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Crowdfunding has helped bankroll movies, albums, exhibitions and books – and as Irish artists face dwindling resources this alternative type of ‘public’ funding is about to get more popular

THE ARTS, we keep hearing, are facing a financial crisis. Whether it’s the type of artistic endeavour that relies on dwindling public funding, or the commercial arts that are seeing revenues collapse due to downloading, the financial models that underpinned creativity over the past few decades are changing rapidly. But a solution might come in the form of “crowdfunding”, an innovative form of distributed capital funding that has been pioneered by New York web company Kickstarter, and which will soon be coming to Ireland in the form of Fundit.ie.