Barrow Borough Council

Barrow Borough Council supports the view that everyone is entitled to access to the arts; that investment in culture and the arts can lead to a strong sense of place where people will want to live and work and which can also lead to the growth of the creative industries sector which is one of the great growth areas in the economy.
    
As a Local Arts Development Agency (LADA), the Council has supported the development of the infrastructure necessary to ensure ongoing arts activity in the borough and to act as a creative bridge between our community and the world beyond our peninsula.  This has led to a number of professional arts organisations growing and developing their bases in the borough, they include;

Art Gene   http://www.artgene.co.uk/
Ashton Group    http://www.ashtongroup.co.uk/
Barracudas     http://thebarracudas.wordpress.com/
Signal Films   http://www.signalfilms.co.uk/
The Canteen Arts & Media Centre   http://www.canteenmaac.co.uk/

Dance Resource: For further information contact Amanda Mortlock email: danceresource@tiscali.co.uk or phone: 01229 833228 

The LADA also delivers annual programmes of work that includes:
• Support for the arts programme for participants and audiences at forum twenty eight.
• Identifying gaps in provision and delivering opportunities for children and young people to take part in arts activity. 
• Providing high quality training for emerging community musicians to enable them to work professionally.
• Providing ‘out of hours activity’ in secondary schools in the borough 
• Supporting professional arts activity at The Dock Museum
• Providing support for a number of local and Cumbria-wide initiatives
• Providing advice and support for arts initiatives

For further information please contact: Doe Brannon, Arts Development Officer.    A copy of the Barrow Arts Strategy 2007-11 is available upon request.

The image shows an Up & Comin’ under 18’s music night at forum twenty eight. As part of the council’s Music Development Programme the Up & Comin’ Project enables musicians to work in secondary schools in the borough teaching young people to play music of their choice by playing in bands.  When the bands are ready they are invited to play at the under 18’s music nights at forum twenty eight supported by a local headliner band.  Both the workshops and the performances are well attended and now in its sixth year the project is more popular than ever and still developing with additional support from Soundwave.