Birmingham City of Culture plans revealed
A four-day Asian music festival, free public dance nights in a floodlit Victoria Square and an exhibition of work by Van Gogh and other French impressionists are just some of the artistic delights in store if Birmingham is named the UK’s first City of Culture.
Organisers behind the council-organised bid have released details of a year of community-based events planned for 2013 should the culture title come our way.
Birmingham’s plans have been kept under wraps until now for fear that rival cities might try to steal the best ideas.
But with the winning city likely to be named by the government shortly, the council-led Cultural Partnership has lifted the lid on what is proposed.
As well as Birmingham, Norwich, Sheffield and Londonderry are in the running for the title.
Festivities proposed for 2013, which have been finalised following a huge public consultation exercise involving hundreds of arts, culture and community groups, concentrate on Birmingham’s ethnic diversity.
Keynote events include:
* Global Asian Fusion – a four-day festival weekend celebrating contemporary sounds Asian artists across the world. Supported by a programming team involving major figures in British Asian music it will bring together for the first time a range of representative artists from North America, the UK, Middle East, India and Pakistan.
* United Colours of Dance – using the ‘workshop of the world’ as its theme, this will be a major multi-stage outdoor dance production transforming Victoria Square over the May Day weekend, against the backdrop of Birmingham’s civic buildings. Free to the public, the event will begin with a mass dance procession weaving through the city streets enticing people to come and see the performances.
* Dance the Night Away – seven nights of dancing on a stage in Victoria Square set against the backdrop of a floodlit Town Hall. Each night will focus on a different popular dance style including salsa, siroc, flamenco, samba, jive, tango, ballroom, disco and morris dancing led by international live bands and singers. The public will be invited to dance under the stars.
* Waters Edge – a festival along Birmingham’s canals to explore the unseen side of the city. There will be free impromptu performances of music, dance, drama and comedy along the canal side and there will be activities on barges up and down the canal as well as on tour barges. Bars and restaurants on the canal side will take part with performances and special offers.
* Made in Birmingham – will include the opening of Thinktank’s new gallery showcasing the city’s manufacturing heritage as well as performances and exhibitions of works commissioned for Birmingham in the past, guest appearances by cultural leaders who made their names in the city and new commissions.
There are plans to open a new gallery at Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery to display part of the Anglo-Saxon Mercian Hoard. The display will explore the Hoard’s history and look at the manufacturing techniques used by the Anglo-Saxon goldsmiths, drawing comparisons with techniques adopted by craftsmen in Birmingham’s Jewellery Quarter.
One of the 2013 highlights is likely to be what’s described by the council as a major blockbuster summer exhibition of early work by French impressionist artists Vincent Van Gogh, Mary Cassatt and Edgar Dagas.
The exhibition will highlight significant works in Birmingham’s world-class art collections, including one of only two Mary Cassatt paintings in UK collections, while also drawing on loans of paintings from the Metropolitan Museum in New York and the Musee d’Orsay in Paris.
Details of one of the bid’s main planks, an autumn arts festival, were announced earlier by the council. The festival, which would take place over nine weekends through the autumn, would be programmed by a guest curator each year. and feature new plays, films and shows to be premiered in Birmingham and go on to tour internationally.
Handsworth will stage a weekend-long Flyover Festival show under the Hockley Flyover featuring work inspired by the “lives, personal tales and experiences” of young people living locally.
City strategic director for culture, Sharon Lea, said the programme for 2013 was one that Birmingham could be proud of.
Mrs Lea added: “Our aim is to increase cultural participation by making what’s on offer increasingly relevant to our young, diverse population. At the same time we will raise the national and international profile of the city.
“We feel confident we have struck the right balance between spectacular events – like the Autumn Festival and Library of Birmingham opening – and a calendar of grassroots activities that will reach communities across the city.
“This has been a collaborative effort from day-one. Arts organisations, individuals and groups across the city have played a significant role in shaping a final bid that shows we are a city that celebrates and values its cultural diversity.”
