How is everyone? I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and New Year! We have all enjoyed a restful few weeks and are looking forward to working on our upcoming events, so be sure to check them out! A big thank you to everyone who entered our first ever competition- we were overwhelmed with the response and can’t wait to share more!
Sharing conversations and opportunities
- David Furlong, co-founder of Migrants in Theatre and Artistic Director of Exchange Theatre is looking for collaborators connected to the Algerian, Kabykian and Saharian regions.This is for a stage adaptation of the novel The Golden Droplet. He is particularly interested in hearing from performers and designers connected to those regions, but would welcome interest from other creatives too. Please email david@exchangetheatre.com
- Bursaries available with MGC Futures; Stephanie Arditti Bursary for costume professionals, Lyric Hammersmith Bursary for a Literary Associate (Trainee), The Nicole Kidman Bursary for female directors/producers, and The Pilot Theatre Bursary for a Creative Assistant. More details and applications here: https://www.mgcfutures.com/bursaries/bursaries-2020/
- The Fourth round of the Theatre Artists Fund will be open from midday today.
The Theatre Artists Fund has been set up to provide emergency support for theatre workers and freelancers across the UK. It is for theatre professionals who are in need of urgent and critical financial support due to the devastating impact of Covid-19 on the theatre sector. Details: https://theatreartists.fund/who-is-the-theatre-artists-fund-for/
- Tamasha Theatre Company are currently looking for directors for a number of projects and opportunities throughout 2021. To enquire, send your CV and details to samia@tamasha.org.uk
- London-based Iranian-Croatian director Natali Khalili Tari and Somali-Dutch Qali Nur are currently working on Between Mountains and Wars, a documentary about the Jewish community in Sarajevo. In the documentary, three Sephardic-Bosnian women who survived both the Holocaust and the Bosnia War tell their stories of solidarity between Muslims, Jews, Catholics and Orthodox people in times of war. Find out more and follow their work at: https://www.instagram.com/betweenmountainsandwars/
- London based artist Madiha Sebbani has curated a virtual exhibition featuring contemporary artists from Saudi Arabia, Morocco and South Africa , entitled "SACRED". This exhibition is hosted virtually at ESCAP3 Gallery in Cape Town, and opens on 21st January. More info: https://escap3gallery.com/exhibitions/group-exhibition-sacred-curated-by-madiha-sebbani
And that’s everything! For the new members, mailout is sent on a fortnightly basis. As we ease back into working patterns after the New Year please keep sharing and sending me any of your wonderful work or opportunities you want included in the next mailout to this email. Please continue to sign up to our directory, and share our community with your friends in the industry!
Have a great week,
Jessie x
Our position on endorsement of our main areas of work is to help connect the creative industries with UK MENA+ talent, so we will always share castings, job opportunities, or marketing information. We will track these projects in the hope that they are a great example of how MENA+ talent is used. But by sharing this information, it should not be seen as an endorsement of the project.
We will call out work that is appropriating a MENA+ narrative and does not have MENA+ talent at the heart of the creative process; and we will always champion, front and centre, work that is made for and by MENA+ talent.
Our position on world events
Our focus is on bringing artists from the MENA+ region together, celebrating what connects us, spotlighting our achievements, and lobbying for change when it comes to representation in the British live and recorded arts industry. As such, while we fully support each individual’s right to their own political or artistic beliefs, we will not take a position on political events coming out of the MENA+ region.