Funding success for four Mind the Gap Artists

Following on from JoAnne Haines’ success in securing investment to develop her Dancing with Colours project, four Mind the Gap Artists have successfully secured investment from Arts Council England. The Developing Your Creative Practice fund supports individuals who are cultural and creative practitioners and want to take time to focus on their creative development.

Find out what they’re using the funding for below!

Alan Clay
Alan has been an Artist at Mind the Gap for many years and has taken leading roles in many of the company’s productions including Leave the Light on for Me, which is touring UK festivals this summer. In 2015 Alan created Skip Rap, a semi-autobiographical piece of gig theatre.

Continuing this theme, Alan will use his DYCP funding to work with directors and writers to explore new and different ways to tell autobiographical stories. The funding will also be used to develop new ways of pitching ideas that work for Alan and his access needs. This includes working with an illustrator and a filmmaker.

Daniel Foulds
Daniel is an Associate Artist at Mind the Gap who has enjoyed previous independent success through his Hidden History project, which appeared at four northern venues in 2021.

Daniel was the first of these four Artists to receive DYCP funding. He is already using it develop his writing practice through courses and mentoring, and to research a new piece of work called In Neither Camp – a semi-autobiographical piece based on his own experience of not feeling he belongs in either the learning disabled or non-learning disabled community.

Jez Colborne
Jez is one of Mind the Gap’s most recognisable faces having appeared in many of the company’s biggest productions over the years. He is also the mastermind behind Mind the Gap’s highly successful site sensitive shows Irresistible, Gift and Trickster.

Jez has received DYCP funding to explore an idea for his next outdoor spectacle – a big dance party on the beach about lighthouse automation, and the lighthouse keepers who subsequently lost their jobs. Jez is hoping that this piece of work will explain how the automation process affected, and ultimately built resilience, within local communities. Jez will be using the funding to visit lighthouses and work with musicians to help shape his vision as well as to develop as a creative leader.

Paul Bates
Paul is a talented physical performer, which was skilfully demonstrated in Mind the Gap’s co-production with Gecko, A Little Space. He has since been cast in Animikii Theatre Company’s show, The Kaspar Hauser Experiment, which previewed last month.

Paul has received DYCP funding to develop an idea for an independent physical theatre piece which explores judgment towards people with learning disabilities rooted in his own experiences. Paul will use the funding to work with A Little Space co-creators Rich Rusk and Karen Bartholomew to explore different ways of telling stories.

Mind the Gap will be supporting all four Artists throughout the process and we’ll be sure to keep you updated with the progress of each piece as it develops.