Friday, December 09, 2005

The Mowlem

As a regular visitor to the Swanage area for various festivals, can someone please explain why the Jazz, Blues, Folk and Film Festivals never put anything on there? Come to that, there's hardly anything on during the Carnival either.
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11 comments:

Anonymous said...

We have already had quite a discussion on Swanageview about the Mowlem and the cabal who run it. Anywhere else an establishment with pretentions to be an arts centre would be actively knocking on the doors of organisers of festivals asking how they could help.

This basic fact is, however, lost on the godfathers.

11/12/05 2:40 pm
Anonymous said...

I looked at the previous discussion from October, and it seems to me that if what I hear is true, there are a lot of people willing to TALK about what should happen with the Mowlem, but only the Trustees are actually DOING anything.

Otherwise, why isn't there a 'Take Back The Mowlem for the People' group with all you wannabee artists and culture vultures banding together to get the situation changed? Surely with all your expertise and experience you can create a pressure group to work away at the situation?

It seems to me that you're all just individually picking away at the Mowlem Organisation, which quite rightly takes no notice of you individually. That's why you're getting nowhere.

But if you band together and make a concentrated effort you are bound to succeed!

If I lived in Swanage I wouldn't just moan, I'd do something...

12/12/05 11:14 am
Anonymous said...

Put pressure on who exactly? The trustees are not elected, they are not accountable to anyone and have made clear over the years their contempt for public opinion. So far as the charity commission is concerned they are doing their job. Result impasse.

12/12/05 5:00 pm
David Bale said...

The Mowlem is available to any group or individual who wishes to make a booking.

The Jazz and Blues Festival are regular users of the Mowlem and the Folk Festival also used the venue in 2005.

Both use the Community Room, the Theatre is also available but it is not always the right environment for these Festivals though both have tried major concerts there in the past.

The Purbeck Film Festival declined to make a booking in 2005 but they have been users in the past. They are welcome to hire the theatre but have rarely attracted an audience sufficient to cover costs.

The Landcrab Film Festival has booked the Theatre for the last two years.

The Theatre hosts about 250 film performances and 60-80 live shows each year.

By all means moan and make constructive comments but be aware that the Theatre receives NO subsidy from the Town, District or County Councils or from the Arts Council. Its supporters have, however raised over £30,000 towards the current refirbishment project.

What a pity people hide behind anonymous labels when making misinformed comments.

At a recent public meeting in The Community Room a lady complained nobody could discover the names of the Trustees - they were on a noticeboard behind her!

David Bale
Trustee

1/1/06 1:11 pm
Keith Roker said...

Thank you David, for your posting.

Here are some observations. On your figures the Mowlem is used 75% of the time to show ordinary commercial film releases. Local amateurs use it for about 20% of the time and professionals for rather less than 5%.

Although the notice over the door says Theatre and Arts Centre this means the usage is actually closer to a 1960s provincial Odeon cinema than a modern arts centre.

I think it should be a theatre and arts centre not an Odeon. Does anyone agree?

Although you say that anyone can hire the theatre you only achieve a 25% hire rate. Do you need to review your hiring policy to increase this?

Other arts centres are run by people with experience in arts organisations with the support of advisors skilled in finance, etc. You seem to have trustees with all the support skills but none of the core ones. If you were more successful in hiring this would not matter but as you decide what is on 75% of the time it does. Why not increase the number of trustees so there is a majority with arts credentials.

The Mowlems failure to attract funnding is an indictment of the existing arrangements and nothing to take pride in. It is the arts in Swanage which have suffered as a consequence. How does the organisation need to change to make itself eligible for public money? Even Bridport Arts Centre gets 25% of its income this way. Like yourselves they are a charity and not controlled by local government so it can be done.

How can you increase openness and accountability? The lady who did not know the identity of the trustees was expressing the view of the majority in Swanage. You seem to think it is somehow her fault that you do not communicate with the rest of us. You are accountable to the Charity Commission for providing a reading room and library but to nobody at all for what is on in the theatre so long as the books are balanced. I dont think this is right.

Finally, what are you doing to build new audiences and encourage innovation?

2/1/06 3:45 pm
Anonymous said...

On a more positive note, one thing we are good at in Swanage is youth theatre. The Mowlem hosts more performances given by young people than any of the other small theatres or arts centres I know of. It is tremendously beneficial to all concerned.

How can this be built on? It has developed over the years because of the enthusiasm of a small number of individuals but surely more could be achieved through organisation and co-ordination, for example by helping those concerned find grants and sponsorship. Giving this type of support is a normal way in which arts centres work in partnership with other arts organisations.

Keith Roker

3/1/06 10:48 am
Anonymous said...

Here is an interesting comparism. I looked at the objects of the charities running arts centres in Dorset.

They include Weymouth's short and sweet "TO DEVELOP A GREATER KNOWLEDGE, UNDERSTANDING AND PRACTICE OF THE ARTS"

Yeovil's equally brief "TO ADVANCE THE EDUCATION OF THE GENERAL PUBLIC IN THE UNDERSTANDING AND APPRECIATION OF THE ARTS"

Pooles "TO PRESENT A RICH AND WELL-BALANCED ARTISTIC PROGRAMME TO HELP DEVELOP THE TASTES, EXPECTATIONS AND EXPERIENCES OF THE ARTS AND ENTERTAINMENT FOR THE PEOPLE OF POOLE AND ITS SURROUNDING AREAS AND TO PROVIDE AUDIENCES WITH OPPORTUNITIES FOR LEARNING, PARTICIPATING AND EXPERIENCING A WIDE VARIETY OF COMPLEMENTARY ACTIVITIES."

Bridports "TO ADVANCE EDUCATION AND TO FOSTER AND PROMOTE THE MAINTENANCE, IMPROVEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE ARTS, AND KNOWLEDGE, UNDERSTANDING AND APPRECIATION THEREOF AMONG THE INHABITANTS OF BRIDPORT ..."

All rather different from the Mowlems "LIBRARY AND READING ROOM ... FOR USE FOR MEETINGS, LECTURES AND CLASSES OR FOR OTHER FORMS OF RECREATION AND LEISURE TIME OCCUPATION WITH THE OBJECT OF PROVIDING FURTHER EDUCATION AND IMPROVING THE CONDITIONS OF LIFE FOR THE ... INHABITANTS."

If the Mowlem wants to be a Theatre and Arts Centre changing the objects to reflect that it is no longer legally a Victorian working men's reading room would be a good start. Alternatively they could look for another organisation that does want to run an arts centre and sign everything except the reading room over to them.

3/1/06 12:22 pm
Keith Roker said...

By way of contrast there is a charity in Swanage with arts centre objectives! Its the Tithe Barn which is officially a museum and arts centre and whose objectives are THE ADVANCEMENT OF EDUCATION BY:- PROVIDING AND MAINTAINING A MUSEUM FOR THE EXHIBITION TO THE PUBLIC OF SPECIMENS OF THE FINE AND USEFUL ARTS, ETHNOLOGY, ARCHAEOLOGY, BOTANY AND NATURAL HISTORY; AND BY FOSTERING, PROMOTING, IMPROVING AND DEVELOPING ARTISTIC TASTE AND ENCOURAGING THE KNOWLEDGE, APPRECIATION AND UNDERSTANDIN OF THE ARTS AND CRAFTS.

So there you have it, typos and all.

Its all getting a bit mind boggling. We have two arts centres one of which thinks it is a further education establishment and which is also under the illusion that it is a library while doing a very convincing impression of being a cinema.

Are there any more arts centres I don't know about? That else is not as iDoes the library imagine it is something totally different from what it appears to be, a battleship for example, as there is a cinema claiming to do its job? Perhaps the railway station has told the charity commission it is an opera house and the pier is legally a small university!

3/1/06 4:18 pm
Anonymous said...

Mr Bales comment seems to prove all the anonymous people of Swanage correct by putting up more barriers in his agitated tone. Can he really claim to being part of the Folk Festival, all does he mean a Morris Dancer used the restaurant. I could be wrong.
And how as a public building can you seriously not get involved with the Purbeck Film Festival on financial grounds. The festival does alright and continues to grow and gets national press coverage off its own back. Surely that would be good for the Mowlem.
There should be a more active role in the community, how about the odd season of films or a battle of the Bands for the youth.
How about being a bit more vital and listening to the anonymous voices of Swanage who obviously care enough to comment and start building something good
Mr Royston Vasey

3/1/06 7:56 pm
Anonymous said...

What has always surprised, and saddened, me about the Mowlem is that - for a place supposed to be promoting the arts - it seems singuarly lacking in any expression of artistic or aesthetic sensitivity. OK, the architecture may not be to everybody's taste, and they/we are stuck with that. But what about the environment and in particular the presentation and display of information? It always seems that the local primary school has been let loose. All very sweet and homespun, but not very inspiring, let alone professional, to see messy hand-drawn signs and amateur collages taking up every available space.There is nothing stylish or artistic within 50 metres. And this (unsurprisingly) permeates through every aspect of the place — the exterior displays, the lobby, the restaurant, the bar. It applies to the decoration, the furniture, the signing, the poorly painted loos, even the choice of menus. (The auditorium itself is perhaps an exception).This place is neither hip nor quaint, neither progressive nor tradtional. And I'm sure it's not about money. I bet sensitive, artistically aware, people with a little imagination could easily make the environment attractive on a fracion of the existing budget. Are there any artistic people among the trustees? Dull, shabby and uninspiring about sums it up.

3/1/06 8:39 pm
culture vulture said...

you should encourage us crockles to visit the mowlem more. ive been on holiday in the aera several times and never been tempted over the threshold, i am down in oct, and havent been able to discover whats on there yet??? sounds like the trustees should hear there swan song...

16/9/06 12:38 pm

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