Creative Scotland is delighted to announce the panel for the 2012 Creative Place Awards, which will take place on 24 January 2012 at the Scottish Storytelling Centre, Edinburgh.

The panel is chaired by Creative Scotland’s Chief Executive, Andrew Dixon. Joining him are:

• • Pat Kane, Writer, Musician, Consultant and Activist;
• • Malcolm Roughead OBE, Chief Executive and Director of Marketing, Visit Scotland;
• • Andy Milne, CEO, SURF – Scotland’s Independent Regeneration Network
• • Yvonne Rock, founding member of TYP Kulturkapital AB, Sweden.

The Creative Place Awards aim to celebrate the creativity of smaller communities across Scotland, and to reward the hard work and imagination of such places by supporting them to develop a year-round programme.  Nominees were chosen for the wide involvement of the whole community, as well as the creativity of their existing plans.

Each category winner will receive a financial award which will allow them to enhance their activity further. The judges will announce a winner from three award categories with a shortlist of three nominees in each.

• • For places with under 2,500 residents, the nominees are Creetown, Kilmartin Glen, and Wigtown; (award £50,000)
• • for places with under 10,000 residents, the nominees are Huntly, Prestonpans and West Kilbride; (award 100,000)
• • for places with under 100,000 residents, the nominees are Irvine, Perth and St Andrews. (award 150,000)

The awards will be presented by Dougie Vipond, a much sought-after host for corporate events.  Dougie was founder member and drummer with Scottish band Deacon Blue with whom he recorded and toured for eight years. His expertise in music has helped when presenting The Score for Channel 4, Och Around The Clock, a history of ‘Jock n Roll'; T in the Park for BBC Scotland; and The Blues and Soul Show.

Andrew Dixon, Chief Executive, Creative Scotland commented:

‘We were overwhelmed by the number of entries we received for the Creative Place Awards and the judging panel will have some tough decisions ahead to select winners within each category. It’s fantastic to see so many Scottish creative communities coming together with exceptional ideas and visions to achieve the most they can from the Year of Creative Scotland.

This is the first year of the Awards and we hope to see even more communities putting themselves forward next year and for the Awards to go from strength to strength.’

Source: Creative Scotland