annual report 07/08
Community Arts North West is passionate about supporting diverse communities and artists in Greater Manchester to develop high-quality, meaningful participatory arts projects. Based in the Northern Quarter of Manchester City Centre, CAN is an arts development organisation that works in partnership with communities, the voluntary sector, agencies and artists to encourage, develop, produce and promote cultural programmes of work by people who are excluded or on the fringes of mainstream society. A fuller description of CAN’s work can be found at
www.can.uk.com
Can Mission
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can& Developing & celebrating refugee arts across Greater Manchester. Greater Manchester hosts more asylumseekers than any other conurbation outside of London and is home to many people with refugee status. People who have not succeeded in obtaining leave to stay, but who are unable to return to their country of origin, also remain here in destitution. People arrive in Greater Manchester disorientated and apprehensive. Many have experienced persecution, torture and terror. Many have lost loved ones, or have left their families behind. Since 2003 CAN has worked with people seeking sanctuary to promote Exodus, an artistic programme that challenges negative representations, supports the arts and culture of people in exile and creates a voice for refugees and asylumseekers.
Michael Eakin, Executive Director, Arts Council England North West
The work described in this report represents the culmination of the first three year Exodus project which was supported by Arts Council England North West. Key events of this flagship programme during the year were a third outdoor festival celebrating refugee arts, a new commission at the Manchester International Festival, a week-long programme of short films, ongoing developmental work throughout Greater Manchester, bespoke training for artists from refugee backgrounds and live music nights in Manchester, Salford and Oldham. In addition, young people from refugee and asylum-seeker backgrounds worked alongside local young people in the second Urban Music Theatre project.
Exodus continues to
encourage integration and dialogue, providing a platform and visibility for refugee arts in Greater Manchester. We are very happy to report that CAN’s work with refugees and asylumseekers will continue for another three years thanks to support from the Big Lottery Reaching Communities Fund.
www.can.uk.com/exodus
The Exodus Greater Manchester Refugee Arts Partnership is led by Community Arts North West and in 2007-8 included Refugee Action, In Place of War (Manchester University Applied Theatre Department), Manchester Refugee Support Network, MARIM (Multi Agency for Refugee Integration in Manchester), and Salford Museum and Art Gallery.
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Can & Exodus
www.can.uk.com
exodus Exodus Picnic at Feast! The 2007 Refugee Arts festival; Exodus Picnic at Feast! took place on Sunday 3rd June at Platt Fields where 75 artists and community groups from refugee backgrounds performed in front of 10,000 people – double the audience of the 2006 Festival. This unique celebration of arts and culture by Manchester’s diverse refugee communities included high-quality World Music, dance, interactive workshops, children’s activities and international food from Sri Lanka, Bosnia, Pakistan and Sudan. The Exodus Picnic was broadcast all day on ALL-FM 96.9.
talents from Manchester’s refugee communities were given the opportunity to perform to an eager audience, including many people who otherwise would not attend a refugee arts event.
Left & Below: International food stalls, audience and performers at Exodus Picnic at Feast! in Platt Fields.
MIA’s wholehearted support of CAN gave us the opportunity to produce a highprofile, high-quality festival very economically and opened up the event to this enthusiastic new audience. CAN was also delighted to work with Mosscare Housing Ltd., whose sponsorship supported the workshop programme.
CAN worked in close partnership with Manchester International Arts (MIA) to present the event. Feast! – the picnic by the lake is a key element of MIA’s annual programme and provides non-stop entertainment to a large and diverse audience each summer at Platt Fields. Exodus Picnic at Feast! shared the infrastructure of this festival to deliver a third day of activity given over exclusively to Exodus and the cultural production of people seeking sanctuary. The brightest
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Exodus Picnic at Feast!
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The group spent two full days filming and a further week of post-production to produce The News – the story of a murderer on the loose in modern-day Manchester. The film boasted an original music score, composed by Gediminas Stumbras one of the participants, who was supported by Pat Makela , an artist from the Democratic Republic of Congo, who volunteered on the project. The movie premiered at Exodus Shorts and was a finalist in the Best Horror category at the First Light Movie Awards at the Odeon Theatre, Leicester Square, London where it was judged by a panel including Kevin Spacey, Nira Park and Sam Mendes.
Exodus Shorts Film Festival
Camcorder Guerrillas, who discussed their film and activist work with refugee communities in Scotland.
Exodus Shorts was held from 18th–23rd June 2007 during Refugee Week and with the support of Northwest Vision and Media, the programme was considerably expanded from previous Exodus Shorts events in 2005 and 2006.
With activity in three Greater Manchester venues: Urbis, Cornerhouse and Imperial War Museum North, the programme included screenings of 21 films, two filmmaking workshops, a week-long residency by artist Mahmood Haidary, and a script-writing master-class. Exodus Shorts films were also shown on the BBC Big Screen in Exchange Square, Manchester. The programme also included panel debates with film-makers, such as the
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Digital Art
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The News Sixteen young people, primarily from refugee and asylum-seeker backgrounds worked with Kurdish film director Alan Amin to produce The News in a project funded by First Light Movies. The initial consultation with the participants showed that the young people involved were adamant that they did not want to make an issue-based movie about the plight of refugees. They elected to make a horror film! The project ran over eight weeks and involved the group developing skills in script writing, camera work, acting and video editing.
www.can.uk.com
Above & Left: The cast and crew of The News.
Support of other participatory work Other work supported during 2007–8 included collaborations with Manchester Arts Gallery in their work with CAFRASS (Children and Families Refugee and Asylum Seeker Service) and with LiveWire at Cornerhouse on projects working with young refugees. Assistance has also been provided to groups including Kurdistan Arts and Culture, and to individual refugee artists, musicians and filmakers by offering free access to the media lab, one-to-one training, and free hire of digital arts equipment.
the beating wing orchestra & exodus live
The Beating Wing Orchestra gives both local and refugee musicians the opportunity to learn and perform, to fuse cultural forms from communities whose paths rarely cross, to facilitate the chance for refugees to mix with more stable communities, and also gives much-needed exposure to musicians from under-represented cultures resident in the region. CAN is currently working with the Orchestra to develop its potential and practice during 2008. The Beating Wing Orchestra is working on a new commission for 2009.
Highlighting the cultural value that refugee artists bring to Manchester. Working in partnership with Manchester International Festival, CAN facilitated the creation of the Beating Wing Orchestra – a project working with twelve established musicians, six of whom were refugees, to commission and showcase an original composition that was a highlight of the 2007 Festival. The Orchestra worked intensively with the highly-respected composer/singer Reem Kelani – a renowned musician of Palestinian heritage. Paradise in Strangers, composed by Reem Kelani and the Beating Wing Orchestra
played to great critical acclaim at an Exodus Live Special at the Manchester Academy on 8th July in a concert that also featured music from the Indian sub-continent, Zimbabwe, Angola, Kurdistan, Gambia, China, Iran and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
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Beating Wing & Exodus Live
Exodus Live regularly plays in mainstream
venues and is a series of World Music nights where the emphasis of the evening is to celebrate musical talent rather than highlight issues associated with seeking sanctuary. It is an opportunity for a mainstream audience to experience high-quality entertainment from refugee artists, highlighting the cultural value that they bring to Manchester. A second Exodus Live was held at Contact Theatre in September 2007 which celebrated the culmination of the Exodus programme of work funded by Arts Council England North West between 2004 and 2007.
www.can.uk.com
www.can.uk.com
urban music theatre Original music, theatre, dance and digital arts created by young people. Urban Music Theatre is CAN’s three year programme working with 13-25 year olds from local host communities and young refugees and asylum seekers which is supported by the Big Lottery Fund and The Paul Hamlyn Foundation.
Produced in association with the Zion Arts Centre, who provided extensive workshop, rehearsal and performance facilities, the project worked with 119 young people in 192 workshops during its second year. Following on from the highly successful Now We Talkin’ and In the Mix projects,
which promoted both music and other performance arts with young people, Urban Music Theatre has continued to develop and produce high quality participatory youth arts. It creates the very best opportunities for excluded young people to develop new skills.
Inside the Lines was created by a core
group of the participants and developed over four months in an incredible range of workshops that promoted self-confidence, developed skills and allowed the young people to learn in a professional and positive environment.
Opposite: Young people rehearse and perform Inside the Lines at the Zion Arts Centre.
The second year of the project established an effective working model that produced high-quality, multi-media theatre within a participatory youth arts context. It established new partnerships with youth agencies across Greater Manchester as well as nurturing existing relationships with the Zion Arts Centre and the creative team, which will be further developed in the final year of Urban Music Theatre programme in 2008.
Using Hip Hop as inspiration and working across five art forms, participants worked intensively with practitioners in drama, music, street and African dance and digital art to produce an original hour long performance – Inside the Lines – which played to an enthusiastic audience of over 500 people in December. 47 young people performed in the show.
www.can.uk.com
Urban Music Theatre
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exodus
exodus
Development of script-writing skills with an opportunity to see the work created in performance.
Traineeship for artists from refugee backgrounds.
Exodus Sparks is CAN’s new writing
project that initially showcased as part of the Exodus Onstage theatre season in November 2006. The project was developed in association with North West Playwrights and Contact Theatre and was revived in autumn 2007 to facilitate further development of the skills of individual writers.
The primary focus of the Exodus Traineeship was the development of workshop leadership skills amongst artists with refugee backgrounds. These skills were then applied to nurture and develop the creativity of communities in Greater Manchester.
Dramaturge Sonia Hughes worked with five participants in both a group and individual context to create new scripts which were professionally performed at Contact Theatre to a packed house on 20th November 2007.
The training programme equipped the artists with the relevant knowledge they needed to obtain future work. Trainees attended day-long seminars over 22 days where they undertook a diverse range of activities: some practical, such as film making or using a music studio; others more theoretical such as project planning or studying the dynamics of groups.
The project gave an excellent insight into how ideas and words on paper come across in performance. The resulting development of new writing skills has allowed critical and distinctive voices to emerge, animating stories rarely seen in other theatrical contexts.
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Exodus Sparks
The Exodus Traineeship ran for a second year between April and September 2007 working with five more artists from refugee backgrounds. It was supported by the Lankelly Chase Foundation.
both paid work and volunteering opportunities. The feedback from the trainees has been overwhelmingly positive, with the programme having a real impact on their lives. Not only have they reported an increase in their skills as workshop leaders, but they have reported enhanced self-confidence and have met new artists and friends with whom they can collaborate. The trainees also benefited CAN and the Exodus programme with their creative energy and fresh, new ideas; and they became an important part of the CAN team. We expect that there will be many more opportunities for them to work with us in the future.
Each trainee worked with a mentor and undertook practical placements in participatory projects run by CAN and by other agencies. The course has been instrumental in helping trainees access
www.can.uk.com
www.can.uk.com
Exodus Traineeship
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exodus in greater manchester
Developing, facilitating and promoting participatory cultural production with artists & communities. With many asylum-seekers being supported across Greater Manchester by the Home Office and the importance of Bolton, Bury and Rochdale in the Gateway Refugee Protection Programme, the significance of projects that support people seeking sanctuary throughout the region is increasing. Exodus in Greater Manchester, supported by the Association of Greater Manchester Authorities (AGMA) has developed a series of participatory workshops and consultation events in Rochdale, Oldham, Salford, Trafford, Bury, Tameside and Stockport. Work has continued in Bolton and Wigan to build on networks established in previous years in preparation for the new Exodus project starting in April 2008.
for an audience of 120 people. This event was produced in association with the Citizen’s Advice Bureau and was enthusiastically received.
Opposite: Artists perform at Global Roots and Exodus Emerge.
In a similar initiative, CAN worked with the University of Salford’s Arts Unit to present Exodus Emerge to a packed audience at the Robert Powell Theatre. These events gave an opportunity for the many artists who have performed at Exodus Live to perform to new audiences. Thanks to a new grant from the Big Lottery Fund and on-going support from AGMA, the new Exodus programme will continue to support arts projects and events across all ten boroughs of Greater Manchester for the next three years, between 2008 and 2011.
A night of World Music, Global Roots, took place during Refugee Week in Oldham at The Castle – Oldham’s main music venue
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Exodus in Greater Manchester
www.can.uk.com
toolkit& artsnet
Managed by a dedicated Information Worker, The Toolkit now boasts over 3,000 subscribers, who can access web-based up-to-date information on organisations, networks, training and funding opportunities; and advice in areas such as marketing, successful workshop leading and event management.
The service also offered training opportunities to 125 artists working within participatory arts, with 13 sessions run in topics as diverse as becoming self employed, fundraising, tax, marketing, production management and making digital video. A popular Artists’ Job club and one-to-one surgeries also provided bespoke advice to emerging new artists. The Toolkit continues to fulfil an important
role within Manchester’s cultural landscape, providing a gateway between people from grass-roots communities and mainstream cultural providers, as well as providing a comprehensive professional development package of support to new and emerging artists. This free information service has had a real impact in helping socially excluded artists and communities in navigating and accessing opportunities for future cultural development.
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Artsnet
Staff:
Teresa Adesanya Helen Caplan Sara Domville Rhonda Finlayson Sue Fletcher (Chair) Angela Harris (Treasurer) Martin Hazlehurst Joan Johnson Leanne Manfredi Trupti Patel Dave Peters Judith Watson
Cilla Baynes MBE – Director Amy Cham – Digital Arts Manager Kooj Chuhan – Principal Artistic Manager Nicola Colclough – Administrative Assistant Kim Haygarth – dxn Coordinating Editor Dot Lomax – Cleaner Ian Marsh – Exodus (GM) Artistic Manager David Martin – General Manager Erin McNeaney – Exodus Coordinator Martin Milner – Exodus Traineeship Coordinator Dave Morris – Finance Worker Leon Patel – Exodus Artistic Manager Adelle Robinson – Toolkit Information Worker Sue Robinson – Artsnet Coordinator Duncan Sackey – dxn Editor Faye Salisbury – Arts Development Manager Yaz Yaqub – Artistic Manager
Zoe Higgens (Manchester City Council) Julie McCarthy (Arts Council England NW) Linda Meagor (Arts Council England NW)
thank you
The Manchester Cultural Partnership advises the Local Strategic Partnership on the contribution of culture to Manchester’s Community Strategy and monitors and supports the delivery of the City’s Cultural Strategy. In addition to this role, Artsnet distributed a quarterly full-colour newsletter with a total distribution of 4,254 in 2007-8, reporting on information and opportunities within creative arts within Manchester.
www.artsnetmanchester.co.uk
Board of Directors:
Observers:
Artsnet is a service hosted by CAN for people employed in, or interested in arts and culture. It helps them to engage with the wider strategic issues which affect their work, play and quality of life in the City of Manchester through the Cultural Partnership.
Artsnet also promoted an e-mail listings service, a Google-group and a Facebook page, providing a local forum and signposting service highlighting opportunities within the sector.
Community Arts North West Green Fish Resource Centre 46-50 Oldham Street Manchester M4 1LE Tel: 0161 234 2975 Fax: 0161 234 2976 info@can.uk.com www.can.uk.com
CAN gratefully acknowledges financial support from:
Above: www.thetoolkit.net
www.thetoolkit.net
Arts Council England North West; The Association of Greater Manchester Authorities; The Baring Foundation; the Big Lottery Fund; Community Network for Manchester; First Light Movies; The Paul Hamlyn Foundation; The Lankelly Chase Foundation; Manchester City Council; Manchester International Festival; Mosscare Ltd.; Neighbourhood Renewal Fund; New Deal for Communities; North West Playwrights; Northwest Vision + Media; Oldham CAB; RAST; Rochdale Metropolitan Borough Council; Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council; University of Salford.
Photo credits: Lesley Chalmers, Amy Cham, Kooj Chuhan, Joel Chester Fildes, Lynn Irving and Jason Lock. Design by: REFORM CREATIVE
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A full copy of audited accounts for Community Arts North West is available at:
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www.can.uk.com or from David Martin, Community Arts North West, Green Fish Resource Centre, 46-50 Oldham Street, Manchester, M4 1LE.
Building Costs & Administration Core Staff & Contracted Services Project Costs
Project Grants Other Income
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Financial
www.can.uk.com
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Core Grants
£2 78 ,43 6
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Governance
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www.can.uk.com
Expenditure in 2007-8 was part-funded by resources brought forward from the financial year 2006-7.
Financial
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