Shake-up in Barnet’s arts scene as borough council prepares to launch a long-awaited arts and culture strategy

Barnet Council is to take on the task of helping to promote and support arts and cultural events across the borough — a role previously performed by a network of volunteers.

An online guide is to be published by the council listing a wide range of arts, leisure and sports events.

Council staff will help to co-ordinate attempts to gain sponsorship and advertising.

Details of the new council-led approach were outlined to arts enthusiasts and supporters at The Bull Theatre, High Barnet, during a commemoration of the achievements of the late Pam Edwards who devoted 60 years of her life to encouraging the local arts scene.

Councillor Anne Clarke (above, left), Barnet Council’s cabinet member for culture, leisure, arts and sports, told the get together that a new strategy on arts and culture in the borough is due to be published in the spring and will set out the new framework.

A new online guide to arts, culture and sports events will be compiled by the council.

It will replace the listings published in Barnet First, the quarterly magazine published since the 1970s by a volunteer team at the Barnet Borough Arts Council.

Ros Staines (centre, above), who took over from Pam Edwards as the secretary of the arts council, welcomed the borough’s decision to take on the task of publicising the listings of local arts events.

With them above is Susi Earnshaw (far right), of The Bull Theatre, which will assist in co-ordinating the volunteer committees which organise the annual Barnet Christmas Fayre and Theatre in the Park at Oak Hill.

These two events were previously organised under the auspices of the arts council which is now to be wound up following the announcement of the introduction of a new borough-wide arts and culture strategy.

Councillor Clarke said the borough council’s aim was to link up Barnet’s cultural and sporting institutions and provide full access to a comprehensive events listing on the council’s website.

“We hope by April or May to be able to launch an arts and culture strategy for Barnet.

“Our aim is to widen access to events in the borough and bring people together, so we are reaching out to cultural and sporting groups to compile the fullest possible listing of future events.

“We have also been getting to grips with the task of seeing how we might be able to encourage sponsorship for events and perhaps support such initiatives with the help of advertising.”      

Susi Earnshaw told the gathering that she hoped that in the future The Bull Theatre – which is the home of the Susi Earnshaw Theatre School – might be able to offer a wider programme of events.

If funding could be obtained, she said she would like to appoint a full-time theatre manager who could build up a wider programme of evening and weekend events.

A look back at the life of Pam Edwards, who was a founder member of what is now the Bull Theatre, was presented by Jenny Remfry, who worked closely with Pam from the 1970s to 1990s and who was a former chair of the Barnet Centre Association.

Pam, who died in July last year at the age of 98, was a tireless supporter of the local arts scene and helped to initiate a range of well-established and much-loved artistic and community events which are now an established part of Barnet’s social calendar.

Of all the challenges she faced, by far the most ambitious was her role as a founder and organiser of the original Old Bull Arts Centre which expanded to become the Bull Theatre.

Among the many successful ventures which she helped to develop were the annual Barnet Christmas Fayre, East Barnet Community Festival and Theatre in the Park.