CVAN EM announces new Steering Group members

CVAN EM is delighted to welcome three new members to its Steering Group. Andy Batson – Head of Audiences and Partnerships at Nottingham ContemporaryDaniel Sean Kelly – artist and co-director of Two Queens in Leicester and Ruchita Shaikh – Executive Director of Artcore in Derby – join the Group as we near the end of our current three year programme of activity. They bring new perspectives, skills and connections to the Network as we plan for the future, drawing on the legacy of the last three years, in particular its projects Document, In Another Place and The Start of Something. Andy, Daniel and Ruchita join our other seven members, to support programme development and delivery and ensure good governance, as well as represent our widening community of interest across the region.

CVAN EM Chair Ben Carpenter, Head of Fine Art at De Montfort University, said: “CVAN EM seeks to represent the whole of the Visual Arts sector in the East Midlands, and so it’s really great that, given the opportunity to refocus our steering group, we are joined by two artists who lead regional visual arts organisations, Ruchita Shaikh and Dan Kelly. Dan and Ruchita bring a wealth of experience of working with artists to develop opportunity and talent. We’re also really pleased to maintain our relationship with Nottingham Contemporary through Andy Batson, whose expertise in marketing and audience engagement will be especially useful as we expand our reach. I am sure that they will all help and challenge us as CVAN EM develops.

Andy is Head of Audiences and Partnerships at Nottingham Contemporary. He has been involved in developing opportunities for audience engagement in Nottingham for over a decade, including at Broadway Cinema and Art Centre, New College Nottingham and Spirit Nottingham.

Daniel is an artist and co-director of Two Queens, an artist-run gallery and studios based in Leicester. His practice seeks to create a space for imagining other realities, usually realised through painting, printmaking and ceramics, with recent solo exhibitions at Xero, Kline and Coma, London and Trade Gallery, Nottingham. He is a graduate of the free, alternative postgraduate programme ‘The School of the Damned’ and is currently studying MA Contemporary Art Theory at Goldsmiths College, where his research focuses on theory fiction and speculative futures.

Ruchita is a Visual Arts graduate with a post-graduate qualification in Industrial Design (ceramics) from the National institute of Design India. Ruchita joined Artcore in 2000 in India and is now the Executive Director of Artcore in Derby. She sits on the Culture and Leisure Board of Derby City Council, is a trustee of Community Action Derby and an active member of the local Neighbourhood Board.

 

Find out about all our Steering Group members.