Tony Hall, Chief Executive of the Royal Opera House and newly appointed Chair of the Cultural Olympiad Board, today announces the first members of his board.
The first founding member is Jude Kelly, who is joined by Alan Davey, Vicky Heywood, Sir Nicholas Kenyon, Munira Mirza, Mark Thomson and Sir Nicholas Serota. The appointment of the first board members is part of the restructure of the Cultural Olympiad’s leadership which will oversee the Cultural Olympiad programme. Additional board members may be appointed later this year.
The London 2012 Cultural Olympiad Board members
Tony Hall, Chief Executive, the Royal Opera House (Chair)
Jude Kelly OBE, Artistic Director, Southbank Centre
Alan Davey, Chief Executive, Arts Council England
Vikki Heywood, Executive Director, Royal Shakespeare Company
Sir Nicholas Kenyon, Managing Director, The Barbican
Munira Mirza, Advisor on arts and culture to the Mayor of London
Sir Nicholas Serota, Director, Tate
Mark Thompson, Director General, BBC
The Cultural Olympiad is a national celebration of culture as part of the London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games. It will harness the power of the Games to inspire creativity across all forms of culture, especially amongst young people and is designed to give everyone in the country a chance to be part of the Games and to leave a lasting legacy well beyond 2012.
The Cultural Olympiad has benefited from a National Lottery grant of £15.6 million from the Olympic Lottery Distributor which makes them the largest single funder of the 10 major projects.
Tony Hall said: “I’m delighted that each board member brings such a wealth of experience and talent from so many different areas of the arts. Together we share the vision for the best Cultural Olympiad yet, one that will showcase the incredible arts and culture this country has to offer and engage people everywhere in the arts, whatever their background or taste. I very much look forward to working together with the team to make the vision for the Cultural Olympiad a reality.
The new Board and I are grateful to the Olympic Lottery Distributor for the investment announced yesterday, which will enable to Cultural Olympiad major projects to produce world class work”
Seb Coe, Chairman of London 2012 said; “ This announcement, the investment made by the Olympic Lottery Distributor this week, and the plans that are being developed by the cultural sector across the project will help us deliver a powerful cultural Olympiad “
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Notes to editors The Olympic Lottery Distributor, (www.olympiclotterydistributor.org.uk) distributes National Lottery money in support of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
The Cultural Olympiad The Cultural Olympiad is a national celebration of culture which is happening now and is about:
Giving everyone in the country a chance to be part of London 2012
Putting culture at the heart of the Olympic Games, in a way and on a scale not done before
Using the power of the Olympic Games to inspire creativity across all forms of culture, especially amongst young people
Making a real impact which will leave a lasting legacy well beyond 2012
The Programme The Cultural Olympiad has been running since September 2008 and has several different elements to it:
The Inspire Programme The Inspire programme is open to non-commercial organisations which have vibrant, exceptional projects and events inspired by London 2012. Successful projects and events carry the Inspire Mark on their publicity material, are officially recognised as being part of London 2012 and will benefit from marketing and communications support, as well as exclusive networking opportunities.
More than 175 non-commercial projects – over 100 of which are now part of The Cultural Olympiad - have already been recognized with the Inspire Mark.
Cultural Olympiad Major Projects All the Cultural Olympiad Major Projects are listed below, the first six of which have received OLD funding:
World Shakespeare Festival – The World Shakespeare Festival is an unprecedented celebration of Shakespeare in performance, led by the Royal Shakespeare Company. It celebrates Shakespeare as international property and the British as an international people and will focus on the relationship between the many communities of the world’s diaspora represented in the UK.
The central spine of the Festival will be a series of high-profile collaborative productions with UK theatre companies and their international counterparts from 10 Olympic nations and regions, commencing on Shakespeare’s Birthday, 23rd April 2012 for three months across three main hubs; Stratford-upon-Avon, Newcastle and London, where it will culminate just prior to the Games. Major UK partners already include the National Theatre and Shakespeare’s Globe.
The theme of collaboration will feed through into UK-wide participatory projects for amateur and community groups, young people and schools, which will develop from late 2009, with regional celebrations leading to performances in Stratford-upon-Avon in Spring/Summer 2012.
A Shakespeare programme involving the amateur and voluntary arts sector is being devised with the Voluntary Arts Network, to create new models of professional/amateur collaboration which share skills, encourage a mix of art forms and provide opportunities for increasing participation in the performance of Shakespeare. The celebration will bring an international dimension to the RSC’s schools network, activating youth participation through new networks.
World River - will welcome the world to London the weekend before the London 2012 Games with a spectacular two day free festival at iconic sites along the River Thames. A series of five performance sites, each representing the music and performing arts of a different continent will stage specially commissioned performances by world-class artists alongside young people and communities. Each of the 205 Olympic and Paralympic nations will be represented across the stages. Three years of participatory activity, developed with communities across the UK, will culminate in a spectacular weekend of music and performance, bringing the city alive and allowing Londoners and visitors alike to participate in the celebration of the Games. World River is part of the Sounds music project.
Film Nation – this project is run in partnership with the UK Film Council and others and will introduce young people to film, support them in developing social and film making skills, and provide opportunities to discover new and non-mainstream film. The project includes a UK wide film making competition for young people, an Olympic Schools film week and an international film festival in London prior to the Games. Film Nation will celebrate film’s ability to offer a window on the societies and cultures of the UK and will bring together young people across the UK with some of the world’s great film masters and a new generation of filmmakers who are still exploring the flexibility and interactivity made possible by digital technology.
Discovering Places - this project explores and showcases the historical, built and natural environment and landscape of the UK on a scale never seen before through a series of open days, participation and performance events from 2010 onwards at both iconic and undiscovered urban and rural sites across the UK. The project will culminate with a series of cultural events animating the route of the London 2012 Torch Relay and is managed in partnership with Heritage Link, with CABE, Natural England and the UK's World Heritage Sites all playing key roles.
Unlimited – will be the UK’s largest ever celebration of arts and disability culture and sport and will use the power of the Olympic and Paralympic games to profile the creative talents and ambitions of disabled people and to challenge traditional perceptions of disability. Unlimited will incorporate a series of major commissions for disabled artists and organisations as well as providing workshops, mentoring, career and training advice. It will also be developed internationally by the British Council, and will work with a consortium of arts, cultural and disability organisations across the UK to deliver an exciting and dynamic programme of events, festivals and showcases. LOCOG is developing Unlimited in partnership with the national Arts Councils'.
Carnival - this project will celebrate the raft of popular outdoor cultural work that spans street theatre, spectacle, circus skills and traditional and contemporary carnival forms in a series of events and festivals which will culminate in a world class street theatre commission in London in 2012. This project will play a key role in animating London and other UK cities during games time and before, helping to bring alive the streets of London and the UK in the run up to 2012 and further boost this flourishing sector.
Other Major Projects Sounds - this major music programme will showcase and celebrate the sounds of the nation in 2012 and is led by the BBC. In addition to World River, the programme includes the creation by Youth Music of a national youth vocal ensemble and to be announced composing, singing and performance programmes in all forms of musical genre in collaboration with the BBC and other leading music producers and orchestras. Sounds will highlight the best musical talent in London and the UK and will be launched in Autumn 2009.
Artists Taking The Lead – an eight million pound project encouraging artists to use the nation as a blank canvas and showcase the UK’s creativity to the world. 12 major works of art celebrating 2012 will be commissioned from the 2000 artists across the UK who have already submitted applications for the project, which is run in partnership with Arts Council England and other national arts councils. The shortlisted artists will be announced in August and the winning commissions in October 2009.
Stories of the World - a series of 14 major exhibitions in over 50 leading museums, galleries and libraries across the UK, which will see the cultures of the world understood and interpreted in new ways. This project was launched in April 2009 and will involve young people of all backgrounds, from every part of the UK, becoming ‘curators’ of the collections and objects held in participating museums, libraries and archives.
Somewhereto - new spaces and places around the UK will be found and young people will be enabled to take advantage of the new opportunities this creates to practice their sport or hone their creative talent. This project is in partnership with Legacy Trust UK and will launch in early 2010.
London Festival – Arts Council England is developing ideas for a major arts festival to be held in London between January and July 2012, which will feature world class work in a variety of art forms from London’s leading arts and cultural organisations.
Open Weekend
Open Weekend is a mass participation event which gives people across the UK the opportunity to join in and try something new. Open Weekend invites arts and cultural organizations around the UK to open their doors to the public and challenge themselves to do something different and exciting. The first Open Weekend, held in September 2008, attracted 655 events staged by 421 organisations with over 750,000 visitors. Open Weekend this year is taking place on 24-26 July.
Who’s involved:
LOCOG works closely with the government and the Mayor of London along with a network of partner organizations such as the Arts Councils, BBC, MLA (London Museums Archives and Libraries), Regional Development Agencies and national and regional arts organizations.
BP is a Premiere Partner of The Cultural Olympiad and sponsors the ‘2012 Open Weekend’.
For further information please contact the London 2012 Press Office on +44 (0)203 2012 100 or visit the
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As it heads towards its £2bn budget for staging the Olympic and Paralympic Games, LOCOG now has six domestic Tier One Partners - adidas, BP, British Airways, BT, EDF and Lloyds TSB. There are four domestic Tier Two Supporters – Adecco, Cadbury, Cisco and Deloitte. There are ten domestic Tier Three Suppliers and Providers – Airwave, Atkins, Boston Consulting Group, Crystal CG, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP, Holiday Inn, McCann Worldgroup, The Nielsen Company, Populous and Trident.
The Worldwide Olympic Partners signed up for London 2012 are Coca-Cola, Acer, Atos Origin, GE, McDonald’s, Omega, Panasonic, Samsung and Visa.
