The Weekenders are a trio of events which will showcase the diversity and innovation of the region’s arts. The last Weekender on “Democratising Creativity and Culture” is to be held on Saturday 26th September. We’re aiming to celebrate and platform some of the region’s young creatives exploring all things arts, culture and heritage. Not only will themes of democracy be explored (in its broadest sense) throughout the programme, but audiences and participants will get an opportunity to be a part of steering the festival content with three regional young producers: Aksana Khan, Diandra McCalla, and Paige Jackson.
Opening up creativity and culture starts with making sure that young creatives get paid their dues. This is especially important because in July, the Office of National Statistics reported that “the estimated number of people unemployed aged 16 to 24 years increased by 47,000 on the year.” Some of us know personally how young people have lost a lot of income due to COVID-19, and with it, lost opportunities to platform their creativity and work.
The final Weekender is an opportunity to come together as a community to support the region’s current and
future talent.
What does my support mean?
Your support will help to develop and deliver this exciting festival, making it bigger and better. You’ll be
supporting:
● Creatives/Artists who have lost work or been furloughed due to COVID-19;
● Young producers;
● Local people and communities through access to creativity, culture, arts and heritage.
That sounds great! How do I help?
● Become a corporate sponsor;
● Personally donate via our GoFundMe for West Midlands Young Creatives Fund;
● Re-share social media posts via @CultureCentral;
● Tell people about the festival;
● Signpost young creatives to apply to be a part of the programme here. The deadline is 6 September.
All donations will be gratefully received because it will support young artists in the West Midlands (aged 16-
30) to showcase their talent in this Festival. The amount raised will determine how many artists we can
feature in the final Weekender. A donation of £100 will support an artist submitting their work for the festival
and £300 will pay for a new piece of work by an artist.
Corporate Sponsorship:
The Midsummer Festival had a national and international media reach including listings in The Guardian,
The I, Yahoo! India and Birmingham Post along with over 30 other media outlets covering the festival. This
resulted in a reach of over 4million people with an estimated value of £465,00.
What will you get?
We’ve got two tiers:
“OG”
Pledge £1200.00 and you get to raise the profile of your organisation as you’ll get:
● Named as a headline sponsor of the festival;
● Mentions/tags in social media posts as lead sponsor of the festival;
● Hyperlinked logo embedded in festival announcements (Culture Centre weekly Newsletter which
has almost 2000 subscribers), e-flyer invitations and on the MakeItWM website;
● On the day of the festival:
○ 1 minute pre-recorded advertisement embedded within the festival stream online (minimum
of 1 showing with potential of up to 3 repeats depending on the duration of the festival).
“Legend”
Pledge £300.00 and you’ll be sponsoring a piece of newly commissioned work and get:
● Named as a sponsor of the festival;
● You get recognised as sponsoring the commision;
● Mentions/tags in social media posts as a sponsor of the festival;
● On the day of the festival:
○ Your logo will appear with a thank you message after commissioned work is shown.
GET IN TOUCH – If you would like to sponsor this Festival, or have a further discussion, please get in touch
with Paige via paige.s.jackson@icloud.com. Please put “Sponsoring DCC” in your subject line so we can
get the ball rolling. She’ll get back to you on the week commencing 24th August.
Fundraising deadline: Tuesday 1st September 2020.
