Event Details

Culture Days invites everyone to explore, discover and participate in arts and culture in every community across the country. In 2014, the fifth annual Culture Days event took place in more than 850 Canadian cities and towns, with attendance topping 1.6 million Canadians. Last year, more than 1,650 activities were presented across Ontario.

As a grassroots, collaborative movement, Culture Days relies on your participation. Whether as an arts or cultural organization, an artist, a municipality, a school, a citizen, a business person…everyone can play a role in shaping this event. So get involved! Browse the 2015 Activities to find out what's happening in your community during Culture Days.

This application is for “Ontario Culture Days 2023”, taking place over three weeks from September 22 to October 15, 2023, in approximately 100 municipalities across Ontario. Leading up to the Festival, Ontario Culture Days will create year-round content to attract visitors to cultural sites, events, and communities; expand on their regional festival hub model tested in 2022; and undertake a digital strategy project to grow their audience. The 2023 event features:

(1) Regional Festival Hubs: local partners that will be supported by Ontario Culture Days to act as community ambassadors, producing anchor events, encouraging local groups and organizations to register their events, coordinating event logistics, engaging with local officials, and assisting with event promotion. Hubs will each include a minimum of 5 in-person experiential and participatory programs/events. The 2023 hubs are: Elora/Fergus (Regional partner: Centre Wellington), Halton (Regional Partner: Town of Oakville), Ottawa Region (Regional Partner: National Arts Centre), South Georgian Bay (Regional Partner: South Georgian Bay Arts Network), St Catharines and Niagara (Regional Partner: City of St. Catharines), Thunder Bay (Regional Partner: City of Thunder Bay), Toronto Queen West (Regional Partner: Queen West Arts Crawl), Vaughan (Regional Partner: City of Vaughan), Guelph (Regional partner: City of Guelph), Sault Ste. Marie (Regional partner: Art Gallery of Algoma), Scugog (Regional partner: Scugog Arts), Windsor (Regional partner: Arts Council Windsor and Region);

(2) Creatives in Residence Program, featuring artists working in the realms of visual art, dance, heritage, theatre, and more. Residents develop a project, program or piece that relates to their creative practice and create various opportunities for the public to engage in-person throughout and beyond the festival. Creatives in Residence will include: Mushtari Afroz (Choreo-xperience Public Spaces in Scugog; Betty Carpick (The Land is Dancing in Thunder Bay; Juliane Foronda (A century of great fights in Ottawa); Myung-Sun Kim (Rituals for Belonging in Toronto); Owen Marshall (Six and a Half Flags over Queen Street West in Toronto); and Alisa McRonald (Telling a story through yarn in Toronto and Guelph).