News from 2010 continued and plans for 2011

Farewell and thanks to Rona Fineman
Rona Fineman retired from her position as Chair of Trustees at Firebird Theatre’s Annual General Meeting, which was held on the 4th December.


We would like to thank Rona for starting us off on our journey as an independent theatre company. Rona has been a trustee and the chair of trustees since we set up as a company limited by guarantee and a registered charity in 2006. We shall miss her as a trustee but we are privileged and honoured to know that Rona will continue to work with us as an advisor and a supporter.


Funding
Throughout 2011 we need to concentrate our efforts on fund raising to maintain and develop what Firebird Theatre does. Since 2006, we have received support from Trusts and Foundations (listed on our main website) and Arts Council England whose Grants for the Arts awards have enabled Firebird Theatre to move forward as a theatre company. We have received donations and gifts from individual supporters and friends. We would like to thank everyone who has helped us. Your help is very much appreciated and really helps Firebird Theatre to keep doing what it does.


We recognise that it will be more difficult to raise funds over the next few years because of the current financial climate. We know that we need help to get through this difficult time and  support with fund raising is very difficult to find. If anyone has any ideas or can offer any help with this area of our work, we would be most grateful.

Our plans for 2011

Artistic plans
First of all we are working with our patron, Kathryn Hunter, to see if we can get involved in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s World Shakespeare Festival in 2012 with our re-telling of The Tempest. The Festival is part of the celebrations around the Olympics. We know this is a very BIG ambition but we would like to try to make it happen.


We are developing The Nine Lessons of Caliban with artists who are part of Ferment at Bristol Old Vic. We are now part of Ferment which is the Old Vic’s artistic development programme that works with artists from Bristol to enable them to try out new work, develop ideas, collaborate with other artists and form relationships with their audiences. We are really pleased to be given this opportunity to be part of Ferment and work with Ferment artists.


Outreach and education
We also want to do other things around education and involving other people in what we do. These include running more workshops; working more with other disabled artists and theatre practitioners; getting the films that Ann Pugh has made of Firebird’s work on the internet so that people all over the country can find out about Firebird Theatre.

We also want to explore a new way of working with other people so that we can involve them in making productions with us without them having to audition or become a member of the Company. We hope we can develop this idea over the next year.


Business plans

As already mentioned, the trustees and the company will be focussing on raising funds to maintain and develop the activities of Firebird over the next three years.

In the New Year we will be getting help from Katie Keeler from Theatre Bristol to write our business plan.

Our trustees also want to focus on the recruitment of new trustees to strengthen and develop the skills of the Board.