Partnerships

Growing Partners

Our partnerships and the way that different organisations work together have sustained the Centre and enabled it to grow. Sometimes this happens on an individual basis where a visual artist works alongside a musician or a dancer, at other times the partnership is between the Centre and other organisations, sponsors and the John Bunyan Baptist Church.

Partners with artists

James, the director, took Cecilia, one of the dance tutors, into the church to show her a new 4m x 5m banner that had been painted and hung by Mark, a local artist. It was the beginning of September and immediately Cecilia said that the piece could be used as the focus for the work of some of the dancers that term.  At the same time Cecilia was also inspired by the exhibition in the gallery which showed the work of a children’s summer holiday project and decide to make that a focus of the term’s work as well. Nearer to the performance, Cecilia met with the artists (and most of these were children) who also helped design the costumes to reflect the banner and the pieces in the exhibition. The performance took place at the Oxford Playhouse where the banner was hung and all the artists took a bow and were applauded for their work.  Visual artists and dancers working together. A year later musicians from the youth music project created the sound-track for the dancers and at other times film-makers have worked with musicians, visual artists have spoken about their work in the church, a sculptor has designed a piece to tell the story of the café, Irish dancers have danced the story of the visit of the wise men for a Christmas concert.

Partners with others

The Centre works in partnership with many different organisations across the caring professions, local government and voluntary bodies, with churches and schools, local and corporate businesses and with arts organisations across the city.  A major partnership project which the Centre is responsible for coordinating is the Cowley Feast. Re-launched after a gap of 40 years, the Cowley Feast brings together 40 local organisations in a festival to celebrate the art, culture and talent of people in the area. The next Cowley Feast will be in May 2007.

Some of the partnerships put us in touch with particular client groups such as those with mental health issues, people looking for opportunities for volunteering, adults and young people wanting work experience or training, students excluded from school or young people caught up in crime, young mothers, people living with disability, musicians, artists, dancers and caterers and many other groups and individuals. We are highly dependent on our partners referring and sending people to us because this is the only way that we can get in touch with those who are more marginalised, make contact with emerging artists and provide opportunities for diverse groups to work together. On the other hand we know that our partners, working in their different spheres and with particular client groups, are highly dependent on us and the resources and opportunities we offer. The greatest resource that the Centre offer is a naturally mixed community of artists and people of different ages and experience who work together and are identified less by their need as their potential and desire to create.

Partners with sponsors

Increasingly partnership lies at the heart of funding received through business, trust funds or statutory support. The Centre is highly dependent on outside funding and all of those who give to its work do so as partners. In some cases this has led to people actively sharing in its work, such as a group from Barclays Bank who shared with a local accounts firm and Aspire Oxford in a two day project to transform the garden. Barclays had previously given a substantial grant to establish the Centre’s café.

John Bunyan Baptist Church

Key among its relationships is the one that it holds with John Bunyan Baptist Church where the Centre is based. It is a relationship of trust and respect where the church allows its minister to act as the Director, where the day to day programme is entrusted in the Centre’s staff, artists and trustees and where those who work in the Centre, from whatever tradition or faith, respect to the Christian roots from which it has grown.

Return to top of page

Centre

What’s On

Artists

Gallery

Music

Dance

Home

Workshops

Contact

History

Review

Partners

Cafe

link to John Bunyan Baptist Church