Black British Ballet project We began the year with a hugely successful hybrid event with The Royal Ballet, Dance Theatre of Harlem and Jacob’s Pillow Dance festival. The event took place with a live audience in the New York Library for the Performing Arts and the Royal Ballet and Opera. Dance Theatre of Harlem sent over their new Artistic Director, Robert Garland as well as some of their dancers to perform with Black dancer from The Royal Ballet Company. Two of our dancers from the project, Julie Felix and Brenda Garratt-Glassman featured on a panel along with Garland, Kevin O’Hare, Artistic Director of Royal Ballet, and our Director Dr Sandie Bourne. The event was also streamed live on YouTube and has to date been viewed over 17.000 times. We then received £35,515 from the Windrush Day fund to deliver the second tour of our Windrush themed ballet, Island Movements to 11 libraries in England and NI in June. The tour opened at Northern Ballet’s Stanley & Audrey Burton Theatre and closed on Windrush Day with two shows at the Birmingham Hippodrome. The ballet was reimagined to focus on the little known history of the contribution of Black Caribbean women in WW2. The shows were again accompanied by a storytelling and movement workshop for 4-8 year olds based on our illustrated children’s book, Onisere and the Ballet Queen to help reach diverse children at the age they would need to begin ballet training. Comments from audience members included: “More events like this please! I had a better understanding of Windrush, ethnic minority challenges. With the ballet, I was inspired to continue pursuing my dreams!” “Wow! A stunning production. Please thank all those involved. Music, dancing, storytelling – joy, injustice, dignity. We were ‘treated’ to a first-class ballet packed with emotion and I for one gained a huge amount from it – not least the feeling of outrage that such shameful treatment happened and is still happening in this country. It made me feel ashamed and determined to play my part in eliminating racism. Thank you for educating me – you really brought the subject to life and got the right message across.” “I have been to many good events in libraries over the years, but this was something else. I never thought that I’d go to the ballet – but you brought the ballet to me! So glad that you did. What an experience. Storytelling par excellence. Stunning outfits and choreography. Dancers at the top of their game. Loved the opportunity for a Q&A afterwards; where else could you get such a night. The whole group were honest and open in their answers, and it was both heart-breaking and enlightening. Change is brought about by enough ordinary people saying, “enough is enough”. THANK YOU.” We found out at the end of March 2024 that we had successfully partnered with Libraries Connected to receive a £245,000 grant from National Lottery Heritage Fund to develop an exhibition tour based on the history of our Black British Ballet pioneers. The Into the Light: Pioneers of Black British Ballet exhibition comprises of 30 images, two short films, and a VR version of the exhibition for more remote branches in each service. The tour launched in September and will travel to 24 libraries across England over the next 14 months. The exhibition is also accompanied by an activity programme designed to engage people of all ages. This includes family ballet workshops for children aged 3+; storytelling and movement workshops for ages 4-8 (that included a free copy of the children’s book for children and/or schools attending); dance and ballet workshops for all aged 7+; creative writing sessions for ages 9+; dance photography workshops for ages 14+; interviews with dancers from the project; and the final tour of our Island Movements show tour in October. This final tour comprised of 20 libraries and community centres around England. Our partnership with Libraries Connected continues to allow us to bring diverse, quality creative experiences to communities with little or no access to this type of activity; and to bring the stories of our Black British Ballet pioneers to a much wider audience. We also created a version of the exhibition for Royal Ballet and Opera that focused on the dancers with a connection to the company or the school. This went on display in October alongside a curated programme of events at the Opera House which featured Dr Sandie Bourne as well as Vincent Hantam and Shevelle Dynott, who are both dancers from the project. The full exhibition was also displayed at English National Ballet’s HQ in Canning Town, in October where we performed our Island Movements show to a sold out audience. Finally, we also received a £4900 grant from MSN Fund in June to enhance our pilot mentoring scheme for Black ballet students. This pilot trained five of the dancers from our project to mentor a total of 14 dancers aged 16-18 in the leading UK ballet schools, including Royal Ballet School, Central School of Ballet and English National Ballet schools. The six month programme ran from October to April aimed to encourage the students to remain in ballet as young Black dancers still report being ‘encouraged’ to enter different dance fields such as contemporary or musical theatre. Student comments include: ‘I have now gained the confidence to embrace the things that make me, me, and I’ve started wearing skin-toned tights which I never had the courage to do before.’ ‘I have definitely gained and developed my sense of self-worth and confidence amongst other things. I have also been able to massively widen my understanding about the dance world through the experiences my mentor shared with me which has been extremely insightful as I now approach stepping into the professional dance world.’ The schools were equally enthusiastic and we plan to run the scheme again in September 2026. Lambeth Our local work has reduced significantly this year, due to the expansion of the Black British Ballet project, the challenging funding position that Lambeth Council is in, as well as the growth of their culture team which has made them less reliant on cultural partners for delivery of services. However, we did manage to secure one grant from the council as part of their nighttime strategy funding which allowed us to put on a sold out performance of our Island Movements ballet show at Clapham Library in September. Consultancy work We continued to provide regular communications support to ATLEU, the anti-trafficking charity, to support their advocacy and direct casework with survivors of trafficking and slavery. This year saw an increased focus on campaigning and policy work with the creation of their policy unit which comprises a lived experience group, as well as increased support for their sister company, Saltworks Law, which invests its profits to support ATLEU’s work. We also worked with other charities and public sector organisations through our consultancy work including The Reading Agency’s Quick Reads programme that aims to get more adults to read, and University of Reading on a mental health podcast aimed at addressing the stigma and stereotypes around Black fathers in child welfare and youth justice settings.

Our stakeholders are young people, community audiences, charity clients and cultural partners. Our consultations this year were mainly centred on our Into the Light: Pioneers of Black British Ballet exhibition. Those consulted included library partners, audiences and young people. The first few libraries on the exhibition tour were particularly helpful, especially in Redbridge which booked a wide range of our activities, many of which we’d never delivered before, and library staff were invaluable in helping us to refine and improve the content of these activities: ‘Redbridge Libraries pilot tested the Black British Ballet Island Movements show in 2023. It was a great success with amazing feedback and appetite for the show to return. When applying for the project we were keen to host it in October to feed into and be the highlight of, our larger Black History Month programme and we have been lucky enough to receive it in October. Black History Month is a Strategic Priority for Redbridge Council, Vision Redbridge Culture and Leisure, Redbridge Libraries and Redbridge Outdoor Arts. Vision RCL are commissioned to deliver Black History Month events and activities, which enables us to deliver on these strategic council-wide initiatives & deliver on Vision’s Strategic Objective ‘to build stronger & more sustainable communities’. This project gave us the opportunity to change our approach, raise ambitions, offer a varied programme and present new initiatives such as a VR Exhibition. Delivering a programme as part of Redbridge’s Black History Month, meant representing the diversity of the borough by reflecting local communities, engaging new audiences and bringing diverse communities together, to feel reflected through relevant content.’ Libraries were also consulted at the outset of the exhibition tour to help us to understand their priorities and needs: ‘We were very keen to take part in this programme. As our Central Library has its own Library Theatre and sits beside The Crucible and Lyceum Theatres, we are huge advocates of art and culture, and felt this was an ideal opportunity to not only celebrate the arts, but the contributions of black British people in ballet. Sheffield is a very diverse city, and this kind of exhibition is so important, to allow us to share the stories that people living in our city will identify with or be inspired by. We were very keen to have the opportunity to inspire school children, in particular with black British ballet through the wonderful events offered as part of this. Further, survey feedback on the activities we deliver is sought after each event and this is reviewed on an ongoing basis to help improve our work.

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