Community Partners
Attenborough Arts Centre’s Community Partners programme brings together a range of Leicester creative organisations to deliver weekly participatory activity for our local communities.
Our Community Partners bring a range of expertise to deliver participatory programmes which are inclusive and accessible. Attenborough Arts Centre works individually and collectively with our Community Partners to identify additional ways of collaborating together and creating exciting new opportunities for our participants.
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Bright Sparks
ArtSpace
A visual arts drop-in for targeted mental health service users with severe and enduring mental health. Currently supported by Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust (LPT).
Showcase Collective
This is a Attenborough Arts Centre-based creative writing side of Showcase Smoothie – an award winning literature and music based project, predominantly targeting Black men with experience of mental health issues. It is led by Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust (LPT) and partnered by a range of arts, health and education organisations locally and nationally.
Comedy Asylum
The Comedy Asylum is one of BrightSparks’ longest running projects. Led by Rob Gee, the project started out as an annual programme of workshops using improvisation to write a show for the Leicester Comedy Festival each February. Alongside core delivery at AAC, Comedy Asylum now delivers regular comedy courses in Leicester and Leicestershire, including at the Recovery College. They also work in psychiatric hospitals in Northamptonshire and Nottinghamshire, having expanded the team to include local comedians Matt Hollins and Kirsty Munro.
WORD!
WORD! is a poetry and spoken word voluntary organisation uniquely co-produced by an NHS Trust, LPT, and delivering one of the longest running poetry and spoken word events in the UK. The eponymously named ’WORD!’ takes place, usually, on the last Thursday of the month at Attenborough Arts Centre – where WORD! has been in residence since 2018.
![Movers Shirt](https://attenborougharts.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Movers-Shirt-e1723804662942.jpg)
Movers Theatre Company
![VALUES](https://attenborougharts.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/VALUES.png)
Tea Dance by Values (Voluntary Action Leicester)
VAL provides advice, support and training to charities and community groups across Leicester and Leicestershire.
With around 2,400 registered charities and an estimated 3,800 grassroots community organisations across the city and county, VAL helps charities to reach their potential and continue delivering vital services within local communities.
![ID-Dance](https://attenborougharts.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/ID-Dance-e1723804723130.jpg)
ID Dance Co. produced by We Are Epic
We Are Epic
We Are Epic explores new ways to develop high-quality inclusive dance practice in the UK and internationally, brokering innovative international collaborations and exchanges which support and develop diverse artists with different bodies, minds and backgrounds.
We Are Epic has over 23 years of experience of working in the arts. Between them they have danced, directed, toured, produced, created multiple brands and social enterprises, launched and developed the careers of multiple artists and arts professionals, managed international tours and project managed international development and educational theatre projects.
They have worked with and consulted for leading cultural institutions such as UNICEF, WaterAid, University of Leicester, British Council and the BBC. Their UK home is Leicester, but you’ll find them delivering projects in Amman, Cambodia and Indonesia and anywhere else in between.
We Are Epic believes that everyone deserves the opportunity to grow and develop no matter what their background. We all live under the same sky and opportunities to grow and connect should be limitless.
What do We Are Epic do?
Uncover: We uncover talent from under-represented groups
Develop: We develop artists by removing barriers and responding to individual needs
Connect: We connect and support artists with new opportunities, possibilities and experiences
Collaborate: We create unique collaborations and exchanges between the UK and Southeast Asia