impact Report 2023-2024
Rising Arts Agency’s 2023-2024 Impact Report
INTRODUCTION
From coming to the end of our time as Creators in Residence at Arnolfini to working on a cultural strategy for a Northern Devon town, 23-24 has felt like an agency-defining year for Rising.
It’s brought up questions about our role in social change and how we show up for ourselves, our community and our city. It’s also brought up tensions about how Rising balances the need to contribute to conversations about what’s happening globally, while staying hyper-local, focussing on the needs of our community.
This year saw us dipping our toes in academia to interrogate power imbalances in sector partnerships. We’ve also taken our work regionally to embed young people’s voices in cultural strategies and placemaking. We’ve taken time to reflect on what ‘placemaking and place-shaping’ means to Rising and our community.
What does it mean to f*ck with existing systems to ensure young people have a seat at the table when it comes to the future of our towns and cities? How do we do that equitably? How do we stay radical and anchored in the work, while recognising that the spaces we’re entering are laden with certain expectations about what our role is within them. When there’s a responsibility to our community, what demands must we continue to make to the sector?
DOWNLOAD OUR IMPACT REPORT:
2023-24: A YEAR OF ‘FIRSTS’:
Alongside the stories from our community about how Rising has impacted them over the past year (or more), here’s some of key highlights of this year:
We got core funding (for the first time) through Bristol City Council’s Openness fund, £11k a year for 3 years.
We welcomed 19 new community members, and had an induction week to welcome them to Rising (a first)
We won an award from our research with Kings College London in power and partnerships (a first)
We wrote a cultural strategy for Bideford (a first)
We fed into the 20 year Bristol Harbour placeshaping strategy (a first)
We launched a new website
We piloted the Rising fund - offering 6 artists £750 to do something new in their practice. (a first)
Letting the Work Speak for Itself:
A still from Rising’s 2023 Community Picnic at Queen’s Square. Taken by Olumide Osinoiki
The theme for this year’s Impact Report is ‘letting the work speak for itself’. We’re proud of the fact that we’ve been able to build momentum at a time when it is becoming increasingly difficult to work in the sector.
As an agency we’ve been able to stretch and flex in ways that have created new opportunities for our community, but that hasn’t without its challenges. Navigating the world as a young person is hard right now and we’re mindful of the limits to how we can support as an agency. We can only keep pushing for change, challenging the status quo and pushing the boundaries for what we think is possible.
This year has brought a lot of ‘firsts’ for the agency, so for the first time, we want to pass the mic over to our community about how they’ve experienced Rising over the past year through their own creative expressions.
In this slightly different impact report, you’ll be hearing from 5 members of our community: Iman Sultan West, Valentina ‘Paz’ Huxley, Emmanuella Blake Morsi, Tay Aziz Malik and Gabriela ‘Gabz’ Sobeira; about the impact Rising has had on them through their creative responses / practices.
GABRIELA ‘GABZ’ SOBREIRA
“I’m Gabz, a Brazilian multidisciplinary artist based in Bristol. I joined Rising at 2021 after seeing billboards around Bristol in one of the Whose Future initiatives, funny because months later, after joining, I was participating in the same initiative, where one of my poems was in one of the billboards too. I worked for 2 years together with amazing artists for Bristol Museum & Art Gallery in a commission called Extinction Silences, which turned to one of my most important projects "We Are Still Here".
I also had my work exhibited at Arnolfini in one of Rising’s events, participated of multiple workshops and get together with the Rising Community, and I know there's so much more to come!”
-Gabz Sobreira
TAY AZIZ MALIK
“Being part of Rising’s community of creatives has felt like both a big hug and a helping hand. Over 2023 and 24, I’ve been navigating my own chronic health issues, and more recently, my new responsibilities as a caregiver following my mum’s hospitalisation a few months ago. Throughout all of this, Rising has helped me to reflect and explore how I can bring collective care and radical rest into my own practice.
In a sector that has often left me feeling burnt out, marginalised and excluded, support from the Rising team as well as being awarded the Rising Fund grant has been both transformative and nourishing. The work that Euella, Jess, Sid, Olu, and the whole Rising team have put in to ensure Rising’s spaces both online and in person are caring, welcoming and priorise care has been incredible. They embody what it means to foster a creative space where everyone can thrive and our flourishing is mutual.
With help from the Rising Fund grant, I’ve been experimenting with growing a natural dye garden and embracing the rhythms of the seasons in my work. The chemistry of natural dyes takes time—days, even—and the colours shift with each brew, creating a process that demands care, attention and patience. Over the summer, I grew and foraged a variety of flowers and now, in winter, I’m transforming dried petals, buds and stems in a steaming pot in my kitchen, connecting to my mother’s and grandmothers traditions of herbalism, and gratefully staying warm at the same time.
The lino prints I’ve shared here adorn some of my handmade and home-dyed paper, with the beautiful yellow-orange tone from a mix of coreopsis and marigold petals. Both Chai and Chaunsa depict homely scenes that any child of immigrant parents can relate to - how nothing says ‘I love you’ more than our mother’s hands handing over a plate of cut fruit, or making a cup of chai sweetened just how we like it.”
- Tay Aziz Malik
VALENTINA ‘PAZ’ HUXLEY
Illustration by Valentina ‘Paz’ Huxley.
Listen to Paz’s audio piece which explores how Paz has built friendships through Rising. Edited by Harry Li-Kam-tin Forrester
EMMANUELLA BLAKE MORSI
As one of our first Non-Executive Directors, Emmanuella Blake Morsi, stepped down in 2024, they reflect on their near decade-long journey with Rising and how resourcing rest has influenced their practice.
IMAN SULTAN-WEST
“Thinking about what success means as a freelancer can be a never ending path of swerving massive ditches, shallow puddles and the occasional successful funding application. Sometimes it can be a pretty lonely place but thoughts of full time office work and being cut off from your access to creative freedom torpedo you through. So what does success mean for me as an artist? It means having the funds to explore my creativity, not only as an artist, poet or producer, but also as a friend and a person in a community. It means access to opportunities and knowing what it means to be appreciated by potential partners and employers. It means feeling safe to be adventurous with projects, to build confidence and feel represented as a person from the Global Majority. It means being paid for meetings to make spaces equitable, suggesting sustainable moves for Bristol institutions that raise the voices of people from underrepresented communities.”
-Iman Sultan-West
CONSIDER SUPPORTING OUR WORK
If you like the work we do, please consider joining the Rising Alliance and supporting us through a one-off or regular donation. So that we can have more firsts.
