Question of Funding

Formed in 2019, the Question of Funding is a Palestinian collective of cultural producers and community organizers that challenges the dominant models of international funding that shape cultural production in Palestine and globally. Rooted in informal encounters among artists and workers from various NGOs and independent initiatives, the group shares knowledge, resources, and experiences to rethink how culture is funded, produced, and sustained. Their work spans beyond the arts sector, engaging broader community concerns and exposing the political and economic pressures cultural institutions face under external funding dependencies.

At the heart of the collective’s mission is the question: “How to Work Together?” In seeking answers, they aim to build alternative, community-driven economic models that resist imposed boundaries by donors and instead foster local resilience. The collective’s work remains rooted in developing a new economic system grounded in solidarity, as well as the connection of sectors like agriculture, creative businesses, and cultural production to support a more autonomous and self-sustaining Palestinian society— one that can also serve as a model for other communities navigating similar constraints imposed by transnational structures of hegemony.

City

Ramallah

Country

Palestine

Region

Middle East

Year of Creation

2019

Featured Project

Dayra
Dayra is a blockchain technology project produced by the Question of Funding to provide a medium through which truly free exchange can take place, via minting and measuring communal resources. According to QoF, through Dayra, a supplementary economy can be established in Palestine that avoids relying on external donors. Dayra, which is Arabic for “circle” and “circling”, materializes the existing trust in social circles within specific communities. The economic model starts with the premise that in times of crisis, individuals, local organizations, cooperatives, and associations have no funds to sustain their operations, but have an abundance of resources and knowledge, whether material or intellectual. The Dayra medium thus aims to generate and store value through the act of exchanging, bartering, sharing, and putting existing resources to use for the common good, giving these resources alliterative values beyond capital. Furthermore, Dayra expands on and makes tangible a community-governed economic system, facilitating and connecting the local economy to and through local cultural institutions, small businesses and creative industries, household economies, and freelancers to foster social development and unity in their geographic context via decentralized blockchain tech.

Resources

Baka, Anastasia and Giulia Busetti. “Thinking Beyond the Donor Economy: Collectivity as the Answer to the Question of Funding.” OnCurating, Issue 54, Nov. 2022, https://on-curating.org/issue-54-reader/thinking-beyond-the-donor-economy-collectivity-as-the-answer-to-the-question-of-funding.html.

Casey, Ruairí. “Questions of Funding.” London Review of Books, 7 Nov. 2024, https://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2024/november/questions-of-funding.

Genda, Dagmara. “The Slow Work of Dialogue: An Interview with The Question of Funding.”BerlinArtLink, 22 Jul. 2022, https://www.berlinartlink.com/2022/07/22/interview-with-question-of-funding/.

Liu, Jasmine. “Vandals Graffiti Documenta Exhibition Space of Palestinian Artist Group.” Hyperallergic, 31 May 2022, https://hyperallergic.com/737101/vandals-graffiti-documenta-exhibition-space-of-palestinian-artist-group/.

“QUESTION OF FUNDING – DAYRA.” Gwaertler Stiftung, https://gwaertler.ch/en/question-of-funding-dayra/.

Sapija, Mateusz. “Field Notes: The Question of Funding, Eltiqa, and Sada [Regroup], Documenta 15.” e-flux, 11 Jul. 2022, https://www.e-flux.com/education/features/479069/field-notes-the-question-of-funding-eltiqa-and-sada-regroup-documenta-15.

More Information

IMPORTANT: Profile pages for all collectives are in permanent development and have been built using information in the public domain. They will be updated progressively and in dialogue with the organizations by the end of 2024. New features and sections will be included in 2025, like featured videos, and additional featured projects. Please contact us if you discover errors. For more information on mapping criteria and to submit your organization’s information to be potentially included in the database, visit this page

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