DASH Annual report for 2004/2005

DISABILITY ARTS IN SHROPSHIRE

Annual Report 2004 - 2005

CONTENTS Chairperson’s report

Director’s Report

Statistics

Auditors report and Accounts

Directors / Trustees of DASh

CHAIRPERSON’S REPORT Ruth Kaye 04

ARTISTIC DIRECTOR’S REPORT Looking back over the past year, I’m aware how much DASh has changed and how different the Organisation feels from a year ago.

The main change is our Staff, we now have three staff, this has not only stabilised DASh, but created an expansion and a diversification of our work. This an exciting time for DASh, with unlimited possibilities We not only have an efficient Office, thanks to Paula, but are developing individual Artists development, thanks to Tanya and much, much, more. All this work is detailed below.

Our work in 04-05 breaks down into 4 areas:  Visual and Digital arts  Performing arts and Film  Accessible Transport to the Arts  Information and Advice VISUAL AND DIGITAL ARTS TANYA

PERFORMING ARTS AND FILM Carnival The third inclusive Ludlow Carnival was a great success, with 200 people taking part (up from 92 in 2003) and 75 of these were Disabled people (up from 25 in 2003), with people coming from all over Shropshire and beyond.

The partnership with the Town Carnival has worked. It has put our part of the Carnival in a clear context. Everyone in Ludlow knows that Whit Monday is Carnival day. Feedback from

Carnival 04 was that it was the best Carnival people remember in Ludlow.

The unique partnership of a traditional Carnival, an inclusive carnival and an Arts centre working together, have increased funding opportunities, though we still struggle to find the full budget.

This year we are running accessible minibuses from Shrewsbury, Bishops Castle and Cleobury Mortimer, to increase the access for all. We are slowly involving more young Disabled people in the Carnival, with groups from Secondary Schools participating.

Borderlines Film Festival In March we ran ‘Close up and Personal’ a day of Disability related films as a partnership with the Borderlines Film Festival.

The day took place at the Courtyard Theatre in Hereford.

There was a degree of uncertainty about how much support we would get, as our Herefordshire contacts are minimal. In the event we had 80 people attending the day.

We showed short films by two regional Disabled Film MakersMat Beddell and Alan Wijgerden and in the afternoon we showed ‘Afterlife’, which stars a Learning Disabled Actress. We had Caglar from London Disability Arts Forum and Tanya Raabe leading a panel discussion.

We will definitely repeat this day next year.

In Yer Face & The Last Freak Show DASh supported the organising of the West Midlands part of the National Tour of the Last Freak Show(TLFS). Through our support one week in Wolverhampton and one week split between Telford and Shrewsbury have been booked.

We have combined TLFS with an afternoon street festival ‘In Yer Face’ on Pride Hill in Shrewsbury. This will be happening in June 05

ACCESSIBLE TRANSPORT TO THE ARTS We have continued our two transport schemes, Bridgnorth Arts for All ( BAA ) and North Shropshire Arts for All (NOSHAA). The two schemes were extended to 7 shows for BAA and 6 shows for NOSHAA. This extended the season, which helped attract people by word of mouth etc.

This showed in the numbers of bookers: BAA: 78 bookers NOSHAA: 64 bookers We now have comprehensive databases for these two schemes and would expect them to develop from this solid foundation.

The only uncertainty is funding. North Shropshire District Council have cut their Arts Service and though we have funding for 05-06, it is uncertain if we will be funded after this.

INFORMATION & ADVICE This area had dramatically changed with Paula our General Manager taking the role of Information Officer for ½ day a week.

Accessibility was the key element in the redesign of the website.

To show readers that we have taken care to create an interoperable Web page, a "W3C valid" badge has been displayed. The site also complies with Bobby and has ‘AAA’ status, the top criteria for accessibility. The website was submitted to www.net-guide.co.uk , the top search engine for accessible websites, and has achieved an ‘excellent rating’.

The DASh newsletter is no longer posted, but can be downloaded in pdf format from the website. This makes it accessible to people who use screenreaders.

INTERNATIONAL WORK Five Polish Artists from the Crackow group came on a visit to Shropshire in September.

Their visit involved visiting a variety of venues around Shropshire and meeting a number of DASh artists.

We had hoped to bring Jeffrey Chock, Trinidadian Carnival photographer to this year’s carnival to document the event, but we could not raise sufficient funding this time, we hopefully will achieve this for Carnival 06.

CONFERENCES AND EVENTS Awayday The DASh Board Awayday (in fact overnighter) happened in January 05 at Westhope College.

The main theme of the event was to look at DASh’s products and how to develop these.

The outcomes were:  Develop DASh Marketing plan  Develop DASh Graphic design business  Staff to keep Board more informed of day to day developments

DASh has presented at the following Conferences:  Arts Council small to middle scale venues groups  Folk Arts National Conference  Regional Carnival forum DASh is represented on the Boards of Blue Eyed Soul, Mosaic Arts, the QUBE, the steering group of Bridgnorth District Arts, Festive Ludlow and Climate Change.

STATISTICS DIGITAL NOW Participants - 10 ADTeam Participants-4 CARNIVAL Participants - 200 Audience - 4000 BAA and NOSHAA Participants – 142 BORDERLINES Presenting Artists and panel – 10 Audience - 80 TOTAL PARTICIPANTS - 366 TOTAL AUDIENCE - 4080

DIRECTORS / TRUSTEES OF DASh Ruth Kaye - Chair Sue Bott - Secretary Ian Wainwright - Treasurer Sylvia Earthy – Vice Chair Jayni Anderton Joy Tudor Rachel Gibb Mike Layward - Company Secretary STAFF Mike Layward - Artistic Director Paula Dower – General Manager Tanya Raabe – Visual Arts Manager