Fresh Start - thinking about a Regional Convenor

This weeks blogpost from Fresh Start for the Arts

It was great to see such a good turnout for the recent session to discuss the future of the Regional Arts Hub. Around 35 practitioners and others came along to Mill on the Fleet to hear Fresh Start for the Arts project manager Kathleen O’Neill outlining how the Region Hub will evolve to become the spine of the new arts structure for D&G.

The idea is to reshape the existing Regional Arts Hub into a co-ordinating and executive body. This will bring together the D&G’s professional arts strength to implement an exciting arts programme to take the region through to April 2015. A Regional Arts Convener will be appointed who will be at the heart of the process.

Diagram of proposed new D+G Arts Infrastructure from Kathleen O'Neill's presentation

The new-look hub will support organisations in reviewing and strengthening themselves for long-term sustainability.

All this represents a fresh and dynamic approach to taking the arts forward in D&G and provides a way to support emerging projects, artists and new collaborations. On top of that it will bring together arts professionals from across the region to work towards a common set of strategic goals. Other practical benefits will include an improved approach to marketing and promoting everything that D&G has to offer.

All this represents quite a step change, but very much builds on what the original hub had done to bring people together at a regional level.

One project which is already helping take the arts forward in new ways is the Fresh Start for the Arts Youth Learning Journeys. This is providing opportunities for young people in each of D&G’s four districts to develop their skills and experience. Among those to benefit is a young dancer called Kelly Whiteside. Click here and you can find out more about how YLJ is helping her.

And just one more thing – a quick reminder that it would be a great help if anyone who has been involved in any way with Fresh Start for the Arts activities, events, projects and consultations of any kind could spend a couple minutes to fill in a very short questionnaire.

It’s on our website and just needs to be downloaded, filled in and emailed back to us, so we can create a good record of who has been involved and how.