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Celebrating Sanctuary Birmingham

Celebrating Sanctuary Birmingham 2012 – 2022 – Foreword by Rachael Cox CBS Programme Manager

Between 2008 – 2012 Celebrating Sanctuary (CSB) underwent a major change which was initiated by a few things, including loss of funding that had previously supported the Festival from Angel Housing, and the Schools Festival through the Education Department. Both of which had enabled CSB to present a large, city centre based Festival, but also shifts within the City regarding public events in Victoria Square.

The result of this was that CSB moved from being a Refugee Festival focussed organisation to one with a broader, year round, arts based programme still with a focus on refugees, but with a smaller festival. Without the large investment that the festival had previously had, it now became a multi venue event happening in locations around the city with a main launch event at Mac. This was due to relying on venue partners and changes in funding.

I joined Celebrating Sanctuary towards the end of 2012 as Development & Support Officer. My role was to co-ordinate the Platforma West Midlands Network, and to identify artists development needs and opportunities. In 2014 I took over from Isata Kanneh as Co-ordinator. As a small team, myself and Sid Peacock worked to develop a programme between 2014 – 2016. We ran a schools project ‘Songs of Sanctuary’, a number of partnership events with Jazzlines (THSH), Mac, Ikon, Moseley Folk and a regular series of events at Ort cafe, which was now building a regular audience.

The next few years were very difficult with funding and at one time we lost our regular funding for 18 months between the end of 2016 – early 2018. We managed to raise some smaller grants to put on a Refugee Week Festival in 2017 and relied a lot on partnerships and the commitment of board and staff to make it happen. In 2018 we were successful in receiving funding to develop a new and wider programme. We increased the staff team by creating 2 new part time posts, and my role changed to become Programme Manager. Over the next few years CSB really benefited from this and we were able to grow as an arts organisation. We invested a lot more in artist development and creating new opportunities for refugee and migrant artists.

2018 and 2019 saw a real surge in our community engagement work and artist development, which ran alongside our main music programme and Refugee Week festival. We developed the Birmingham Refugee Week Network bringing together people from Arts & Culture, Faith & Community, Refugee Support sectors to develop partnerships and an inclusive programme for Refugee Week. This network has developed and continues to share and create opportunities for partnerships and engagement. Through Near Neighbours Faith & Community network I was invited to represent CSB at a reception with Queen Elizabeth in 2019.

Rachael Cox ( third from left) meeting HRH in 2019

2020 – 2022 we had an amazing programme planned for the next 2 years, then the pandemic hit and all of a sudden we didn’t know what was going to happen and if we would be able to continue delivering a programme. Not knowing how long it would last and impact our plans, we decided there were still opportunities to engage with people and support artists. We found a way to use this forced situation to start developing digital content and the idea of increasing our profile and reach online. This was something we had talked about, but not had an opportunity to progress, and now here we were with it as our only option. So over the 12-15 months we developed our online programme, content and marketing. And even now since returning to live events, we are still finding real benefit in continuing to develop this programme.

Refugee Week 2022 was amazing, after 2 years of no or very small audiences we were finally able to bring people together and really celebrate Refugee Week, while as always, raising awareness to refugee issues and experiences and giving a platform for refugees to share their stories and refugee support agencies to voice current campaigns.

One of the amazing things about being involved with CSB for 10 years, is that I have met and worked with some amazing people, artists, musicians, participants, audiences and partners, who have inspired and enriched my life in many ways. We have created friendships over many years with artists and participants. What has been the most rewarding thing for me is to see people have opportunities, whether as artists performing to new audiences and in new environments, or emerging artists getting a chance to develop their skills and ideas, or participants enjoying the experience of being with others and doing something creative and fun, or even a reminder of home through music from their country.

Over recent years we have worked hard to develop new partnerships which bring the artists we support into new arenas and reaching new audiences. 2021 – 22 we started a new monthly series of Lunchtime Concerts at Symphony Hall, audiences for this have grown to a consistent number of around 120 – 150 each month. We have taken musicians to the idyllic setting of Compton Verney in Warwickshire and performed to hundreds of people at 2 events. Also through the Commonwealth Games B2022 Festival we presented 6 bands at 3 stages including Victoria Square in the City Centre, Handsworth Park and Ward End Park. We’ve held events in the outdoor arena at Mac and in the Hexagon Theatre to a sell out audience, Birmingham Cathedral and the Ikon Gallery for Refugee Week and Ikon Migrant Migrant Festival. Our plans going forward are to continue developing these partnerships because they reach new wider audiences and offer the artists we support an opportunity to have their work more widely appreciated.

Our focus is now three fold – World Music events including the Refugee Week Festival, artist development & collaboration opportunities for refugee and migrant artists, community engagement with refugees and asylum seekers. With the addition of artistic partnerships and collaboration, which help to push the creative programme further and seek to present excellence in new artistic works. We have established ourselves within the music and arts scene of Birmingham by presenting a diverse and rich programme at many high profile venues. This helps to put Refugee Week into the arts programme of the city and have it recognised alongside other festivals. Although not in Victoria Square, we have managed to bring the Festival back into the City Centre with this year’s Refugee Week takeover of Symphony Hall and Launch event at the Library of Birmingham, both well attended by refugees and asylum seekers along with the general public showing solidarity.

Celebrating Sanctuary has a committed team and network of artists and creatives who keep the organisation going and bringing forward exciting ideas. We will continue to grow, creating more opportunities for future engagement, for artists, participants and audiences as we head into 2023 and beyond.

The Archive

The CSB Archive is a celebration of the past twenty years and is a space where we’ve explored our heritage: documenting hundreds of photographs, our collection of festival programmes and flyers, sharing some of the festivals, performances and projects we have been involved with over the past twenty years.  Our primary goal was to create this archive to share our collection with audiences and reflect on how Celebrating Sanctuary Birmingham has changed over time.