each sponsoring company, and the differences between each sponsor/partner must be clear in terms of the partnership relationship and objectives.
• Projects may be entered on a year-on-year basis, as part of BASA’s sustainability strategy, regardless of prior wins. In assessing these entries, judges will consider the evolution and growth of the partnership from previous years.
• Eligible creative mediums include visual arts, dance, theatre, physical performance, music, architecture, fashion, design and all forms of creativity appropriate to the understanding of arts and culture.
• There are no limitations regarding the arts partner or creative medium – whether an individual, a small or large organisation/project, or an emerging or established organisation/project, the project impact and achievement of objectives will be considered by judges in relation to size, experience and the sponsorship value.
• Entrants are required to motivate for the entry’s alignment to the selected category.
• Note that the categories open for entry are not restricted to any particular creative medium (i.e. design projects, theatre projects, etc.), but rather apply to the nature of the partnership or sponsorship relationship and its impact or objectives.
• Although there is a category specifically for long-term relationships, such partnerships may enter into any other category where alignment can be motivated.
• Similarly, although there are categories focusing on recognising SMMEs for sponsoring the arts and on medium to large businesses supporting the arts through CSI/CSR programmes, they are not limited to this category alone, and such partnerships may enter into any other category where alignment can be motivated.
• The same applies to the Community Development category, which recognises non-profit support for the arts – these partnerships may enter into any other category where alignment can be motivated. A sponsorship programme/project/partnership may be entered into a maximum of two categories. BASA may use information and images (excluding confidential financial information) for publicity purposes.

By submitting an entry, the entrant agrees to abide by the terms, conditions, rules and regulations governing the awards programme, and declare that the information provided is true and correct.

“Each year, the BASA team delivers an exceptional awards experience for corporate members and creative industry partners,” BASA chairperson Zingisa Motloba said. “Even through the limitations imposed on us by COVID, the team excelled in its production quality and content. I anticipate this 25th Awards experience will be no exception.”

Read more here.