Martin Green
production and creative industries . We are not doing anything else with our money than funding great works . We will have the final numbers in the end but currently it is a moving feast .
One of the things about this project is we wanted to fund R & D . Too often R & D doesn ’ t get funded and companies are expected to come up with ideas without being given a cent . In the middle of the pandemic , we had more than 100 freelancers involved in that process .
Currently , we have around 700 creatives working on this project . We totted up that there are 654 separate live event happenings . Of course , all of that needs production and technical support so we ’ ve got companies all over the UK working on it .
Underneath the 10 commissions sits a learning programme where we want to reach 2.5 million young people . We have also created paid opportunities for first jobbers , or early jobbers , to pivot their work into new technologies or production . For example , StoryTrails has employed 50 people who are using the project to pivot their careers into new technology . There are also hundreds of internships and paid opportunities through the
programme , so I ’ m hoping that we ’ re nailing it in every aspect .
Probably , there are very few people in the industry now who are not , or don ’ t know someone who is , working on this project .
Has the impact of the pandemic and Brexit on the supply chain impacted the organisation and operation of Unboxed ? It ’ s tough out there to hire . There are three years of events happening in one year this year so it ’ s an incredibly contested and expensive market . Obviously , we are spending public money so we don ’ t have the kind of freedoms of the commercial sector . We are experiencing the same supply chain challenges as everyone else , and as soon as everybody realised we had issues , and this goes for the Commonwealth Games too , we pulled everything forward . Among the things this industry is great at is coming up with really creative solutions , so it ’ s been good to see that kind of problem solving .
Are you engaging with suppliers locally for each event or on a national scale ? Our role centrally is to curate and promote the whole festival , the 10 commissions then build and run their commissions . So , 59 Productions has brought its team in for the whole run . They will also pick up locally because that is something we have really encouraged . There will obviously be times where it makes sense to have the same supplier running the whole run of shows but there are equally good opportunities to pick up local talent and local companies as we go into each city . We ’ ve just let them make those choices for themselves as they go through .
What size audience attendance are you expecting across the whole project ? It ’ s really difficult to tell because it has never been done before ; this is new , bold stuff . We set ourselves the target of getting 66 million people to engage in this project in one way or another from viewing online or live to taking part . The Green Space Dark Skies event needs 20,000 volunteers to help deliver that . I ’ m absolutely convinced that the work is popular enough and broad enough to bring in very large audiences . We want big figures ; we want people to engage with it and that ’ s why the BBC is really involved in it . We will be using all the channels we have to create active engagement .
Do you expect the event to have a considerable economic impact ? Of course we want to make sure the investment is worthwhile . A lot of the funding is going into the industry and that helps make it more stable . This project will bring some of the team involved to the attention of a wider global industry and they ’ ll get asked to create new work . I also think some of these projects will continue to tour ; I can see the Dreamachine project by Assemble continuing to tour
“ Probably , there are very few people in the industry now who are not , or don ’ t know someone who is , working on this project .” - Martin Green
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