Summary Report from ‘Shaping the Future’ Discussion Event
Key points from the St Hugh's Foundation for the Arts' first consultation event with local arts organisations
On the 12th November 2015, we welcomed representatives from arts organisations in our area of benefit (the City of Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire (including North and North East Lincolnshire)) as well as managers and producers who work with artists in that area to a discussion event at Bishop Grosseteste University in Lincoln.
Participants contributed generously to our discussion about ways in which the St Hugh’s Foundation for the Arts could support artists through a revised awards programme and provision of other opportunities such as artist workshops in the future. The topics covered were wide-ranging, too many to cover in detail here, but the following gives an overview of some of the main points and key questions:
What could we achieve with our funding?
- Funding is needed for the developmental process of making new work
- Investing in artists is essential.
- Don’t narrow the field of prospective applicants – keep to a wide range of art forms and individual/organisation applicants
- St Hugh’s could part-fund larger projects as some may take more than one year’s funding budget.
- In the future could other partners provide match funding or funding in kind to supplement our Arts Award?
The uniqueness of the St Hugh’s Foundation for the Arts offer:
- We were told that the flexibility of the St Hugh’s funding (where, according to some participants, other funding streams are becoming more structured or “deterministic”) means that it can make an enormous difference for people who do not fulfil the criteria for other funding, or who may have ideas for exciting projects that tend to be overlooked by other funders
- It could help new/emerging artists, who may find it difficult to find help elsewhere
- The St Hugh’s Foundation for the Arts is valued for our grant system but also the support we give; this is one of our unique selling points
Our assessment criteria for awards:
- There should be a clear approach to how the Foundation assesses each application, and our criteria should be included on the website so that our process is more transparent, and applicants understand what we are looking for.
- The Foundation needs to articulate a clear vision for what we understand to be ‘high quality’ work
- We need to assess the impact of potential projects on the the individual or organisation being funded; does it assist in taking their work forward? How?
Structure of awards programme:
- We talked about different scales of awards e.g. ranging from £1,000 - £15,000. However, some attendees cautioned that lower grants could attract less realistic applications as artists try to complete their entire project within a smaller budget.
- Longer term, perhaps we could consider offering two award programmes per year
- Overall, attendees agreed that we should keep our Award scheme open to a wide range of art forms and individual/organisation applicants.
Application and Interview Process
- There was much discussion about a potential two part application process e.g.
- Artists/organisations register their intention to make an application. The form need not be onerous at this stage (tick box rather than discursive answers; perhaps there’s a 400 word (or equivalent) ‘pitch’ of the idea). Artists who are selected at this first stage are given an independent mentor (not a Trustee) to work with applicants on their bid. For applicants who are not selected, the process ends here.
- Artists/organisations submit their worked-up applications and an interview list is prepared.
- When it came to the second-stage application/proposal, attendees discussed:
- An application of a couple of pages may be sufficient for a small project or individual artists but larger projects should have to complete a larger application
- Although some artists need a bit of structure the process should be open to all art forms and interesting artistic proposals. Therefore restrictive questioning on an application form is not very helpful.
- If the Foundation’s criteria were clearly expressed, then it could be more possible for applicants to write a proposal without responding to particular questions?
- Many attendees talked about the value of having advice from a ‘critical friend’ before applying; someone to help them focus on what they need and what they are applying for.
- We talked about making the application process more inclusive by changing the method of application (e.g. offering the option of submitting a video rather than a written application). Similarly, we could re-design the interview process to make it more user-friendly and creative; make the interview more specific and less generic. Interviews could include videos and practical work.
Evaluation
- It may not be necessary to invite applicants to consider this when making an initial application, but it could be discussed at the interview.
- Should we fund external evaluation, or would this be up to the applicant?
- Encourage artists to use their own practice to evaluate what they have done, so to be creative about methods of evaluation
Sharing practice/ongoing learning:
- Attendees agreed that any learning our funding might facilitate should not stop with the project/s being funded. Suggestions for sharing learning and facilitating an ‘artists community’ included:
- Networking/social event/s e.g. a once or twice yearly event or evening where practitioners can meet each other and socialise as well as build networks would be very valuable.
- Workshops for artists, e.g. to develop the strength of applications, might be appropriate
- A mentoring scheme which could be carried out in partnership with other established organisations.
- The Foundation’s current ‘Attached trustee’ system is much valued and should be maintained.
- Award winners (called ‘Fellows’ in the future) could be mentors to aspiring applicants
- Reports commissioned for the projects we support should be added to the Foundation website, as well as more informal reporting on the blog
- St Hugh’s could sign-post to other opportunities, including funding opportunities
- A ‘Friends of the St Hugh’s Foundation for the Arts’ group in the future? e.g. a community of ‘critical friends’ who could support the Trustees in supporting local artists; other partners who could provide in-kind resources to match our cash contribution, or with whom we could work to facilitate mentoring.
Managing expectations:
- It is impossible (particularly with a limit on our funds and a limit on time Trustees can volunteer to oversee the programme) to try to “be all things to all people”
- What we can do is to try something out with our re-launched award programme, see how it goes, and then keep the award programme under review in forthcoming years; so we could implement bigger changes in future years if those changes seem to be necessary
- Identifying where the organisation wants to be over the next two years and review regularly to see its plans are on target and it is developing in the right way. Don’t set strategic visions too far ahead as things move very quickly. A local organisation is so valuable.
Other resources
- Blog on our new website: we discussed that this is only useful if you have traffic reading it. Could we have a guest editor for a month? We could also consider commissioning articles for the blog.
- Links to other funding bodies.
- Links to performance/exhibition opportunities – i.e. list of festivals etc.
- Links to websites of local venues who, in turn, could also promote St Hugh’s.
We need to prioritise raising awareness of the Foundation in our three target areas; East Yorkshire, Hull and Lincolnshire (including North and North East Lincolnshire).
We are very grateful to all participants who contributed their time and ideas to this event. Trustees have reviewed all the information we collected, and will be responding to it a step at a time. In the short term, we are getting ready to re-launch our awards programme in January 2016 (sign up to our mailing list to receive details of the new scheme in the new year) and we will be trying to:
- maintain the uniqueness of our offer, keeping our awards programme as flexible and open as possible
- retain our capacity to offer smaller awards of £1,000 (e.g. for artists who are just getting started or considering a change of direction in their practice) or larger awards of up to £15,000
- revise our application process, allowing for different application formats, new interview methods and opportunities to receive more support with application-writing for example
When our new awards programme is up and running, we will turn our attention to facilitating further networking opportunities and artist workshops. Longer term, we hope that there is more that we can take forward from our discussions on the 12th November, and we will keep our programme of activities under constant review.