Failures in governance still to be addressed
Hi Adrian,
Thank you for your welcome to skyscrapercity.
Do you know how I can switch on a facility that will notify me when someone adds a comment to this thread?
I don't know anything much about skyscrapercity. It is a massive site.
Does anyone have any tips on how best to navigate around skyscrapercity?
I do have other interests beyond High Bridge that I am prepared to comment on.
I am NOT here merely to complain and express grievances against my former employers. :bash:
It is futile to wallow in these murky waters with resentment and serves no wholesome purpose.
Of course I am sure we all agree that the High Bridge Gallery (HBG) does need to hurry up and flippin' open now the money has been spent.
Since the gallery's completion, two years ago, this brand new resource has been kept dark, and has never been used, which everyone agrees, is a sad waste of a valuable cultural resource.
In response to the enquiry about whether I will have opportunity to show my work in the HBG all I know is that currently there is no application process through which anyone can put forward an exhibition proposal on the High Bridge Studios and Gallery website.
http://www.highbridgestudios.co.uk/
There has been no public call for HBG exhibition proposals from Baltic yet.
If Baltic does secures the extra yearly funding it is currently requesting from Newcastle City Council and the Arts Council England, to run the HBG, then the exhibition programme is due to begin in April.
It follows therefore that if Baltic is going to make a call for proposals from local artists to show in the HBG, it will need to explain the process publicly, in the next few weeks.
Once I know what the process is, I may make an application to present my work there, just like anyone else, but I doubt any proposal from me would really be taken seriously.
Finally, I would like to explain, respectfully, why I think the term, "personality politics", does not accurately describe the ongoing concerns relating to the governance of HBG.
Here goes... :wallbash:
As I was familiarising myself with all the content of this really rather comprehensive skyscrapercity thread, I noticed that almost two years ago, (18 February 2010), Cllr Greg Stone posted a copy of a Council Statement.
In that Council Statement, the number one reason given for not moving forward with Waygood as the primary operator of High Bridge Studios and Gallery was because of...
"
Waygood’s lack of co-operation in addressing the findings of the recent governance review".
The governance review in question is known as the (Susan) Royce Report.
Even though this was an independent publicly funded external report, only a heavily redacted version was initially made available. Despite the redactions, it could still be seen that there were three options available for Newcastle council regards moving the High Bridge project forward:
Option
1: continue as is
Option
2: to work pro-actively with Waygood to build the organisations capacity
Option
3: to seek other operators via a tender process
The Royce Report went on to say:
Option
1 is the least attractive option; it is more likely than not that Waygood will, if its organisational capacity and make-up remains unchanged, experience a major crisis within the next two years.
Option
2 is the lowest risk option, assuming the funders, (ie the council), have not reached "the point of no return" in their relationship with Waygood...
Option
3 is the most challenging option to contemplate; it would involve the greatest uncertainty, be politically difficult and require substantial investment of time and resources from the funder group.
Obviously Newcastle council wanted to pursue Option
2, but that required that they "work pro-actively with Waygood to build the organisations capacity".
That meant Newcastle council went to the Waygood board and requested that a new chair, "with strong strategic skills," be appointed.
The Waygood board refused to co-operate with the request.
If the Waygood chair had stepped aside at this point, in all likelihood, Waygood would still be the main operator of the High Bridge site.
The whole multi million pound project at High Bridge went into a crisis because the Waygood chair refused to step aside.
So... the question is...
Why is it, two years on, the Waygood chair, who is, and always was, on the Baltic board, will, under this new arrangement, be reinstated to a position of authority over the High Bridge Gallery?
The failures of governance that were identified in the Royce Report back in December 2009, have still not been fully addressed.
This is more a problem of cronyism and a lack of strong leadership than it is of personality politics.
.