Who? In the West Midlands
Who is Ali Williams?
After a year of working as a Physio for South Glamorgan Health Authority I gave up my career to form NoFit State Circus and from 1986-1997 I was performer and General Manager for them, with responsibilities for tour planning, fundraising, finance, marketing and general administration. During this time I was also a freelance performer, director and arts administrator and worked with other theatre companies such as Travelling Light Theatre (Bristol), The Public (West Bromwich), Desperate Men (Bristol) in various consultancy roles. In 1993 I set up the community wing of NoFit State and created opportunities for our community performers to work with Welsh National Opera on their large-scale community projects. In 1998 I began to direct circus productions and directed three community circus shows for Oddfellows Playhouse (Connecticut), Circus Eruption (Swansea) and Syrcus Circus (Bangor)
Between 1997-2002 NoFit State created three large-scale community circus projects for which I was community director and we involved over 400 adults and 200 young people from the community in these projects. This was and opportunity for experimentation with artform development. In 2001 I returned to college to study Arts Management, and for my business plan module I created in collaboration with a science advisor a new show called Science Circus, which was funded by NESTA and Science Year to tour around the UK in 2002.
In 2004 I became co-producer of the ImMortal project with Tom Rack which is now an internationally recognised, award winning critically acclaimed production. The development and tour of ImMortal took NoFit State to a new level, being recognised for creative excellence and revolutionary apprenticeship scheme to create a career pathway for community performers.
The success of Immortal enabled the company to expand to employ an Administrator, General Manager and Education Assistant enabling the founders to focus on creative development.
In 2006 I also became part time director of the Circus Arts Forum, the UK umbrella organisation for the Circus Arts. My role in this organisation is advocacy and strategy development for UK circus and involves me working closely with stakeholders such as ACE, DCMS and DEFRA.
In 2008 I returned to work full time with NoFit State producing three shows Splott in the first 6 months Splott on the Landscape in January, Tabu in March (Co-producer) and Burn Swindon in June
Who is Stewart McGill?
Director of Playbox Theatre:
‘Playbox Theatre is a unique creative company based at The Dream Factory in the UK.
It exists to provide young people and developing artists a unique environment for training, creation and exploration in theatre and related artistic forms.’
Before this Stewart studied at Dartington College of Arts and Birmingham University. Stewart has previously worked with Cambridge Theatre Company, Haymarket Theatre Company - Leicester, English Shakespeare Company, Bristol Old Vic Theatre Company, Royal National Theatre (assessor for Young Theatre Challenge).
He is also the Course Validator for Central School of Speech and Drama BA Circus (with The Circus Space) and a member of Circus Arts Forum, Drama Advisor for The Arts Council of England. Stewart was also a judge for the European Capital of Culture 2008.
Who is Bill Ferguson?
Bill Ferguson started as a performer from a passion for Street and Circus Arts he obtained as a boy. Bill has performed nationally and internationally at major street, music and art festivals.
Bill is also the Founder of the Shrewsbury Street Festival, now in its fourth year and is called upon for his expertise by others wishing to start festivals in other areas.
Bill is originally from Montreal Canada.
Loading ...
June 11th, 2009 at 1:55 pm
[...] Stewart McGill, Director, Playbox Theatre, [...]