The very first grants secured by Raiser users have been for arts and heritage projects. And I couldn’t be prouder.
When I was a teenager, I saw a reproduction of Picasso’s Guernica at the Art of War exhibition in the Imperial War Museum, London.
Alongside other music and literature I was engaged with at the time (the Manic Street Preachers handwritten lyrics from If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next were also part of the exhibition), it drove home something I’ve never forgotten: war is futility, dressed up as strategy.
That painting didn’t just depict suffering, it warned us. About what happens when we forget our humanity, and our history.
Right now, the headlines are full of military budgets and chest-thumping about being “battle ready”. But if we want a civil society worth defending, we don’t get there by spending billions on bombs. We get there by funding what makes us human — art, history, community. The things that hold the line against barbarism.
That’s why I’m so excited about the kinds of projects Raiser is already raising funds for.
Because it’s not just money. It’s stories, memory, and humanity.
And it’s exactly what the charity sector exists to protect.
