Past Projects
In March I worked my final month of an almost-ten-year career with EastSide Partnership, taking the leap into self-employment for the first time in my life.
I’ve always admired self-employed people, those brave enough to set up on their own,.. but to be honest, I’ve never felt that was for me.
So, what changed?
Looking back – I was always going to work in the arts sector – it took a while but I got there!
In 2001, Hugh Mulholland gave me a job at the Ormeau Baths Gallery. That led to 5 wonderful years working at the leading contemporary art gallery in NI and learning the ropes of running an arts charity. Thanks to Hugh, I also got the chance to spend a month working at the Venice Biennale. Definitely a career highlight!
From OBG, I moved to Down Arts Centre, as the live event programmer. I remember standing at the back of the auditorium at the first gig I booked, watching the rapt audience and artist create magic in the way that only happens with live performance, and thinking yes, this is it, this is my place in the world.
Over the next 10 years at DAC, I was able to develop my interest in creating events in non-arts spaces during a year of off-site programming whilst the centre was refurbished, and commissioning and producing The Downe Chorus by Reggie Chamberlain King in the old Downe Hospital, before the doors were permanently closed.
During this time, I took part in the Clore Leadership Programme. I learnt an incredible amount, mainly about myself and how I wanted to show up as a leader in the arts community. The experience was transformative and led to the next step in my career.
In 2016 I joined the team at EastSide Partnership, and for the next almost ten years, led the strategic and creative development of EastSide Arts. I delivered multiple annual festivals, created a new literary symposium and commissioned and produced new dramas, all with inspiring local artists. It’s impossible to sum up the excitement, challenges, successes, failures, and occasional terrors of this period of my life, but I’m immensely grateful for it all. Special memories include;
Ø Watching the Riverdance choir, Anúna, promenade up the isle of St. Patricks Church in east Belfast in my first festival in 2016;
Ø Standing on stage with The Night Institute DJs Timmy and Jordan, arms raised, after the first joyful return of live music gigs in 2021;
Ø Watching The Gertrude Star Band perform on the stage of the MAC, and bring the house down;
Ø Working with d/Deaf artists to open up the festival to a wider
Ø Getting a call to ask if I could please get the racing pigeons removed from the ‘dressing room’ in a social club so that the drag artists could get into costume!
All of these experiences have led me to the point of being able to start my own business as an independent creative producer, working with clients to bring creative vision to life – more about that in my next post!
