On a Rollercoaster Ride

ROXANA MEECHAN reflects on her work in Sutherland and beyond.

IT’S BEEN a rollercoaster for me since beginning Arts Development work in the Highlands in March 2001, first in Lochaber on a temporary basis, and then upgrading to Job-Share (permanent) before moving to Sutherland in June 2002 to take on board a new area and another challenge.

I am often asked by friends who have known me for many years how I feel trading work as an artist for work as an Arts Administrator. They assume that the work of an Arts Development Officer will involve pushing paper around, and they are surprised when I enthusiastically explain how creative my job really is…

The work of an Arts Development Officer is hard to explain, especially when people ask the question “What does the job actually involve?” They expect a quick answer which I can never give them.

The most important aspect of my job is that it is about personal, individual, community, economic and skills development, using the Arts as a tool.

I will try to list here some of the projects that I have been lucky to be able to develop in Sutherland, even though that I believe that for real and sustainable Arts Development to take place in the Highlands, one need not keep to our own area’s boundaries.

Bringing groups together is also a very satisfying part of the job. It promotes health within the arts scene of the area

Working together with Tom Bryan, then the new Arts Development Officer for Caithness, we developed a three year project for Caithness & Sutherland called ‘Move On Up’, funded by New Opportunities Fund. The Project encouraged regular physical-related arts activities – or arts related physical activities – such as Dance (Capoeira, Egyptian, Indian, African, Traditional Scottish, Modern, Contemporary, Ballet, Hip Hop, Stage…), Physical Theatre, Mime, Circus Skills, and Comedy, in the form of weekly workshops for children, youths and adults from both areas during term times, with intensive residencies on Easter, Summer and October School holidays.
 
In Sutherland, participants had the opportunity to work with local artists, helping them also to develop their customer base, and also artists from other parts of the UK and different countries, such as Africa, India, Portugal, Germany, Canada. As lead person for this project, I’ve learned a lot about monitoring and reporting, and I am both sorry and relieved that the project came to an end last August.

Working in collaboration with Ali Macdonald, then the new Arts Development Officer (Job-Share) for Lochaber, who had replaced me, we developed a multi-area Youth & New Media Project called ‘New Dynamics’ (the project’s website, www.new-dynamics.org , will be launched soon) for all seven Social Inclusion Partnership areas of the Highlands (three in Lochaber and one each in Sutherland, Caithness, Ross & Cromarty and Inverness).

The seven three-month New Media Artists residencies involved the appointment of a Trainee (or two trainees in the case of Durness) to work with the artist, and the establishment of sustainable New Media Production & Projection facilities for Young People.

The main funders for this project were the Scottish Arts Council (Promoting Inclusion Through Public Art Award), local Enterprise Companies from each area, Community Economic Development, the Health & Well-being Alliance, Social Inclusion Partnership and the Highland Council.

The final show in Sutherland was called ‘Off the Wall’, and it took place at Smoo Cave, an event of cave architecture and contemporary video produced by the artist and young people from Durness, along with live fire performance, music, lighting, dancing, and snow filtering through the cave ceiling against a background of moon and stars in late December.
 
Another example of working collaboratively in the development of new and exciting projects beyond my own area involved teaming up with the Caithness Arts Development Officer and Sue Jane Taylor, a Sutherland-based artist who later became the lead artist, in the development of the ‘Past, Present & Future’ project, a regeneration Community Public Art Project in Wick’s Telford area. My input in this project included extending the New Dynamics project’s concept idea to make sure that Young People from Wick would be involved in the “Future” part of this important town regeneration project.

Working in partnership has been the main focus of my work. Some of these partnerships have included helping HI~Arts to establish the Sutherland Creative Media/Music Hub at Brora Learning Centre, and developing the first Youth Music project at the new Music Hub with Youth Highland: Write your Own Song, Record on CD.

Instigating the development by Grey Coast Theatre of ‘The Song of Sutherland’, a professional production performed by East Sutherland Primary School Children at the Dornoch Cathedral.

Working with Cultural Co-ordinators from different areas, we developed the Time Travellers Project, an Arts & Heritage project for Primary School pupils that involved visiting sites of local and national Historical/Archaeological/Natural Heritage interest and creating maps which were later displayed in a touring exhibition.

Making links with Docspace which resulted in the installation of a High Definition projector at Timespan to show a Programme of European Documentaries. Working with Scottish Screen, we were able to set up the ‘Moving Image in Education’ project at Farr High School and ASG.

Bringing people together to work on common ideas and creating new synergies is all part of the day-to-day work of an Arts Development Officer, and setting up new groups such as the Visual Arts Sutherland group (http://www.visualartssutherland.com/ ) has been a particularly enjoyable experience for me.

Seeing something grow from strength to strength and helping the group to overcome internal and external challenges and to achieve their objectives: 2 Open Studio Trails, 2 group Exhibitions, artists works displayed at Skibo Castle & Craiglea…

Bringing groups together is also a very satisfying part of the job. It promotes health within the arts scene of the area. Working with East Sutherland Writers to develop a collaborative project with North West Writers (another dynamic group that I have helped to set up) to produce their first joint publication. North West Writers are now planning to collaborate with Visual Artists and Musicians.

Being part of Steering groups such as the Durness Development Group/The Mackay Country for their Arts & Heritage Artists residencies’ series, GREAN for their Arts Garden Project, Golspie Film Society for the setting up of their Society and fundraising for the necessary equipment, or the Forestry Commission (Touch Wood) for the Dornoch Forest Amphitheatre project is all part of the job, and very gratifying when projects are successfully delivered. I really enjoyed my time being the Highland Council Observer for the Promoters Arts Network (PAN).

Helping non-arts related groups and organisations to become involved in Art related projects and explaining the benefits of the Arts when it comes to attaining some of their organisations’ goals has been another of my objectives.

I have helped the Mental Health Local Implementation Group to develop and fundraise for the K-SCOPE Public/ Community Art (Glass) Project. I will work in close collaboration with the Gatehose to run the project.

I have also worked with the Caithness & Sutherland Sexual Health Forum, the NHS & Young Carers to create the B-XAFE project, a Youth Animation project involving Young People promoting Sexual Health amongst their peers. We are now in the process of fundraising for this.

I have just completed the design and budget for ART-SCAPES, a 2D/3D Graphics/Animation project that will be run at the Brora Learning Centre once funding is in place.

Helping art related organisations such as Timespan Museum & Art Gallery to grow and develop by opening for them new opportunities connected to productisation of myths by developing The Virtual & The Real Storyteller project, a Storytelling & New Media Transnational project involving Shetland, Hebrides, Ireland and Sutherland.

Working with colleagues from the Community Learning & Leisure team to design and run the ART-S.INC Project, a Community Youth Arts project in the five most fragile areas of Sutherland: Scourie (Public Art: Graphic Design Mural), Brora (Public Art: Glass windows), Bettyhill, Lairg and Helmsdale (Video Art – Youth Issue based). This project was funded by SAC and Leader +

One project leading to another … as in the case of ART-S.INC leading the way to LET’S SHARE! Phase 1, a residential Multimedia Art project with Sutherland Youth from four different towns hosting youngsters from Ireland, project funded by Leader +. And another… LET’S SHARE! Phase 2, a Multimedia Production and Youth Exchange project involving 11 Sutherland Youngsters creating two Multimedia shows performed in a Theatre in Ireland.

For me, real Arts Development is not the product of the efforts of an Arts Administrator but that of the work of a community artist, a contemporary artist.

To intuitively create or be part of the team that creates new visions for the future of the area while collaborating with artists and non-artists, art and non-art related groups, other services and colleagues, private and public statutory and non-statutory bodies, local, regional, national and international organisations to look at The Big Picture to make those visions reality while building bridges, interconnecting people and ideas which then go on to develop into new concepts and seeds that keep on growing and organically transforming the social landscape – that’s what working in Arts Development is all about!

Roxana Meechan is the Arts Development Officer for Sutherland  (01408 635211, roxana.meechan@highland.gov.uk). Her work also involves designing, organising and running Easter, Summer and October holidays Art Programmes and organising workshops and performances throughout the year.

© Roxana Meechan, 2006