Edmonton Fringe Festival explores ‘scaling back’ amid financial struggles

The Edmonton Fringe Festival is almost over, as artists around the world showcased their work over the span of 10 days.

But with the festival facing financial struggles, some artists are curious about its future.

One of those artists is Adam Keefe, who has been participating in the Fringe Festival for 15 years. While he has gotten Edmontonians’ support, he is also aware of the festival’s challenges, especially after the pandemic.

“I’m really concerned actually, we’ve had a lot of issues in the arts community with funding alongside with COVID,” said Keefe of the Sorry Not Sorry improv troupe. “So we have dropped audiences, as well combined with inflation and the lack of support from our government, they don’t really come out and support the arts the same way as they used to.

“It’s not detrimental completely because it’s not gonna destroy the festival, but it makes it harder.”

Daniel Anderson, who is a long-time busker and started his Fringe journey in 2005 as a gate volunteer, shares his thoughts about the future of the festival.

“It’s gonna come down to collaboration, working with other artists, ‘cause I feel like in the past it was a lot of ‘us against them’ to a degree,” said Anderson, a performer known as the Copper Cowboy.

“Now it’s like collaboration is the future.”

Megan Dart, the executive director of Edmonton International Fringe Festival, says the fest is still $90,000 short of its goal, and if the organization does not meet its funding, artists could be affected.

“None of us want to think about what reduced Fringe might look like,” Dart said. “We did this year already look at cutting expenses where we could to ensure we were containing cost without jeopardizing the heart of the festival.

“If we are not able to close that gap, we may have to look at making some difficult decisions next year in terms of scaling back. What does that look like exactly, I don’t know yet.”

Dart emphasizes the pandemic hit the festival hard, with the cancellation costing them $3 million in losses, as well as a 50 per cent increase in infrastructure costs and a 42 per cent increase in insurance.

When asked about steering some content in a digital format, Dart says they have been experimenting with livestreaming and able to reach viewers in 61 countries.

“Definitely something that we can continue to experiment with,” Dart said. “We know too that the digital platform allows a certain level of accessibility that a live event doesn’t so that’s something is really important to us.”

Despite the financial struggles, both Dart and the artists are hopeful the festival can reach its goal.

“I think they’ll be able to do it,” Anderson said.

“Yes we’re gonna close this gap, yes we’re gonna come back stronger next,” Dart said. “But we are still very much relying on the support of the community to do what we do.”

“I think it’s really important now that the Fringe is starting to struggle a little bit financially that we all come together and maintain it because that means it’ll bounce back even faster and we’ll be able to have a bigger year next year,” added Keefe.