Introducing the Creative Programmers...
East of England: Liz Hughes
Prior to becoming a Creative Programmer, Liz was the Strategic Projects Manager for Living East, the regional cultural consortium for the East of England. She headed a number of programmes, including project managing the development of a new cultural strategy for the region. She has also worked as an Arts and Business mentor.
East Midlands: Paul Brookes
Paul was most recently the Joint Project Director for Rivington Place - an east London Lottery funded centre for culturally diverse visual arts. He was previously Director of Leicester Revealed and the Leicester Expo - a three year cultural programme devised to assist the regeneration and profile of Leicester. He has also led two high profile cultural campaigns, as the Chief Executive of the 1998 Year of Photography and Digital Imaging and as Bradford Metropolitan Council’s Director of Capital of Culture. In the early 1990s he was Director of Arts for the Yorkshire and Humberside Arts Board.
London
London has two Creative Programmers: Hadrian Garrard and Sarah Barnwell.
Five Host Boroughs: Hadrian Garrard
Hadrian is focusing on the five Host Boroughs for the Games. He came to this role directly from the Hackney Empire Theatre and was involved in the reopening in 2002. He was responsible for putting together a programme as wide ranging as Jamacian farce, classical music concerts, rock concerts, circus, stand up, black variety shows, festivals, location shoots as well as large scale in-house productions. Before this Hadrian worked as a session musician for six years, touring with and playing for groups and individuals including REM, The Magic Numbers, Saint Etienne and Supergrass and MIA and KT Tunstall.
Wider London: Sarah Barnwell
Most recently, Sarah has worked as Communications Manager at the Heritage Lottery Fund. It was here that she gained an appreciation of how cultural projects can have a lasting impact on the communities and individuals involved, especially young people and those not usually engaged with cultural activities.
"London is a culturally and creatively exciting city, so it's fitting that we've managed to have the 'Inspire mark' created for events outside of the sporting arena - something that no other city has had before. The 'Inspire mark' means we've started with something so positive and groundbreaking, at the beginning of a four year chance to show the world the innovation and vast talent that London and the UK has to offer."
North East: Lorna Fulton
Lorna Fulton has worked in the cultural sector as an artist and programme director and is experienced in working in a wide range of social, cultural and regeneration contexts, from working with young offenders on court orders with the Youth Justice Service to using culture based consultation to develop regeneration programmes of work. Lorna graduated from Sunderland University and Manchester Metropolitan University with a BA (Hons) Fine Art and MA Youth and Community Work.
North West: Debbi Lander
Debbi’s practice includes programme development, arts management and cultural research and spans seventeen years of work in the UK and internationally. Recent work includes the development of a European Capital of Culture project, Human Futures, for FACT, Liverpool. Debbi was a director of performance media research and production unit, shinkansen/Future Physical from 1991 – 2004.
"My interests include utilising culture as a celebratory, educational and socially developmental tool. I seek to encourage access, experimentation and dialogue through cultural projects and support the development of collaborative projects, inter-disciplinary processes and creative public engagement."
Northern Ireland: Pat Wilson
For the past five years Pat has worked on a number of arts and cultural projects promoting and funding international showcasing of Northern Irish arts and culture. Her biggest project was Project Manager for Northern Ireland's participation in the Smithsonian Folklife Festival on the National Mall in Washington DC in 2007. She also provided coordination and facilitation for the Rediscover Northern Ireland programme - a five month long series of business and cultural events in Washington culminating in Northern Ireland's appearance at the Smithsonian.
"These programmes were enthusiastically received by Americans and show how culture can be used as a force for change. Outdated stereotypes about Northern Ireland were challenged and changed as a direct result of these programmes. I want to explore how we can build on this experience within Northern Ireland in the development of our cultural programmes during the next four years."
South East England: Caterina Loriggio
Before becoming the Creative Programmer for the South East, Caterina was a freelance director and street arts consultant. In 2004 she became the Theatre Programmer for the National Theatre's 10-week summer Watch This Space festival, where she significantly reinvented the purpose and programme of festival. "I have commissioned such projects as 'The Day of the Dead' - a fireworks spectacle and filled a library with clowns for London Comedy week". Caterina was also Director of Celebrations at Winchester's Hat Fair - Britain’s longest-running festival of street theatre. During that time she grew the festival immensely, leading its transformation from a little-known community arts event to one of the most significant street arts festivals in the UK.
South West: Richard Crowe
Richard started his career in the theatre as a writer and actor. His play, Cock and Bull Story, co-written with Richard Zajdlic, has been produced on every continent and was made into a film by Billy Hayes, of Midnight Express fame, in 2004. Richard moved on to venue management and arts development before becoming a freelance consultant in 2002. He has worked on a number of large transnational and cross-sector projects as a project designer/manager, using artists and the arts in the natural landscape, parks and gardens.
"My passion is helping people to make connections across the region, the sector and beyond, creating new and unusual partnerships that address mutual agendas and extend the reach and impact of projects. I'm already applying this process to developing programmes for the Cultural Olympiad in the region. I'm like a big kid with a chemistry set at the moment - watching the creative sparks fly and good ideas fuse into great ones."
Wales: Gwyn Williams
Gwyn was Chief Executive of Llangollen International Eisteddfod for six years. He previously worked at the BBC as Senior Music Producer making programmes for Radio 3, Radio Cymru and Radio Wales - working on outside broadcast events and reporting on contemporary music festivals in Europe, South America and the US. "Performing has been a life long passion since my Royal Academy of Music days and long after being a professional trumpet player I still enjoy conducting choirs and orchestras."
West Midlands: Paul Kaynes
Alongside his role as Creative Programmer for West Midlands, Paul works closely with the regional development agency's Tourism Board on developing the capacity and impact of festivals and events. "For the last twenty years I have called the West Midlands my home but I actually started my career in the North East before undertaking an Arts Council traineeship in touring marketing based in Birmingham." He went on to work at Warwick Arts Centre and the RSC before becoming Chief Executive of Birmingham Arts Marketing (BAM), now Audiences Central, where Paul was pivotal in creating the and leading the creation of the new regional audience development agency.
Yorkshire: Tessa Gordziejko
Tessa was most recently Director of Arts and Business in Yorkshire and has particular experience of corporate sponsorship of the arts, brand related marketing and strategic planning, but is interested in all aspects of arts and culture. "My early career was in the professional theatre and commercial media in London and I have recently completed my Clore research project on the moving body and the brain in relation to dance."
Scotland:
The process is underway to recruit a Creative Programmer in Scotland and we'll update you with progress
...Well that's all of them! And we welcome them warmly to the team.
If you're involved in a cultural organisation, have a think about what you might want to do over the next four years to celebrate the 2012 Games. If you already have an idea and would like more information about how it can be part of the Cultural Olympiad you can find more information with contact details of the Creative Programmers in the Culture section of this site.
