We are recruiting 4 paid Programme Committee members for the period September 2022 – March 2024. This new Committee will be responding to our new theme ‘The Home’ and will work with the staff team at The NewBridge Project to curate an arts programme.
OPPORTUNITY!
Join The NewBridge Project’s Programme Committee
Deadline: Monday 25 July 2022, 5pm
We are recruiting 4 paid Programme Committee members for September 2022 – February 2024.
This new Committee will be responding to our new theme ‘The Home’ and will work with the staff team at The NewBridge Project to curate an arts programme.
NewBridge believe in many voices being represented through our projects and exhibitions, and we work with a Committee to enable new narratives, methodologies and approaches to emerge across our programme.
Programme Committee members will be paid a total of £6,230 each over 18 months, at a rate of £12 per hour for a 7-hour day, which works out at around 4 days a month. They will also have a shared budget to commission new work and produce projects and exhibitions.
See below for further details and how to apply.
Fee and Budget
Programme Committee members will be paid:
The budget for Committee members to use:
Who can apply?
We are keen to hear from enthusiastic individuals with all levels of experience who want to work collectively to shape an arts programme at The NewBridge Project, who are interested in cultural and creative programming, and are interested in exploring the theme of ‘The Home’.
The Programme Committee will work together over 18 months to programme 4 projects and/or exhibitions, contributing their own interests, research and ways of working to the group. They will work closely with the whole NewBridge team, most closely with our Programme Director, Dawn Bothwell.
Time Commitment
How it works
The committee will work together to develop, plan and produce an arts programme, gaining experience and knowledge across all parts of this process.
This will involve exchanging ideas and research, managing practical details such as budgets and schedules, planning how the programme will be structured, its content and how it engages audiences, as well as evaluating the projects alongside communities and audiences when they are complete.
Throughout your time on the Committee, you will regularly connect with people from the local community, so we can ensure that the programme responds to different interests and perspectives.
The NewBridge Committee is always evolving, and this Committee will decide how they want to work together as a group and with NewBridge staff, collectively developing guidelines around time commitment, professional development needs and their aims as a committee.
What do I get out of being on the Committee
As well as supporting the production of the programme, the Programme Committee acts as a hands-on professional development experience, which will provide members with the opportunity to gain experience across research, curation and programme development.
The Committee will also have opportunities to attend professional development events, including opportunities tailored to the Committee, and through full access to Practice makes Practice.
About The NewBridge Project
The NewBridge Project is an active artist-led community that supports artists, curators and communities through providing making and exhibiting space, space and an ambitious programme of exhibitions, commissions, artist development and events.
Through working with a Committee we want to create a programme that reflects the diversity of contemporary art practice, that is responsive to the environment within which it exists, that builds solidarity, and that places community-centred, experimental, collaborative and socially conscious programming at its heart.
NewBridge moved in 2021 to the local area of Shieldfield, Newcastle upon Tyne and have a five-year lease on a council-owned premises. They share a building with a doctors’ surgery and a nursery, the building is part of a larger housing estate including housing, shop units occupied by small businesses and community organisations. Through our programme we want to explore the current and future roles of artist-led spaces within their communities and our own role in Shieldfield over the next 5 years.
NewBridge’s building has an art gallery, artists’ bookshop, The Reading Room, over 100 artists’ studios and workspaces: hot desk space, hireable project spaces, our workshops: dark room, ceramics workshop, wood workshop, a print workshop with Risograph Press.
Past committee exhibitions include: Hidden Civil War , which looked at social class division, Deep Adaptation which looked at the climate crisis in the context of every-day social, political and economic issues; and Overmorrow.
Our focus is ‘The Home’
We have a fixed but broad subject of focus for our activity over the next 18 months – ‘The Home’. We are looking for applicants who want to explore this idea in fresh and meaningful ways, and to approach working with others to bring a wide range of experiences on the subject of ‘The Home’ to the programme.
Who is our audience?
The NewBridge Project engage varied audiences across all our work. This includes:
The deadline for applications is Monday 25 July, 5pm
All applications must be sent to applications@thenewbridgeproject.com with the subject heading Programme Committee Application
We have a number of different ways to apply for this role. You can do this through:
• A single PDF document containing the information outlined below.
• A video or audio file containing the information outlined below.
• A mixture of written and video or audio application (eg. an audio application but written Equal Opportunities Form)
If you require any adjustments to the application process, then please contact us directly so we can discuss how to support you in your application (by phone – 07708 195 800 (Mon-Fri, 10am-6pm, or email -applications@thenewbridgeproject.com)
In your application (whether written, audio or video) please include the following:
1. Application (no more than 2 A4 pages in total / 6 minutes) including the following:
1a. General Information
• Your name
• Your pronouns – tell us how you like to be referred to such as she/her, he/him, they/them
• Any access requirements or adjustments you want us to know about
• If applying for a place reserved for those who have experienced barriers to a career in the arts (see above) or applying for a place reserved for those living in Newcastle, North Tyneside and Northumberland please give details.
• Confirming availability to travel to and stay in Newcastle on the 26-28 September and any additional support you may need to do so.
1b. Application for programme committee
• Outline your interest/reasons for joining the 2022-23 The NewBridge Project Programme Committee.
• Any initial ideas for a project/public programming/exhibition you have, including any other people that you would like to work with (artists, other practitioners, community groups, etc.)
• Any specific interests you have relating to the subject ‘The Home’ that you would want to explore.
• What you hope to get out of being on the Programme Committee in terms of professional, personal, or creative development.
You can frame your ideas as a proposal for a project/exhibition/event, etc. which will help us to understand your interests, aims and expectations, but we would like these proposals to be seen as starting points, and we would expect that they would change through discussions with the rest of the committee, in this collaborative process.
2. Equal opportunities and diversity monitoring form
We encourage applicants to complete our Equal Opportunities Form, which helps us monitor the diversity of our organisation and our work. Your responses will be treated with full confidentiality. If there are any questions you would rather not answer, please just tick ‘prefer not to say’ or skip to the next question.
Selection process
The four places on the committee will be chosen by a panel from a shortlist of applicants. The panel are Niomi Fairweather (curator, BALTIC), Beatriz Lobo (curator, INIVA), Peter Taylor (director, Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival), Dawn Bothwell (programme director, The NewBridge Project), Rebecca Huggan (director, The NewBridge Project) and a local community member.
Selection will be based upon the following: your enthusiasm for working as a group and with others, openness to other people and their ideas, imagination and potential of the ideas proposed, and the impact this experience will have on your personal and professional development.
Getting in touch
Programme Director Dawn Bothwell will hold an open day on Tuesday 12th July for people to sign up to one-to-one sessions to discuss your questions and application on the following dates and times (please book a slot).
If none of these times is suitable for you, please get in touch to arrange an alternative time.
You can also send over any questions you have by email to applications@thenewbridgeproject.com
This opportunity is supported by Arts Council England, NCIF and is part-funded by the North of Tyne Combined Authority.
The NewBridge Project is supported by Arts Council England, Newcastle Culture Investment Fund and Newcastle University’s Institute for Creative Arts Practice.
