Our Board

Nolly Aicha Bouameur is a Marketing and Audience Manager at Factory International and has worked on marketing and audience development campaigns across Manchester International Festival and Factory International’s digital, engagement, training and employment programmes. In 2019 she played a key role in the festival campaign winning Best Tourism and Leisure at the Northern Marketing Awards. She has a strong interest in harnessing the power of data to drive strategic decisions across Audience Development and Marketing planning. She also is a graduate fellow of the Arts Marketing Association’s Audience Diversity Academy.

Paul Burns is currently Interim Director of Arts at Creative Scotland. Paul has a broad range of experience in the UK arts sector having previously worked in arts policy, youth arts and in the hip-hop and grime music sectors. For the last 15 years he has worked in dance, initially as an independent producer before going onto lead the programming, producing and artist development activity of DanceXchange and International Dance Festival Birmingham for seven years. He has worked in senior leadership roles at a number of other UK dance organisations including Dance4, Greenwich Dance, The Place and Yorkshire Dance, and delivered his own projects as a freelance coach, mentor and dramaturg before joining Creative Scotland in 2018.

Sindy Campbell is currently Head of Film at Film Birmingham, and has been working with them for 13 years. Before that she was part of the team at Fierce, working on the decibel 2007 Performing Arts Showcase and the 10th Anniversary Festival. She has lived in Birmingham since the age of 16 and is proud of its heritage and excited about its future!

Geraldine is CEO of Compton Verney, which connects people with 120 acres of art, nature and creativity. Prior to this she spent twelve years as a Director at the RSC changing the RSC’s relationships with artists, audiences and communities. She is particularly proud of leading the £4.5m Swan Wing capital project and a series of events to mark the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. Earlier in her career she led Apples and Snakes for 10 years and worked at Battersea Arts Centre as Programme Manager.

Helen is a Senior Employment Solicitor at Harper James Solicitors, specialising in Employment Law. She has a particular interest in equality, diversity and inclusion and regularly hosts guest speaker events.

Outside of work, Helen is a passionate supporter of the Birmingham arts sector.

Becki is COO with 59 Productions, a globally recognised story driven design company working across stage, stadiums, installation, exhibitions and public space. She has a track record working as an Executive Producer and arts finance specialist collaborating with artists to develop ambitious new ideas, pioneering creative programmes and creating resilient business and finance models for their work. She’s largely worked in installation, placemaking, performance in public space, and interaction design and many of her partnerships have been cross-sector and placing art in other industries. Alongside her work Becki is a Co-Director of the Total Theatre Network building advocacy and recognition for the independent performance sector and has co-run and chaired discussion for the Total Theatre Awards, a peer to peer awards process with over 50 people discussing 500 pieces of work at the Edinburgh Fringe, since 2012. Alongside her board role with Fierce Becki is a Trustee for MAYK and on the advisory board for Bert & Nasi. She is a fellow of the RSA.

Hassan is a writer, researcher, and facilitator. Having recently completed a PhD investigating the de/construction of gay men in contemporary British theatre, his practice explores the transformative effects of queer histories and lived experiences on present and future iterations of queer identities,
communities, and (sub)cultures.

As a proud Birmingham Bab, Hassan is particularly invested in situating his work within the city and has secured development funding from Arts Council England to redress the underrepresentation of queer South Asian voices in British playwriting. Moreover, his involvement in coordinating and producing a diverse array of research panels, festivals, and live-art events – primarily within Birmingham – further enriches his practice.

Jamila is a London born and based artist, dancer and body-focused researcher working under the name SERAFINE1369. They consider dancing to be a philosophical undertaking, a political project with ethical psycho-spiritual ramifications for being-in-the-world; dancing as intimate technology. Jamila works with/in the context of the hostile architectures of the metropolis towards moments and states of transcendence. Their work is underpinned by their interest in the invisible systems and structures that choreograph bodies in life.

www.basictension.com

Over the past decade, Mary Osborn has built a reputation for bold international projects and programmes, supporting artists with trust, care, and dedication, and advocating for a more courageous contemporary performance sector. As Senior Creative Development Producer at Battersea Arts Centre, she shapes BAC’s Creative Development, overseeing commissions, productions, and artist development, including flagship initiatives like New Dimensions, Scene Change, and Bloom.

As a Creative Producer, Mary has collaborated closely with artists on significant projects such as the extensive four-year development of ‘The Making of Pinocchio’ with Rosana Cade and Ivor MacAskill, Ama Josephine Budge’s ‘The Apocalypse Reading Room’, and the vacuum cleaner’s ‘Art of a Culture of Hope’ and ‘Madlove Takeover’ as well as many others in her producing role at Artsadmin and independently. Her time
at Artsadmin also saw her developing artist support and the Toynbee Studios public programmes including ‘What Shall We Build Here’ festival of art, climate and community.

For many years, Mary co-led D.I.Y. radical performance platform Steakhouse Live, organising festivals and events including Tender Loin and the Slow Sunday festival of durational performance. Mary’s partnership with Danish curator Emma Møller has resulted in international programs for Wellcome Collection, Copenhagen Stages, and Warehouse9, including their own festival, ‘Bodies Beyond Borders’; and three years as Curators-in-Residence with City of Women festival in Ljubljana.