Culture Strategy

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Sheffield Culture Strategy 2024: help co-create a new vision for creativity in the city

Sheffield is a city of inspiring artists, makers and doers. People around the world know the names and work of our artists, musicians and designers. But those who live here know that there are thousands of amazing creatives across communities and neighbourhoods in Sheffield - just getting on with it. We also know as a city there is much more we can do to support them to flourish.

With this in mind, we need a new vision for creativity and arts and culture here in Sheffield. We hope this will help make sure everyone who lives, works and visits here has the opportunity to take part, to collaborate and to benefit from all the wonderful things that arts and culture bring to Sheffield.

We’re starting a city wide consultation on culture in the city

We want to know from Sheffield’s creative community what the focus of a new culture strategy should be. We completed an initial "pre-engagement" survey in December 2023 to help us design a more in-depth engagement process starting in February 2024 - some of the findings of that can be found in the document here.

Our approach now will aim to rebalance the conversation around culture to magnify voices that are less frequently heard, alongside institutional perspectives - through what we are calling a "diagonal approach". We want to ensure that artists, creatives, freelancers, community leaders, business people and those interested in culture feel able and empowered to get involved and have their say. More detail about our approach to engagement can be found in the document "Engagement Plan".

We have also completed baseline research of the cultural sector in the city at the moment - this detail can be found in the document "Cultural Audit".

This work has been commissioned by Sheffield City Council, the University of Sheffield and Arts Council England. It’s being delivered by creative consultancy company Fourth Street, Sheffield-based social enterprise Opus Independents, and a team of culture freelancers from the city.

What we hope the Culture Strategy will do for the city

We think that to create a healthy culture sector in the future, the new strategy needs to:

• Uncover and celebrate our shared story of Sheffield’s culture and creativity.

• Help create the conditions for organisations and creatives to thrive, collaborate and participate in the way that infrastructure and resources work in the city.

• Map out what changes we need to make so that young people see a future in Sheffield’s cultural world, with clear routes to grow the skills and knowledge they need to succeed

• Offer a view on how any organisation, individual and group could work together if they want to and take part in a growing and thriving ecosystem of cultural work that delivers with and for communities and neighbourhoods across Sheffield.

This page will be regularly updated with new information, draft reports, and dates for engagement events that will soon be taking place in the city - we'd love for you to join us!