Igniting Ambition Festival 2011

The Breath of Fresh Air programme encourages local communities across the East Midlands to engage with their neighbours and environment through a range of activities, joining together and celebrating London 2012 to create a lasting legacy. All events and activities are open to everyone and the majority are free.

Through funding secured by Breath of Fresh Air from Legacy Trust UK’s regional programme, Igniting Ambition, the ERDF and from Arts Council England, the programme of activities will involve site specific artworks, festivals and community events. 

CLIX is an innovative and exciting digital photography project that encourages participants to explore the values and themes of the Cultural Olympiad and London 2012. Delivered through Northamptonshire’s Study Centres, CLIX will promote the county’s key cultural and sporting assets.

CLIX will be taking place at the following study centres: 

Adrenalin Alley, Corby

Northampton Saints Rugby Club

Northampton Town Football Club

Northamptonshire Cricket Club

Rushden & Diamonds Football Club

Silverstone Race Circuit

SHINE will celebrate Northamptonshire’s medieval heritage through its ancient and historic Grade I listed churches. It will provide an online repository of heritage information to include trails, photos, videos, music and stories connected with the church and its associated town or village.

SHINE will culminate in Autumn 2011 with a series of outdoor illuminated events across Northamptonshire. 

Mad About The Seasons is a digital arts project inspired by Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons and by the Northamptonshire poet John Clare.

The project will fuse the traditional with the new to engage audiences with music and poetry with themes such as sustainability, climate change and the rural and cultural heritage of Northamptonshire. 

The Lincolnshire Golden Threads will see the inaugural Poet Laureate work with the community, write monthly poems and perform at various events including The Lincoln Hay / Day and the Wolds Words Festival of Reading, Writing and Performance.

The Lincoln Hay / Day is an exciting new partnership between The Telegraph Hay Festival in Wales and the Lincolnshire-based arts organisation cultural solutions UK. The one-day word feast sees international artists taking part in workshops, readings, talks, performances and panel discussions. 

Unique Cottage Farm Studios in Spalding is collaborating with 3D mixed media artist Carol Parker to work with diverse communities across Lincolnshire on a unique knitting project for the county.

Colourful yarn bombing events will take place and a huge knitted athletics track will be created using natural, recycled and synthetic yarns along with innovative materials such as wire, glow in the dark thread and reflective yarn.

The Trivia of Eccentric England is a six month programme that explores the curiosities of society and history’s selective memory. It will see new artists’ commissions, talks and film screenings that actively explore the presence and role of eccentricity in today’s society.

The programme brings together internationally renowned artists to reacquaint people with a forgotten side of life as it highlights the obscure and trivial undertakings of the British nations.

First Light On Tour will see new sculpture installations which channel natural light and tour venues and festivals across Lincolnshire, connecting communities from north to south.

The vertical emphasis of the installations expresses human aspiration in all fields which will be shared through a series of creative workshops involving young people. They will explore the benefits of light as a modern art medium that can give transforming experiences of uplift, confidence and wellbeing.

The Charter of the Forest is a visual art response to the 1217 historic document of the same name held at Lincoln Castle. The project includes drawing, painting, film, installation, photography, sound art, sculpture and live-art events.

The Charter of the Forest will take place in Summer 2011 at The Collection, Usher Gallery and Chambers Farm Wood to celebrate the significant role that this document had in the making of English history and how issues of woodland and forest still prevail to this day. 

The Sa Fire Festival, is a sequence of four spectacular events in villages along the Spires & Steeples Arts and Heritage trail. It will dramatically tell the area’s story through large scale sculptures, pyrotechnics, light installations, video, drama, dance and music.

The opening ceremony in Lincoln will unleash the impish spirit of creativity which will dance through North Kesteven, culminating in the Sleaford showcase finale bringing together hundreds of residents revealing their creative achievements.

The Lyric Lounge is a season of mini-festivals celebrating spoken word in transformed spaces. This year the Lounge will tour Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire and Rutland, where lead artists will be commissioned to write inspirational pieces of work.

Diverse participants, including young people, will engage with internationally renowned spoken word artists and writers, benefiting from workshops, showcases, and the opportunity to explore new venues. The festivals will bring literature to new audiences, who will experience a broad range of creative work in unusual settings.

The Mighty Creatives are continuing with the highly successful Journals Project, which will have recruited 500 young people by Spring 2012 to make a personal record of their engagement with the Cultural Olympiad and the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Young participants will act as citizen journalists, developing new media skills and creating an extraordinary archive.  This archive will be deposited in local records offices, placing the engagement of young people in the build up to and delivery of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games in an historical context for future generations.  

The Formula Fashion project will combine the region’s excellence in leather craft with its rich motorsport heritage. Designers will produce art works inspired by motorsport and using leather as the primary material.

Commissioned designers will impart their leather craft and artistic expertise to schools, colleges and university students through a series of workshops.  Artworks will be launched and displayed at three major events at Silverstone Circuit before being toured around various venues in the region. 

The Labours: An Astronomical Dance takes inspiration from Greek mythology, the night sky and local histories. Through performance, text and digital media US based artists, Mark Jeffery and Judd Morrissey, will explore the past labours and future ambitions of the people of Lincolnshire.

The work will culminate in a live choreographic event to coincide with summer solstice creating a human celestial map across the city of Lincoln. 

Where the Winds Blow is a world première of a specially commissioned piece telling the story of the inhabitants who live above, below and around Rutland Water.

Told through an ambitious mixture of music, dance and choreographed sailing, the production makes full use of its spectacular setting on the shores of Rutland Water.  

With a cast of more than 500, including a 300 strong choir, this piece is designed to move and inspire an audience whether or not they know the unique history of the area.

FLOW will deliver an exciting series of new site specific artworks that explore and respond to the journey of water through the county focusing on different aspects of the waterways, from major canals and rivers to iconic water towers and reservoirs.

Artists and organisations within the programme include Jo Fairfax, Charles Monkhouse, Steve Messam and Fermynwoods Contemporary Arts.

beam! International 2011 - Lincoln’s Children and Young People’s Festival is an exciting new cultural attraction for Lincoln which will animate Lincoln city centre over an eight-day period.

beam! International 2011 offers both city and county residents and visitors alike, the opportunity to witness some of Europe’s finest street theatre and performers, alongside emerging UK bands, DJs, producers and grime artists.

beam! International 2011 provides a unique platform for more than 40 Lincolnshire schools to perform at the festival. 

Footsteps through life… The colourful journey is a carnival project across the counties of Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire and Rutland.

The carnival will collaborate with different festivals in 2011 to share and learn a variety of skills and celebrate the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012.

The biggest percussion instrument in the county, an eye-catching musical Junk Sculpture will be central to music and dance celebrations in Lincolnshire.

Over the summer soundSPORT will offer lively impromptu workshops with an international flavour for audiences at major sporting events for young people.

A partnership between soundLINCS – Lincolnshire’s music development agency and Lincolnshire Sports Partnership.

Night Run Northampton is the UK’s first dedicated night running event with a twist. Participants will be encouraged to run or walk a three kilometre town centre circuit that takes in all of Northampton’s key cultural landmarks at night.

The proposed route will be animated through a mix of lighting installations, live music and dance performances, giant LED screens, indoor and outdoor art exhibitions and Market Square illuminations.  The event is aimed primarily at young people and families.

Watch This Space and the National Trust will recreate the Victorian sports day that the Dryden family hosted in 1879 at Canons Ashby.

Inside the house audiences will be taken on a magical tour by Watch This Space and the grounds will be transformed into a country gathering with the original races and a variety of stalls and activities. 

Daventry Arts Festival is a first for this rural market town in West Northamptonshire and will take place in open spaces and community venues across the town, including the spectacular new iCon Environmental Innovation Centre.

National, regional and local artists will bring poetry, drama, comedy, dance, carnival, visual art, and orchestral, folk and world music to the town.  It will also feature an event celebrating Daventry’s heritage as the place where the BBC World Service was born.  

Moving Colour will bring together four groups of dancers and fashion designers from Lincolnshire and Helsingborg in Sweden to create a spectacular sporting relay of four dance productions inspired by the London 2012 Games.

This fusion of sport, dance, costumes and colour will be performed at the SO Festival 2011 as part of London 2012 Open Weekend and at the Helsingborg Festival a week later.

Blaze! Dance Relay is an exciting dance project involving community performances in five outdoor areas of Northamptonshire and culminating in a finale extravaganza of performances, for people of any age and background to take part.

This is an opportunity to be part of a record breaking dance routine with hundreds of people dancing together and celebrating dance throughout Northamptonshire. 

Dark Materials is a programme of commissioned new art for the National Trust’s Tattershall Castle, celebrating difference, outsider status, traditional and counter cultures.

Exploring an unlikely alliance between heritage, contemporary art and biker communities, Dark Materials offers a mix of playful, irreverent and challenging events casting a new light on this extraordinary historic site. Events will include a major new site specific commission by a UK artist, an alternative country fair, film screenings and a series of walks and talks covering topics as wide ranging as natural history to the supernatural. 

Encounters invites visitors to take part in a series of artist interventions, residencies and installations along the three mile bridleway connecting Fermyn Woods Country Park to Lyveden New Bield.

Artworks by national and international artists will explore ideas around landscape, place and belonging, using different forms of language - visual, verbal and musical. 

Unlocking the City - A Digital Arts Festival is an ambitious city-wide festival harnessing the talents of local, national and international artists. It will see the cityscape of Lincoln being used as a stage for cutting edge artworks including sound art, projections, lighting and theatre.