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We had our first ever Frazzled Freelancers Board Game Night last week Bradford Arts Centre along with Bradford Producing Hub. It turns out exploring freelance working conditions with some dice and a bag of frazzles is exactly what we all needed on a wet January night! We can’t wait to share the game with more of you soon. Event supported by Bradford Producing Hub and Arts Council England Photo credit: Tom Woollard
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This has been a year of financial uncertainty, AI dominance and Grantium breakdown. But thanks to K-Pop Demon Hunters and Arctic Colin the Caterpillar, not all has been bad, and we’ll no doubt look back at 2025 with misty eyed nostalgia. This year we’ve thought more than ever about the complex systems linking money and workplace burnout. In part this is because we’ve earned less money than ever and entered a new phase of burnout, which will change our working capacities for the year ahead. We’ve fundraised around 53% lower than we managed just 2 years ago. We don’t think we’re getting worse at our jobs, but having a 2 month pause (looking at you Grantium), the removal of certain funding streams, there being less to apply for and more competition in applying for it, is definitely having a real-world effect. We released a beautiful new resource Pause: A Self-Care Support for Producers, co-produced by Producer Gathering with support from Artsadmin and Marlborough Productions. This is complex subject matter so has been hard at times, but this generous group of excellent people contributed to something brilliant: Emma Wee, Evie Muir, Kim Simpson, Lou Platt, Nick Murray, Sarah Ferrari, Seyi Osi, The Black Wellbeing Collective, Toni-Dee Paul. Next year we’ll be pushing this (lack of) energy into launching our burnout-based board game Frazzled Freelancers. So if you happen to be related to anyone at Hasbro, or have philanthropic interests in the gamification of freelancer working conditions, we’d love your money.
We’ve spent our festive end-of-year get together making stuff out of clay. That’s because someone told us to do art if we felt burnt out. It doesn’t seem to matter that the reason we feel burnt out is because of art. We can report it wasn’t particularly relaxing, as Laura had a meeting straight after and Ash had to wipe a kid's arse mid-trinket dish build. But we’re glad we still had something to show at the end of it, because we’re results driven.  Very merry application writing to all tho-ho-ho-se taking part in the R&D-looming-deadline festivities, and wishing you all a well-deserved and hopefully paid break. Ash + Laura x
ACE finally has a new under £30k Project Grants portal up-and-running, so we've shared a few tips and observations after we've had a poke around. Head over to our Instagram, they're saved in our Story highlights - worth having a look before you dive into another unsurprisingly inaccessible application portal :-/ 
For those of you who have been writing ACE applications since the Let's Create 2020-2030 strategy came into play, you'll know that there were 2 locational lists that were important: Priority Places list and Levelling Up for Culture Places list. The Levelling Up for Culture Places list, contained 109 locations which were identified by DCMS based on the "Levelling Up the United Kingdom" white paper under Boris Johnson's Conservative government in 2022. These were in addition to the Priority Places list which ACE themselves had identified as areas of need and opportunity, which contained 54 locations which were also mostly on the Levelling Up for Culture Places list. ACE explained across their guidance and in the 2021-2024 Delivery Plan that they would "prioritise applications” from locations on both of these lists. Throughout this period any mention of the Priority Places would result in a link to a webpage which listed the Priority Places and the Levelling Up for Culture Places together. They were equally described as “Places underrepresented in our funding” across the guidance notes. The 2024-2027 Delivery Plan, details of which were announced in November 2024 explains that the Priority Places are to remain in place until 31 March 2027. Until recently (we think June ‘25, but can confirm April ‘25 for sure) when clicking on the Priority Places hyperlinks from this Delivery Plan, the webpage still housed both Priority Places and Levelling Up for Culture Places lists for download. Similarly, the Priority Places and the Levelling Up for Culture Places were specifically mentioned as locations ACE would “prioritise” in both the under £30k and over £30k guidance, until as recently as 3rd June 2025 (thanks Wayback Machine). However, with the release of the most recent NLPG guidance (June 2025), Levelling Up for Culture Places are no longer mentioned, only stating that Priority Places are considered in the decision-making process (p.73 on Guidance for applicants - £30k and under). We asked ACE if the Levelling Up for Culture Places are no longer a priority, and were told that these two lists had been merged under the name “Priority Places”. We have since however, had confirmation from ACE that all of the Levelling Up for Culture Places are, in fact, now just part of the universal offer and not of specific priority. This might not have an impact on you, but as we and many others have been sharing both of these lists through our ACE workshops and knowledge-sharing to support applicants with project design, it feels important to flag this change in ACE's priorities. The following 56 locations that were only on the Levelling Up for Culture Places list and are not on the Priority Places lists, are therefore no longer seen as underrepresented places for Arts Council England: MIDLANDS Amber Valley, Bassetlaw, Cannock Chase, East Staffordshire, Erewash, Newark and Sherwood, North Kesteven, North Northampton, North Warwickshire, Oadby and Wigston, Redditch, Solihull, South Holland, Tamworth, West Lindsey, Wyre Forest NORTH Bolton, Burnley, Bury, Doncaster, East Riding of Yorkshire, Flyde, Halton, Hyndburn, North Lincolnshire, North Tyneside, Northumberland, Oldham, Pendle, Preston, Rossendale, Sefton, St Helens, Sunderland, Tameside, Warrington, West Lancashire, Wirral, Wyre SOUTH EAST Adur, Arun, Breckland, Castle Point, Eastbourne, Gravesham, Harlow, King's Lynn and West Norfolk, North Norfolk, Spelthorne, Swale, Thurrock SOUTH WEST Forest of Dean, Havant, Sedgemoor, Torbay, Torridge You can access the list of Priority Places on the ACE website here and here. As ACE have said to us in a communication this week, "We acknowledge underinvestment in other areas and we can and do still support activity outside these Priority Places through National Lottery Project Grants – decisions are made in a rounded way against the NLPG criteria of making a difference, in addition to thinking about specific place priorities." Hope this info helps, pls share with your networks!
**this opportunity is now closed**
As part of our work as Strategic Producers for Marikiscrycrycry on their currently touring show GONER, we are pleased to offer 2 mentoring bursaries to producers working in experimental dance and live art. The Offer -Mentoring from Ash and Laura at The Uncultured across 4 x 1 hour sessions, plus any in-between quick fire questions -Focused time for bespoke advice around fundraising, project building, career development or reaching a specific goal -Bursary of £400 to cover your time Who 1. You must have experience of producing at least 2 projects that are not your own artwork. You might be a self-producing artist as part of your practice, but this opportunity is specifically for those who produce other people’s work. 2. You work in experimental dance and/or live art. 3. You can be based anywhere in England. Mentoring sessions will be held over zoom between Feb - April 2025 at times mutually agreed. 4. Marikiscrycrycry and The Uncultured want to ensure this opportunity is accessible to Black and Global Majority producers who are currently underrepresented in this area of the sector. Therefore, one of these bursaries is held for a Black/Global Majority producer. On the short application form, you will be asked to self-identify if this applies to you. 5. If you don’t know who we are, please take a look at our website the-uncultured.com and check that you’d want to spend time with us! How to apply Please fill in this very short Google form to apply, so we can double check you meet the above application criteria. You will be asked to share a link to your website, to your CV or list some of the artists/projects you have worked on. Applicants who meet the above criteria will have a number assigned to their application which will be put into a number generator and randomly selected. Because of this random selection process we will be unable to offer feedback. When Deadline for applications is 4th February 2025 at 12noon. Late submissions will not be entered. We are now out of office until 6th January 2025. Every December, we normally write a reflection on the year that considers the ups and downs of our lovely work, and the complex arts landscape. However, we wrote something and it was actually so bleak and miserable that we deleted it. So for this year, this is the level of merry we can offer. We hope you have some well-deserved, paid, and restful time off this winter. A+L x  A lot of the lovely folks we work with have new stuff going out into the world real soon: What Becomes... Xavier de Sousa 6-29 June 2024 Thursdays to Saturdays (various times) METAL Peterborough, PE1 1PY A new interactive exhibition made in collaboration with Nicol Parkinson and migrant communities in Peterborough and Leeds. The exhibition explores the processes of adaptation that migrants go through when moving to a new place and to a new community. “When you move somewhere, is the onus on you to adapt or others? And what becomes of us, over time, over all these changing landscapes?” Created in collaboration with members of the Peterborough community, Xavier explains that the project “looks into how we change (in our souls, in our behaviour, in our language, in our bodies) as a result of co-existing in a new place, in a new culture.” Blending pottery work, performance, writing and sound art, What Becomes… invites the audience to immerse themselves, experience and also contribute their stories of adaptation.  GONER Marikiscrycrycry 6th and 8th June 2024 Audra Festival, Kaunas Lithuania Plus more tour dates tba soon!  TOPS Ames Pennington TRANSlations Film Festival, Seattle In-person screening: ArkLodge Cinemas at 4.15pm, then online 6-9th June **North American premiere!** Plus more screenings tba soon!  Slow Cooking Live Xavier de Sousa Friday 14th & Saturday 15th June, 8pm Theatre in the Mill, Bradford Live Broadcasting at HowlRound TV Tickets are free with food and drinks provided Spaces are very limited, so please book up! Link to book your space: https://forms.gle/6PCjN5oTUQaewz9q8 Hosted by Xavier de Sousa and video work directed by Richard Warburton, Slow Cooking Live is a live podcast-video art experiment, inviting artists who have a history of migration and also work with food-making and food-sharing as creative tools. Together, they will spend the day buying food from local markets and independent shops, cook together and then travel to Theatre in the Mill to share it all with you. Cooking recipes that are relevant to the guests’ own artistic practices (or their favourite foods), Selina, Toni-Dee and Sonia will discuss the origins of the food, the impact on their communities and how they have incorporated it into their creative practices.  Another year has passed and it’s been a busy one. We celebrated 3 years of working together and spent only 6 days physically in the same room as each other - how’s that for remote work-wifery!
In 2023 we worked with these bloomin wonderful folks...in alphabetical order: Ames Pennington, Brian Lobel, Creative Newhaven, Duckie, Malik Nashad Sharpe and Xavier de Sousa. We finally shared the results of a few long-term self-led projects: Producing Liveness in Interesting Times, OPEN DOORS: The Real Cost of Artist Led Spaces with East Street Arts and 2 Environmental Responsibility resources with Arts Council England. Special shout out to Sarah Ferrari who did the gorgeous design for all of them. As of today, we’ve fundraised £719,128 for 32 individuals and 2 organisations. We also created ANOTHER set of free-to-access ACE templates in our bid to make the v inaccessible process hopefully a little less dreadful. We worked with 71 individuals, independent companies and organisations through advisories, mentoring and consultancy, where we spent time discussing everything from the wildest ambitious artistic ideas, right through to comparing producer burnout stories whilst sunning our feet in an outdoor pool. We were really pleased to have been invited to facilitate workshops with students and freelancers at ArtsDepot, Axis, Birmingham Dance Network, Chisenhale Dance Space, Creative Newhaven, Rose Bruford College, Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of Salford. No surprises, but the most requested topic by far for the year was fundraising. And cos we loved sharing this so much last year, here's one for the low pay fans again - in 2023 we worked 453 unpaid hours - and they're just the ones we remembered to log. That's nearly 5 and a half days a month. A week and a bit a month, gratis. Alongside all this, Ash somehow managed to pop out a little bundle of joy and Laura is looking forward to welcoming their new co-worker to the virtual office in 2024. Sending love and thanks to everyone we’ve worked with this year - see you on the other side. |
