season review 2012 / 13 Catherine McGuinness 13 / Chairman, Barbican Centre Board Welcome to our Season Review for 2012/13. Here at the Barbican Centre there have been many highlights and headlines over the past year, including great orchestras in our concert hall, thrilling dance and drama in our theatre, thought-provoking film seasons in our new © Sheila Rock Sir Nicholas Kenyon Catherine McGuinness © Clive Totman cinemas and critically acclaimed exhibitions in our gallery. There has been so much Sir Nicholas Kenyon activity in the Centre to inspire and excite, and Managing Director, Barbican Centre 2012 Barbican Season Review audiences have certainly responded. It is a unique feature of the Barbican that we have The year 2012 was a remarkable one for the world-class arts this range of art forms in one place, and we Barbican in every way, and the successes of are increasingly forging links between them. this period have been sustained into an equally outstanding 2013. The inspiring power of the But our work also continues outside our London Olympics and Paralympic Games, walls. Through our Beyond Barbican and the enlightened investment in the Cultural and learning programme and creative learning work, we Olympiad that surrounded it, has left a lasting touch the lives of thousands in neighbouring artistic legacy. The Barbican was at the heart boroughs, discovering new audiences and of the celebrations and was invited, with our The Barbican exists to inspire people to discover talents. Perhaps my favourite headline of this partners Create London, to reopen the north of past year has been ‘London youth finds its the Olympic Park with the Open East Festival in and love the arts. We innovate with outstanding voice’, following the moving and powerful July 2013. Unleashed production by young people from artists and performers to create an international across east London working with Boy Blue 2012/13 was exceptional, with record Entertainment and our Creative Learning team. attendances and record levels of commercial programme that crosses art forms, investing in activity as audiences flocked both to the Centre We are proud to play our part in and to its ambitious off-site work in east London. the artists of today and tomorrow. enlivening the City and supporting our neighbouring communities; we thank the Now we are building on that vision of offering City of London Corporation and other arts and learning for all with our use of the supporters for making this work possible. Guildhall School’s wonderful new concert hall at Milton Court, our own new cinemas, and the growing collaborations around the Barbican area that will create a world-class cultural hub barbican.org.uk as Crossrail arrives in 2018. It is an exciting time for the Barbican, as the arts are needed in ever more challenging times, and we hope that you will join us as audiences, patrons and partners 1 ©Lee Mawdsley 2 Forewords as we move forward. Our vision 13 13 / 160,000 / permanent twitter followers 280 employees 48,407 190,000 creative learning 5.7 million free working with participants website visitors attendances Barbican Season Review 2012 Barbican Season Review Barbican Season Review 2012 Barbican Season Review exceptional Olympic 2012/13 saw a... 33% increase in box office increase in commercial income 144arts and education partners 35% increase in arts attendance to deliver 36% part of a cluster of City of London arts and cultural organisations that generates barbican.org.uk barbican.org.uk £291m Cluster the City Arts and Culture of Impact The Economic, Social and Cultural report London commissioned BOP * City of 3 4 3 Year in numbers in Year an audience of to 2,194events million for the London economy* 13 In the past year we’ve achieved a remarkable shift in the / Barbican’s audience, both in terms of numbers and in the increasingly diverse range of people we serve. The 2012/13 financial year saw attendances for events at the Centre exceeding one million for the first time, an increase of 36% on 2011/12. In this Olympics year, box office receipts also rose by 33%. Random International’s Rain Room broke audience records for an installation in the Centre’s Curve Gallery. More than 77,000 people visited the installation, some of whom were willing to queue for hours to experience the work. 2012 Barbican Season Review HM The Queen © Kevin Leighton Queues were also a feature of our Beyond Barbican Queen’s visit programme, with Leandro Erlich’s Dalston House On 5 December 2012, the attracting over 50,000 visitors during its six-week run Barbican and London Symphony in Hackney. The installation caught the wider public Orchestra welcomed a very imagination, hosting press and film crews from across special audience member the world, witnessing marriage proposals, and even when Her Majesty The Queen featuring in the Independent’s political cartoon. visited the Centre to present the Queen’s Medal for Music to Our Beyond Barbican offsite programme was particularly the National Youth Orchestra successful in reaching new audiences. Our long-standing of Great Britain at an LSO partnerships with organisations across east London helped concert in the Barbican Hall. us broaden the appeal of our work, with 26% of audience members having previously low attendance at arts events. As well as serving the audiences of today, we’re investing in those of tomorrow through our Creative Learning programme, our partnerships with schools across east London on initiatives such as Barbican Box, and through our FreeB scheme in which 20,000 members aged 16–25 can access free tickets for performances, screenings and exhibitions at the Centre. The Barbican also continues to increase its online audience, amassing over 160,000 followers on Twitter © Gar Powell-Evans barbican.org.uk and over 110,000 fans on Facebook, while our website currently receives over five million visits a year. House Dalston 5 Erlich, Leandro 6 Our audience 13 The 2012/13 season featured two Innovation Collaboration / major cross-arts programmes, We celebrated the innovators The Barbican’s commitment to demonstrating the Barbican’s of the past with Everything bringing about exciting artistic unique ability to produce was Moving, an exhibition collaborations continued with seasons and events that span surveying the work of visionary a series of interventions within art forms and disciplines. photographers of the 1960s Random International’s astonishing and 1970s, alongside which Rain Room installation, featuring Dancing around Duchamp was the ran a project that saw young Wayne McGregor | Random perfect realisation of this cross-arts people create a photobook Dance performing to a soundtrack offer, encompassing art, music, inspired by the exhibition, enabling by composer Max Richter. theatre, dance, film and creative teachers and students to devise learning. This major season and share exceptional work. Further collaborations included orbited around the legendary the Beck: Song Reader Live 2012 Barbican Season Review artist Marcel Duchamp, exploring We also programmed work from concert, which saw a stellar cast of Rain Room, Random International © Felix Clay his legacy and relationship to the innovators of today, including musicians perform Beck’s unique key figures of the avant-garde, Aphex Twin’s ground-breaking sheet music album Song Reader, including artists Jasper Johns Remote Orchestra project; Netia and Seven Deadly Sins, a film and Robert Rauschenberg, Jones’s multimedia staging of season where leading artists and playwrights and choreographers Oliver Knussen’s opera, Where film-makers – including Dame such as Samuel Beckett and the Wild Things Are, and Katie Vivienne Westwood, Sam Taylor Merce Cunningham, and the Mitchell and Schaubühne Wood and Mike Leigh – selected experimental composer John Cage. Berlin’s cinematic reimagining films that, for them, encapsulated of Strindberg in Fräulein Julie. one of the deadly sins. Wonder: Art and Science on the Brain saw the Barbican Barbican collaborate with the Wellcome International Enterprises Trust on a series of events Our international programme examining the inner workings of of touring exhibitions saw the Beck performs at Beck: Song Reader Live concert © Mark Allan the mind. The season investigated blockbuster show Designing 007: how the brain relates to the Fifty Years of Bond Style visit the Tiff many strands of human creativity Bell Lightbox in Toronto, Minsheng through films, music, performances, Art Museum in Shanghai lectures, collaborations, workshops and Melbourne Museum. and talks, while a free Barbican exhibition during Dancing around Duchamp season © Felix Clay Duchamp season © Felix during Dancing around exhibition Weekender enabled families Watch Me Move, our international to enjoy a wealth of hands-on animation exhibition, toured experiments and experiences. venues in Rio de Janeiro and Brasilia, attracting record- Bride and the Bachelors barbican.org.uk breaking visitor numbers in both cities, with 306,000 people visiting the exhibition during Richard Ayoade appears at the Seven Deadly Sins film season its three-month run in Rio. © Steff Ungerer 7 in the Dancers perform 8 An international, international, An cross-arts programme 13 Our Beyond Barbican programme in summer Open East Festival / 2013 featured a series of world-class arts and The Beyond Barbican programme learning events across east London. saw us work with Create London to deliver our biggest offsite Working closely with our associate partner Create London, project to date. Open East Festival Beyond Barbican built on the Barbican’s long history of was a two-day celebration in the high-quality programming and partnerships with artists Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and organisations in the boroughs surrounding the Centre. marking the first anniversary of These partnerships, together with funding from Arts Council the opening ceremony of the England, allowed us to deliver an outstanding summer of London 2012 Olympic Games events outside our walls, featuring pop-up performances, and the opening of the north commissions and collaborations across east London.