Agenda item

INFORMATION NOTE OF THE SERVICE DIRECTOR - COMMERCIAL

To discuss how arts providers, and their audiences, plan to recover from the Coronavirus pandemic and how to thrive in the new world.

The Chair led a discussion on how arts providers, and their audiences, planned to recover from the pandemic and how to thrive in the new world.  

Audio recording – 32 minutes 33 seconds

The Chair led a discussion on how arts providers, and their audiences, planned to recover from the pandemic and how to thrive in the new world. 

Comments included:

·                Hertfordshire Year of Culture 2020 had not been able to take place as planned due to the Covid-19 pandemic;

·                North Herts had a fantastic arts and culture community and the purpose of this meeting was to connect people with the aim of keeping the sector buoyant in spite of the pandemic and to give mutual support to each other to keep the arts thriving;

·                Some podcast audiences had decreased during lockdown, but were starting to build up again;

·                A short online film festival launched during the first lockdown had a good response;

·                The theatre was seeing a tentative return and numbers had to be limited, including cast numbers;

·                Many people needed reassurance to return to arts events and this benefitted from a slow approach;

·                The Queen Mother Theatre could be used as a venue for the next meeting of this group;

·                Some artists had found it hard to be creative during the pandemic and the return to the studios had been managed sensitively and led to a sense of kindness – creativity was fragile and needed to be supported;

·                People were desperate to come back to music courses and musicians were thrilled to play to live small audiences again. Live streaming had picked up people from all over the world; a blend of online and physical delivery of music performances/courses at Benslow Music was envisaged in future;

·                Royston Arts Festival was keen to return to live performances due to the technical demands of online operation; online concerts commissioned with local artists did not attract as large an attendance as they would have done in person;

·                Baldock Events Forum was thinking about moving towards a more collaborative model in terms of running festivals and mixing areas of the arts. This had been successful in Baldock, working with other events organisers and suppliers to provide joint ventures;

·                Open Art Box collaborated with the North Herts and Stevenage Museums which had encouraged participants to visit the museum;

·                It would be useful to have a network of rentable spaces which arts and culture organisations could use for rehearsals, filming, screening films, exhibitions, etc.;

·                One idea which had come out of recent meetings was to establish a district-wide artists and creatives network which would meet once a month, for a breakfast meeting for example; James Willis was gathering names but North Herts District Council could help to organise this; North Herts Museum had offered a space for the first meeting and the Market Theatre had also been offered once social distancing requirements were not required; the network would enable participants to support each other’s projects, share facilities, resources, work on joint projects, etc.;

·                Hitchin Football Club was keen to incorporate arts and culture its initiatives, particularly with the younger supporters and families, as a way of engaging with the community, with initiatives such as design a kit and design a painted rock. The club was keen to build partnerships and networks and collaborate with other organisations in Hitchin to bring arts and football together; they looking to work with local artists in the new children’s zone ‘The Aviary’, and encouraged interested artists to get in touch;

·                One positive of the pandemic was that it had brought community organisations together in some ways and Zoom did facilitate this in terms of attending meetings, particularly from a district-wide perspective;

·                A lot of collaboration historically happened in the open studios in September and Herts Visual Arts was actively seeking partners willing to host a small group of artists with art which would be promoted on social media;

·                The theme for the Summer Reading Challenge was Wild World Heroes which had potential for collaboration with arts organisations.