This weeks blog comes from Helen Connify, Sunderland Cultural Partnership Coordinator:
The sense of anticipation in Sunderland at the moment is palpable. There is a collective feeling that there is so much potential ahead of us, tantalisingly within our grasp. However, the scale of the task ahead is just as daunting as it is exciting, which is why I think it’s important and timely to reflect on what’s been achieved in the past few years. There has been so many successes, learning curves, ideas, conversations and leaps of faith that has brought us to this point where we feel… we can all do this.
This City of Culture bid didn’t come from a whim. It hasn’t come ‘top down’. Sure, the decision to proceed came from city leaders, but that decision came from watching artists and organisations building their strengths and ambition at all levels across Sunderland, sometimes in the face of great adversity.
I came into my post over three years ago to set up Sunderland Cultural Partnership, which had the initial focus of bringing University of Sunderland, Sunderland City Council and the newly formed Music, Arts, and Culture Trust together to improve joint planning, communications and develop a much needed vision for culture in the city. We worked together with cultural organisations and individuals across the city to create this shared vision, which we launched in October 2014.
It was very well received both across the region and nationally. In the 18 months since we launched it, we’ve moved an awfully long way and delivered most of what we said we would. Partners have had some major announcements – The Cultural Spring, the Fire Station, Hylton Castle, Roker Pier and Lighthouse, Holy Trinity Church, Sunderland Stages, and Asunder to name a few. We now have some well established work stream groups – a way of maximising the great knowledge and experience within the city; taking joint ownership of how we move Sunderland forward.
But what has been more gratifying and in some ways more valuable, has been the process we went through to achieve this – how it has brought people together. Undoubtedly one of the most important things has been open and honest discussions. Some of them were difficult at first, some worked well, some not so well. Some were incredible and brought sparks of ideas and plans that have grown into game changing programmes and developments – at all levels.
I’m particularly excited by some of the activity that has come from the Learning Group who’ve developed some really innovative projects around Arts Award with Sunderland schools, and a city-wide ASD-friendly relaxed offer around Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time that came to the Sunderland Empire last year. What is particularly exciting is that bigger organisations, like Sunderland Empire’s Creative Learning Team, have formed a genuine working synergy with smaller organisations like No Limits Theatre. That’s just one example, there are many more.
So we’ve come to this point where we’ve shared and learned enough together to feel a sense of ownership over what comes next. Yes, we know there is still a road to travel and a significant challenge ahead. However, we’ve got a pretty good idea of what we all need to do and the faith and confidence in each of our abilities that we can work out the route forward… together.
Helen Connify, Sunderland Cultural Partnership Coordinator
13th April 2016
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