2023 highlights
What a year! In 2023 we worked with 101 artists, learning support assistants and volunteers who helped us to deliver a whopping 8088 hours of artist-led activity for 5174 people to enjoy.
We welcomed lots of lovely new studio holders, artist educators and students to our community who constantly enrich our organisation with new ideas, fresh perspectives and incredible skills. We have never felt more creative. Our team has grown too and together we have:
Worked with 204 exhibitors who showed their work in 7 exhibitions
Expanded the learning programme to include new course models and pricing structures
Delivered 15 projects and counting…
On top of that we also delivered in 28 schools across the country, from local schools in Calderdale to London and even Truro in Cornwall!
We’ve gathered together some of the things we’ve been up to month by month and we hope you’ll enjoy learning more about what we do. We’ve loved every minute and know none of this would be possible without our incredible community. So big thanks to our amazing partners, funders, donors and of course students, tutors, volunteers, studio holders and all of our creative community.
A special thank you goes to our wonderful patron Sir Quentin Blake KBE who continues to help us raise the profile of our work and has kindly created the artwork for our lovely new branding.
With Best Wishes for 2024,
Lauren Iredale and Harriet Fletcher
Everybody Arts Co-Creative Directors
January
Ignite Creativity
After years of development, an exciting project created in partnership with The Victoria Theatre, The Piece Hall, Calderale Music, I.O.U and Everybody Arts began.
Ignite Creativity was formed to advocate for, support and strategically develop the cultural education of children and young people in Calderdale. We became Calderdale’s LCEP (Local Cultural Education Partnership) and work with a variety of local partner organisations and individuals.
The aim is to ensure that every child and young person in Calderdale has access to valuable and high-quality cultural experiences. We run networks to connect Schools with cultural sector stakeholders and talk to children and young people directly to learn more about their needs and interests. Learn more about this exciting project and our plans for 2024 here.
Wellbeing activity books
In collaboration with Creative Minds and artist Sarah O’Boyle we printed and published two new wellbeing activity books. Each one full of creative activities designed to support wellbeing. Creative Minds have generously made these activity books available for free for anyone who needs to support their wellbeing. You can check out these fantastic resources on our website. Click here to discover a range of things to do inside and here for things to do outside to support your wellbeing.
Away Day
We rounded off January with a team away day to Edibles, a permaculture farm, market garden, community resource and training centre in Slaithwaite. We spent time learning about the principles of permaculture, seeing how they are used at Edibles then thinking about ways we could apply them to our organisation.
February
A Warm and creative Winter
Our lovely warm club continued to run through January to March providing access to our spaces, art activities and refreshments for FREE throughout Winter thanks to funding from West Yorkshire Combined Authority and Community Foundation for Calderdale.
And guess what, it's back again running until March 2024! All are welcome, whether you are an existing member of our community or a first time visitor- we have activities available for all ages and abilities and will always provide a warm welcome, a hot cuppa and a snack.
Create and Bloom
With the help of artist Michaela Lesayova we started work developing content for a new NHS app called Create and Bloom for South West Yorkshire’s Partnership NHS Foundation Mental Health Trust. Following the format of Couch to 5k, the app will use creativity to improve wellbeing. Watch this space, we’re expecting the app to go live during 2024!
March
GUILD
We completed our 3 year mentoring programme with East Street Arts Guild in March. This fantastic opportunity provided training, resources and funding to help make our organisation more sustainable and resilient. It was thanks to the wonderful mentoring and research time provided by GUILD that we made the decision to become a charity, found our wonderful new trustees, and engaged in the community consultation that led to our name change and new branding.
Nature’s endurance
In March we welcomed our first exhibition of the year, Nature's Endurance which featured the work of 89 artists and was beautifully staged by our curator Sammi Lukic-Scott and our fantastic interns Ellie Yang and Racale Chadwick from the University of York. The exhibition explored ways to take notice of the natural world around us and consider our impact upon it.
April
NHS Creative Practitioners
NHS Creative Practitioner's is a unique pilot project created by Creative Minds and delivered by Everybody Arts. 28 Creative Practitioners started working with ward teams across South West Yorkshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust inpatient units, sharing their knowledge and expertise and delivering creative wellbeing activities for people on the wards. As you can imagine the impact of this work is really something so we were delighted to be part of it.
Art & About
We were flattered to be asked by Calderdale Council to help develop a series of public art commissions for Halifax town centre, how exciting! We have been working together with them throughout the year sharing ideas, talking to artists and engaging stakeholders. We’re so looking forward to these plans being turned into real life artworks during 2024!
Ignite Creativity's First Network Meeting
Ignite Creativity held their first Network Meeting up in The Everybody Gallery led by Ignite’s Sammi Lukic-Scott and Lydia Murrãy. They opened up the floor to get ideas flowing about the support and activities people wanted to see in Calderdale. Network meetings continued throughout the year for Schools and Cultural Organisations at venues across Calderdale.
MAY
Inter Arts Festival
50 artists and performers exhibited at the Inter-Arts Festival curated by Fiona Pattison who runs holistic based art sessions on the first wednesday of every month here at Everybody Arts. This year's theme was the Invisible Made Visible and included a thriving program of 50 artists and performers who produced a living sculpture workshop, an art and word exhibition, soundscape and sketchbook workshop and much more.
Boxes of Wellbeing
Funded by Calderdale Cares Partnership and the Centre For Cultural Ecologies In Art, Design And Architecture (University Of Huddersfield), we started a co-design project called Boxes of Wellbeing. Together with artists and communities we’re putting together 9 loan boxes, full of creative wellbeing activities that can be exchanged between community groups in Calderdale. We have been making boxes for 0-5 years, children and teens, adults and older people and these beautiful boxes will be available to borrow from Spring 2024.
june
Compassion exhibition
A joyous, colourful and diverse flock of birds came to the gallery with the support of St Augustines and Calderdale Valley of Sanctuary. These ‘birds of compassion’ representing freedom, migration, and unity, were made by over 500 local people. They flew through the gallery in solidarity with people fleeing war and persecution.
There was work on the walls too, by three artists, all seeking asylum and living in Halifax. They are part of our Studio of Sanctuary scheme which provides space, materials, and support for people seeking sanctuary to develop their artistic practice. Special events included a Painting Masterclass in British Sign Language with Julio Acevedo.
Creative Minds is 10!
In June we attended the Creative Minds: Celebrating 10 Years of developing creative partnerships, improving wellbeing and transforming healthcare event at Huddersfield University. The discussions explored what’s next for the field of creativity in healthcare and why the shift from a medical focus to an empowering recovery focused approach is so important. Creative Minds are such a special partner to our organisation, supporting our wellbeing work, right from the start, so it was great to celebrate with them.
Trinity academy exhibition
It was lovely to welcome back Trinity Academy Art and Design students for another year in a row. We’re always blown away by the creative talents of the students at this school, and this year was no exception. Well done to all the future creatives!
JULY
DOgs Exhibition
From July through to August the DOgs Exhibition by Illustrator Louis Benoit and author Michael Stewart came to the gallery. This was our first exhibition to feature work by our 4 legged friends too. As part of the show they all got together at the RSPCA’s party in the park to create an art-walk. Let's give a big round of a-paws to these first time exhibitors!
Creativity for Wellbeing network
As our partnership project funded by Thriving Communities came to a close we ran our last Creativity for Wellbeing Network, bringing together people from organisations involved in the delivery of creative and cultural activities that support wellbeing in Calderdale. As a network we established a ‘community of practice for creative wellbeing’ sharing information and experience as a group via active, experiential learning in order to develop professionally and support each other's wellbeing.
August
DIY Utopia
Thanks to support from #IWill Youth Social Justice Fund and Community Foundation for Calderdale, together with artists Andy Abbott and Michael Powell we were able to work with young people aged 10 – 14 to explore how imagination and creativity can be part of making changes happen. 74 young people took part in our DIY Utopia workshops in schools, attended a summer school here at Everybody Arts and presented their work in an exhibition attended by the mayor, local councillors and policy makers who were so impressed with their ideas they invited the group to share their work at Cabinet!
Creative Healthy Holidays
Summer started with a return of our jam-packed programme of fun and exciting healthy and creative activities for children via our Healthy Holidays project. Over the summer we welcomed 111 young people who took part in a range of art activities, made new friends, developed their confidence and creativity, and learnt all about healthy food through the nutritional meals we provided.
The brilliant success of this provision over the past 3 years has blown us all away, achieved because of the incredible contributions of a dedicated team that includes artist educators, learning support assistants, volunteers and core staff. We have provided support and creative provision for over 600 children, receiving consistently positive feedback from parents and becoming a favourite provider for many families, due to our welcoming and accommodating team, the variety and quality of creative activity on offer, and the accessibility of our venue and activities which allows children of all backgrounds and needs to attend.
Youth Voice
The Youth Voice consultation was launched in August. An exciting borough-wide insights gathering project, which will look at the current state and perceptions of cultural educational provision for Calderdale’s children and young people. We’ll be starting 2024 crunching all the data and can’t wait to share our report with its findings and recommendations soon.
September
Back to School
Our Schools Outreach program has enriched curriculums, inspired teachers, and provided plenty of WOW moments for students. Throughout the year we have delivered workshops in schools up, down and across the country helping students and teachers alike to discover new artists, artworks, skills and techniques. We’ve held sessions online, in schools and here at Everybody Arts which has made us accessible to those further afield!
A growing team
Our team expanded in the office, (Welcome Jules Rimer!) and we also brought in an enthusiastic team of volunteers and work experience students who have helped us in all areas of operations. During 2023 our volunteers have been supporting teachers, keeping the space spic and span, invigilating exhibitions, dusting off office admin and providing a warm welcome to our visitors.
Here’s how Stevie summed up her time with us;
“I’m transitioning from a peer session user to a new volunteer helping with sketchbook club… on my first day I had a table with some of my work displayed for people in the group to come have a look and chat - the feedback from everyone was so lovely and truly was an amazing experience - it was the first time I had no anxiety speaking to complete strangers and I felt at home at Everybody Arts.” - Stevie
Thank you to our wonderful team for all your help this year, you’ve been fantastic!
October
New Creatives
With the support of Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Council’s Culture Grants and The Arts and Health Programme at South West Yorkshire NHS Foundation Partnership Trust we’ve created four six-month real living wage trainee programmes available to people right at the start of their creative career. October saw the start of the New Creatives Project which welcomed the first two artists, Rachel Rae and Adelle A’asante. These traineeships will support people early in their career to develop their artistic skills and exercise their creative potential to achieve positive change for people and communities in Calderdale. Work, earn and learn at the same time, what's not to love?!
a New booking system
It was time to update our booking system for our courses and workshops. With so many artists creating incredible learning offers for so many brilliant students, our poor old system was on its last legs. Esther Tait worked her socks off to migrate our whole learning programme over to our brand new platform that supports improved communications with customers, accommodates more offers and better suits our growing team. Have you checked it out yet?!
November
From the Folde: Botanical Alchemy by Fiona Pickles
In November we welcomed Fiona Pickles as our artist in residence in The Everybody Gallery alongside the launch of her ever evolving exhibition. This exhibition celebrates and repurposes imperfections in nature by giving new attention to the unwanted and celebrating the unexpected. Fiona will be working in the space throughout the exhibition (usually on Wednesdays), which means that the exhibition will be growing as it goes. Make sure to come down to the In Conversation event on the 27th January 13.00-15.00pm and the Closing Event on the 24th February 13.00-15.00.
A new name, a new look and so much more!
The start of our soft launch into a charity was a huge success where the team, studio holders, artists, educators, and students met with our brand new board of trustees for a party planning event for our exciting transition to becoming a charity in 2024.
December
Ceramics Studio Access is 1!
In just 52 weeks Matt Cameron (and a team of brilliant volunteers) has transformed our back room, aka the dumping ground, into a dedicated ceramics studio kitted out with a huge kiln, wheels and pug mill with all the equipment, clay and glazes a mud slinger could need. Every week a Labour of Potters (that's the collective noun, don't you know?!) come together to develop their skills with technicians Matt, Karen, Andrea on hand for advice. Courses and workshops day, night and weekends are running, delivered from this fantastic space if you fancy giving it a go.
Art works for Wellbeing
Over the years we have shaped and delivered a range of creative wellbeing projects, programmes and offers. As a result we have seen first hand how art can transform and even save lives.
For another year we were able to offer a range of free wellbeing provision including Peer Group and Wellbeing at the Weekend funded by Re-think Mental Illness and Healthy Minds and Access Funds funded by Creative Minds. These sessions offered a space for participants to feel at home, spend time with others and be creative. Through these sessions we have met so many supportive, creative and talented people. So we’re pleased to say we have a new series of 5 exciting Wellbeing at the Weekend sessions running from January to March 2024 and weekly Peer Group sessions running through the year.
