Welcome

Hi, I'm Martin.....

 About me:

I worked as a burger flipper, salad bar refresher, shed dipper, pie poker*, teacher, record label manager and small-time music impresario, before cutting my teeth as an Arts Officer in one of the least glamorous, most socially deprived, run-down boroughs in the UK. 

*My pie poking experience became the subject of ‘Stories to Tell in the Middle of the Night’ a theatre piece by Francesca Millican Slater: **** “the bleakest thing I’ve ever heard” -  Lynn Gardener

Over the 18 years that followed I managed to eke out what I generously refer to as a ‘career in the arts’. This ‘career’ involved:

• Building an Arts Centre (The Brindley)
• 100s of engagement projects with 1000s of amazing people
• Programming 1000s of shows (theatre music dance)
• Produced and directed Many festivals, shows, projects and happenings.
• Filling in 100,000 miles of arts administration paper work (funding bids, evaluations, letters of apology, more evaluations, NPO reports, business plans, evaluations, strategy documents, evaluations)
• Directing heavy weight boxing champion Tony Bellew in a contemporary dance show
• Transforming an MOD Landover into a fire breathing dragon
• Directing rowdy, heavily medicated elderly ladies in a synchronised mobility scooter show
• Driving 50 drunk desi pub landlords back from the exhibition of their lives (literally) at Southbank,
• Inventing ‘disco dog walking’ - Although the craze hasn’t taken off as yet. 

The following is written on my CV:

‘I am an experienced, skilled and energetic artistic director, producer, fundraiser, project manager, strategic planner, musician, music programmer and educator. I thrive when developing creative ideas and finding ways to connect people to transformative cultural experiences. Years of inspiring projects, bringing together teams of artists and professionals, developing complex partnerships and responding to creative opportunities have established my reputation as a specialist in quality, multi-disciplinary arts development work. My work has been cited as good practice by ACE, Department for Culture, Media and sport and DFES and received international media recognition.’

I also work professionally as a musician and composer; mainly playing double bass for various very talented people.

My PHD 

Title: Art and Cultural Impact: Exploring Alternative Models for Creative Practices, Policy and Sustainability in Contemporary Urban Space.

A not insignificant amount of my life has been devoted to observing and articulating the tensions and systemic problems that exist within cultural policy and funding, or as described by Higashi 2005 ‘bitching about work’*

*Higashi K., Reasons to end relationship; volume 12, (2005)

My PhD is a step back from my professional life to gain a wider view of cultural funding, cultural mediation and the potential role of arts in urban rejuvenation. Working with industry partners my research will explore alternative resourcing models for arts activity in urban environments, critically examining the effects of cultural mediation on practice and outcomes. As diminishing resources are centralized within institutional frameworks that are limited by inequality of access and reliance on traditional funding networks, the role of alternative funding models to rejuvenate cultural ecology in urban regeneration remain under-evaluated. 

 Supervisors and Institution(s): 

Paul Long – Birmingham City University, Media Faculty

Kirsten Forkert  – Birmingham City University, Media Faculty

Publications

The Subtle Art Of Community Engagement. Arts professional 2016

Desi Pubs: History Of Bhangra, Bargies and Boozers in the Black Country – pending

Selected Productions/Commissions

2016 Desi pubs, Creative People and Places

2014 Flat Out, Family Arts Campaign

2014 Simmer Down Festival

1013 Shock Mobility, Illegal Money Lending Campaign 

2012 Punchline, Cultural Olympiad

2012 Going Underground, Castlefields Regeneration

2008 Singout, Liverpool Capitol of Culture 

Venue Producer/Programmer

2000- 2005, The Queens Hall, Widnes

2005 – 2013, the Brindley, Halton

2013 – 2015, The Drum Birmingham 

2017 Mac Birmingham 

Music Work

Double Bass - Jool's Holland

Double Bass - Ronnie Wood

Double Bass - Jarrod Dickenson

Guitar – Jah Wobbles English Roots Band

Composer – Mighty Zulu Nation

Guitar - Kirsty Almeida

Composer - The Case of The Shrunken Moon (Theatre)

Double Bass and Guitar -  Electric Swing Circus

Double bass -  My Darling Clementine

Double bass -  The Toy Hearts

Double bass -  JG and the Ultimate's