2010 Breakthrough Fund Funding for exceptional cultural entrepreneurs

Maria Balshaw – Stewart Laing – Untitled Projects Matt Peacock – Streetwise Opera Simon Pearce – The Invisible Dot Ltd Gavin Wade – Eastside Projects The Breakthrough Fund A successful arts economy requires not only great artists, but also Nominations process talented and visionary people who can enable these artists to make The Breakthrough Fund identified potential applicants through a process of great things happen. Paul Hamlyn Foundation set up the Breakthrough confidential nominations, asking a range of nominators to help spot talent Fund, over an initial period of three years, to support exceptional and share their intelligence across regions and art forms. Whilst art form and cultural entrepreneurs. This year sees the third and final funding round regional spread are not criteria for support, we believe that a balance has of the initiative as it was originally devised. PHF will now evaluate the emerged over the three years of the Fund. programme and start to assess its impact, with a view to reviewing This year, 15 nominators were chosen for their expertise and experience. findings in 2011/12 – and sharing them as widely as possible. They gave their personal recommendations without the nominees’ Cultural entrepreneurs may appear in a range of roles and with various titles – knowledge. Over 40 nominees were put forward and invited to enter the producers, artistic or executive directors, curators, chief executives – but they application process. each possess a pressing and persuasive vision, a drive and a strong track Paul Hamlyn Foundation gratefully acknowledges the invaluable contribution record of making things happen. The Breakthrough Fund aims to support of the nominators for the 2010 Breakthrough Fund: these individuals in their determination to make a difference to the cultural landscape in which they work. Lewis Biggs (Director, Liverpool Biennial) Over the three years of the Fund, PHF has identified 19 exceptional individuals Morag Deyes (Director, Dancebase) at critical points in their development – whether they are an emerging talent, Roanne Dods (Director, RoseOrange & Co-Director, Mission Models Money) reaching full stride in their work or at the pinnacle of their career – to provide support that will make a significant difference to them and to the organisations David Francis (Director of Arts, Dartington Trust) in which they work. Tania Harrison (Arts Producer, Festival Republic) Existing funding approaches, including the PHF Arts programme’s Open Grants scheme, require applicants to have fully formed proposals that detail Rhian Hutchings (WNO Max Director, Welsh National Opera) activities, outcomes, costings, confirmed income and delivery plans. This type Darius James (Artistic Director, Independent Ballet Wales) of funding does not always match what is required to realise a vision, where activities and outcomes are often fundamentally shaped by processes of James Kerr (Executive Director, Verbal Arts Centre) understanding, defining and planning – not just delivery. Donna Lynas (Director, Wysing Arts Centre) Funders are rarely willing to commit at the stage where a vision exists but is Shona McCarthy (Director, Northern Ireland) not yet clear in terms of deliverable activities, resourcing and risk – however compelling it may be. Through the Breakthrough Fund, PHF has been able to Caroline Miller (Director, Dance UK) commit earlier in the cycle of making important things happen in the arts. Gillian Moore (Head of Contemporary Culture, Southbank Centre) Trusting that grantees will identify and realise their plans and the outcomes of the Fund’s support as they progress, lies at the heart of this commitment. Purni Morell (Head of NT Studio, National Theatre) The Breakthrough Fund exemplifies PHF’s willingness to take a new kind of Judith Palmer (Director, Poetry Society) risk, based on a judgement that the selected individual, and the structures Erica Whyman (Artistic Director and CEO, Northern Stage) through which they work, will prove to have what it takes to succeed. 2010 Breakthrough Fund recipients

Maria Balshaw, Director – Whitworth Over the next three to four years, the plan is for him to carve out time and space to think, experiment, incubate ideas and make mistakes – through a Art Gallery series of residencies with key individuals from the UK and abroad, spanning a variety of fields, art forms and backgrounds – to develop a new artistic

£260,000 Photo: Katia Porter strategy for the company. Maria Balshaw joined the Whitworth Art Gallery at He says: “When the Breakthrough Fund was first launched, it sent ripples of the in May 2006. An excitement through the arts sector – nothing quite like it existed and the inaugural Clore Leadership Programme Fellow in vision of the Paul Hamlyn Foundation to support arts entrepreneurs at critical 2004/05, her professional background spans Arts moments is something many of us can only dream about. This is a perfect Council England West Midlands, Creative time for Streetwise Opera to take advantage of the Fund – we have been Partnerships and academic posts at developing a new production model involving live performance and film the and University College which is producing exciting social and artistic benefits. To have more time to . experiment, incubate and dream is truly incredible and will catapult our The Breakthrough Fund grant will, over three years, enable her to conduct practice to the next level.” research and development as well as provide seed-corn funding for new programming strands that will emerge from the R&D carried out. This will include a part-time sabbatical for Maria over a six-month period, research Simon Pearce, Founder & Director – trips, a new curator-collaborator post for 30 months and a programming fund to explore ways of working differently with the collections, artists and The Invisible Dot Ltd audiences. All of this will take place alongside the major capital redevelopment she is leading at the Gallery, infusing new thinking into a ‘new’ £220,000 Whitworth Gallery. Simon Pearce has harnessed a huge number of She says: “Finding time to develop big ideas and retain the creative side of artists to create a whole movement of new talent in my director’s role at the Whitworth is my perennial challenge. The Comedy by bringing to the genre a unique Breakthrough funding will buy me thinking time at a critical time for me and combination of theatre and art practices. Having for the organisation. As we steer through a major capital expansion of the previously published performance poetry, he went Gallery, I will be able to research and develop some completely new ways of on to produce highly successful shows – including working with our wonderful collection, with artists, our audiences and our some of the most talked-about events at last new and old spaces. It is so unusual to have the trust of a funder at the year’s Edinburgh Festival where his productions won the main Comedy beginning of the creation process, so I feel extraordinarily honoured to Award and two Fringe Firsts. In February 2009, he had set up The Invisible receive this grant.” Dot Ltd to support his ambitions across genres. This Breakthrough Fund grant, over three years, will enable the appointment of a general manager for The Invisible Dot, underpin Simon Pearce’s own Stewart Laing, Founder & Director – wages as well as some office start-up costs, and also support some Untitled Projects research and project development activity. He says: “This bold scheme fosters flexible circumstances that nurture £273,000 singular work; unusual work that could not have existed otherwise. And for ommy Ga-Ken Wan this it must be applauded. I'm extremely proud to be among this year's Stewart Laing formed Untitled Projects in 1998, in recipients and I relish starting some unorthodox new projects and developing parallel to his busy international designing and Photo: T the ideas that really excite me.” directing career, to produce more personal, visually driven performances that attempt to reconfigure the perceived conventions of theatrical space. Untitled Projects has since produced four Gavin Wade, Founder & Director – ambitious and distinctive pieces of theatre in Eastside Projects Scotland over the past ten years. The Breakthrough Fund grant will enable Stewart Laing to expand the core £360,000 team of the company and secure his long-term collaborations with both Lorna Duguid and Steve Slater. Over a period of three years or so, the Gavin Wade set up Eastside Projects in 2008 as funding will also underpin other core costs as well as research and an artist-run public gallery space in Birmingham, development work. after 12 years of distinctive and challenging artist- curator practice in unusual spaces. His aim was to He says: “As a mature team, we are thrilled the Breakthrough Fund has establish a new model of artist-run space that recognised the potential for us to radically change the way we produce our supports high-quality artists’ practice, impacts work in Scotland. Over the past 12 years, we have been operating on a significantly on the cultural life of the city, and sporadic schedule, but we have now outgrown that production model. This contributes to both national and international critical cultural ideas and unique award will give us the opportunity to evolve into a more dynamic and agendas. From the outset, the organisation has relied on the interest and effective organisation.” good will of artists and on a committed team of volunteers. Over three years, the Breakthrough Fund grant will underpin the organisational and management structures of Eastside Projects, enabling the Matt Peacock, Founder & CEO – recruitment of an assistant director and supporting other key salaries, such as the gallery coordinator and assistants – with a view to developing a Streetwise Opera sustainable business and fundraising plan by the end of the first year. In £83,000 addition to this core support, a significant budget will be allocated to Photo: Geoff WilsonPhoto: Geoff programming to help sustain and consolidate the organisation’s growing Matt Peacock founded Streetwise Opera over reputation. eight years ago and is included in Gordon Brown’s He says: “Eastside Projects is the most ambitious project of my career and it book ‘Everyday Heroes’. He was one of the means so much to have the support of the Paul Hamlyn Foundation and this inaugural Clore Leadership Programme Fellows in unique grant. Birmingham is an amazing place to be living and working at the 2004/05 and, under his leadership, the company moment. The art scene is growing rapidly and Eastside Projects is an integral has been recognised through a series of highly part of it. We have had great support from our partners and I am proud that prestigious awards. we have been able to achieve so much with so little, but I am also eager for Streetwise Opera runs a weekly music programme in 11 homeless centres in the future where we can achieve so much more with the Breakthrough Fund. the North East, Midlands and South of England, commissions and produces Now we can achieve the vision of Eastside Projects as an artist-run public award-winning biennial opera productions, and has developed an gallery that enhances the texture and vitality of the City and provides a depth international touring programme. This Breakthrough Fund grant comes at a of support for artists. I am ecstatic that the Foundation shares critical point when the success and growth of the company have put my commitment and passion for Birmingham, and that they pressure on the existing operational model and on Matt Peacock himself. would back our development of complex new models of practice and spaces to nurture art.” Paul Hamlyn Foundation Paul Hamlyn (1926–2001) was an entrepreneur, publisher and philanthropist committed to providing new opportunities and experiences for people regardless of their background. His overriding concern was to open up the arts and education to everyone, but particularly to young people. In 1987, he established the Paul Hamlyn Foundation for general charitable purposes. The Foundation works across three UK programmes: Social Justice, Education and Learning and the Arts. Within each programme, funding is delivered through a combination of Open Grants, to which organisations can apply with proposals for funding innovative activities, and Special Initiatives, which are more focused interventions that aim to have an impact in a particular area. The Foundation also operates a programme of support for NGOs in India. The mission of the Foundation is to maximise opportunities for individuals and communities to realise their potential and to experience and enjoy a better quality of life, now and in the future. In particular, the Foundation is concerned with children and young people and with disadvantaged people.

Arts programme The Arts programme supports the development and dissemination of new ideas to increase people’s experience, enjoyment and involvement in the arts, with a particular focus on young people. The Open Grants scheme supports organisations and groups, concentrating on work that is transformational at three levels: for the participants, for the funded organisations themselves and, more generally, for the sector in which they operate. Grants are also awarded to talented individuals through four Arts programme Special Initiatives: Artists Working in Participatory Settings, Awards for Artists, Jane Attenborough Dance in Education (JADE) Fellowships and the Breakthrough Fund. For information about the Arts Programme or any other aspect of Paul Hamlyn Foundation’s work, please visit www.phf.org.uk

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