Remembering Peter Stark, arts ‘genius’, who has died
The death has been announced of Peter Stark OBE, influential former director of Northern Arts – the regional arts body before it was merged with the national Arts Council England in 2002 – and a key figure in shaping the region’s current arts landscape.
Peter’s energy and foresight, according to successor Andrew Dixon, ensured that when the National Lottery started in 1994, generating money for good causes, the North East was primed to make its pitch.
The following year, The Case for Capital was given a high profile London launch. Based on research Peter had initiated, it called for significant investment in the North East arts infrastructure to redress a startling national imbalance.
This would result in ambitious projects such as Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, The Glasshouse International Centre for Music and Gateshead Millennium Bridge, along with other initiatives.
It would see more than £200 million being invested to bring about what some have called a renaissance in the region, making it a case study for culture-led regeneration projects around the world.
Closer to home, it boosted North East participation in the arts, increased its popularity as a tourist destination and fuelled the ambition that would lead to Newcastle and Gateshead jointly bidding to be European Capital of Culture 2008.
Hadrian’s Wall gets £5.7m boost
Two projects designed to unlock the economic and cultural potential of Hadrian’s Wall have been backed by a £5.7m funding boost.
By modernising visitor access across a 33-mile stretch in Northumberland, the Hadrian’s Wall Visitor Exploration project will integrate new physical and digital information hubs across 42 locations.
The Northumberland investment will also support the development of a new 1.94km cycle route alongside the Military Road, which connects the Wall directly to the Reivers Trails network, Kielder Water and Forest Park, NCN 68 Pennine Cycleway and the Haltwhistle active travel hub.
The Discover Hadrian’s Wall West project will introduce 68 heritage-themed interpretation points and physical and digital wayfinding across 10 trail locations, bringing part of the invisible heritage to life through virtual and augmented reality animation via an app with a bird’s-eye wayfinding interactive map. Read more
Newcastle Theatre Royal joins £27m national programme to open doors for young people
Newcastle Theatre Royal has been named as one of 12 theatres across England joining forces with the National Theatre in a £27m initiative designed to introduce more young people to the performing arts and help them pursue careers in the creative industries.
The four-year National Theatre Nationwide programme aims to reach more than 100,000 young people, offering opportunities ranging from acting, directing and playwriting to backstage skills and technical careers.
It will also provide subsidised £10 theatre tickets, productions created for young audiences, school tours and workshops, with a new Nationwide Youth Council giving young people a say in future activities.
The investment comes from the Government’s Dormant Assets Scheme, which redirects money from unused financial accounts to good causes, alongside fundraising by the National Theatre.
Tom A. Smith announces debut album and opens up about lifelong heart condition
Sunderland musician Tom A. Smith has announced his long-awaited debut album, The Golden Gates, and spoken publicly for the first time in a long time about living with a rare, life-limiting heart condition.
The 22-year-old singer-songwriter, who has been performing since childhood, was born with hypoplastic left heart syndrome, meaning he has only one functioning side of his heart.
By the age of four, he had undergone five life-saving open-heart operations, and he knows further medical intervention lies ahead.
In a personal statement accompanying the album announcement, Tom reveals how he spent much of his childhood ashamed of the surgical scars on his chest, even pretending to be ill to avoid swimming lessons and PE.
“I was scared of it. I couldn’t look at it in the mirror, I would pretend to be ill as a kid so I could miss things like swimming lessons or PE lessons because I was so scared of what the other children’s reactions may be,” he says. Read more
Review: Billy Elliot the Musical at Sunderland Empire
There are some shows you can return to again and again, knowing exactly what’s coming, and still find yourself completely undone.
For me, Billy Elliot the Musical is one of them.
I first encountered it in early 2005, spending a day in rehearsals ahead of its West End premiere. The resulting feature became the cover story for the second edition of The Journal’s Culture magazine, with a distinctive photograph of Tim Healy (Billy’s original Dad) leaning against a rehearsal room mirror.
A few weeks later, I saw a preview performance. I was recently motherless myself, so the scene involving the letter Billy’s mam left him was always going to be difficult. But I wasn’t prepared for quite how thoroughly the whole production would dismantle me.
Ten years later, when the show came to Sunderland, it happened again.
And now, another decade on, Billy Elliot is back at the Empire, launching a national tour which will take it back to the West End for a six-month run. This time, I had a teenage daughter beside me to lean on. And, as it turned out, to share a pack of tissues with.
The intervening years have done nothing to diminish this remarkable piece of musical theatre.
A place at the table: how creativity is bringing Sunderland’s communities together
There will be food, conversation and creativity on the menu when a group of Sunderland women invite their neighbours to an autumn feast on Saturday (November 14).
Around 70 people from different backgrounds and generations are expected at St Michael’s Community Centre in Grangetown for the sold out Autumn Mother Table Community Gathering, featuring homemade dishes, artwork and activities designed to get people talking.
But the evening is about much more than sharing a meal. It marks another milestone in a partnership between the International Community Organisation of Sunderland (ICOS) and The Cultural Spring which has helped women explore their heritage, build friendships and take charge of their own creative projects. Read more
Live Theatre producer shortlisted for national playwriting prize
Live Theatre’s artist development producer John Dawson has been shortlisted for the inaugural Climate Playwriting Prize, organised by Shakespeare’s Globe in partnership with Climate Spring and Fern Culture.
His play, Llandonna Witches, is among ten selected from 614 submissions for the award, which celebrates new writing exploring the climate crisis.
The winner, announced at Shakespeare’s Globe on November 27, will receive £15,000 and dramaturgical support to develop their work.
The judging panel includes Sir Lenny Henry, playwright Lucy Kirkwood and Globe artistic director Michelle Terry.
REVIEW: Pitman, Eliot Smith Dance, Alnwick Playhouse
If you want an example of a brilliant idea charmingly executed, look no further than this gently evolving piece by Eliot Smith Dance (ESD).
Its gentle evolution has actually spanned a decade but this was the first time I’d seen it, joining an appreciative matinee audience.
That brilliant idea involves using some of the paintings by the pitmen painters of the Ashington Group (they’re on permanent display at Woodhorn Museum) as an inspirational springboard.
So what you get is a sequence of sections or vignettes (the original six having become 10), each inspired by a different painting and danced to different music.
Rather like the Woodhorn exhibition, it offers glimpses of life in a mining community in the 1930s and ’40s.
Royal honour for Beamish chief executive
Beamish chief executive Rhiannon Hiles has received her CBE from the Prince of Wales at Windsor Castle, recognising her services to museums and the North East’s culture and heritage.
Rhiannon, who joined Beamish as a volunteer in 1995 and became chief executive in 2021, wore an Edwardian-inspired outfit created by the museum’s costume team for the occasion.
The honour follows a landmark year for the County Durham attraction, which welcomed more than 815,000 visitors in 2025 and was crowned Art Fund Museum of the Year. Read more
Troubled waters for seabirds
Declines in several seabird species have been revealed by the annual census on the Farne Islands following an exceptionally difficult winter in the North Atlantic.
This year’s count by National Trust rangers recorded declines in puffins by 12%, from 38,559 to 33,939 breeding pairs, and European shags by 42%, from 96 to 56 breeding pairs.
Arctic terns dropped 27%, from 519 to 377 breeding pairs, northern fulmars declined 21%, from 235 to 186 breeding pairs, and common guillemots fell 11%, from 44,059 to 39,059 individuals.
Longer-term monitoring also points to a downward trend, with the puffin population declining by 22.8% since 2018 despite some year-to-year fluctuations. Similar declines have also been recorded at neighbouring puffin colonies, suggesting the pressures facing puffins extend beyond the Farne Islands. Read more
Crafting a future for the past
Craftspeople in Northumberland have rallied behind a new exhibition which highlights heritage skills and how they can become lost or endangered.
Which is good news for horn carvers and hand papermakers everywhere.
The event, Lost and Endangered Crafts from November 3 to December 13 (and reopening from January 12 to 31) at the Bailiffgate Museum and Gallery in Alnwick, will combine material from the museum archives – such as a Northumberland framed quilt, corn dollies and a dressed stick with a horned snake head – with work by today’s local makers and artisans. Read more
A snowman for every day of Christmas
Artists have lined up 12 snowmen in the grounds of a Northumberland visitor attraction as part of its festive season events.
The sculpture trail at English Heritage’s Belsay Hall and Gardens sees the giant snowmen represent the Twelve Days of Christmas and will be in place until January 10.
The trail has been developed in collaboration with Wild in Art and includes a trail map for visitors. The snowmen are just one of the seasonal attractions at Belsay, with a Christmas craft fair and a special literary tour also on the programme. Read more
Four for the gig diary
A flurry of announcements has added some 2027 dates to the North East’s live entertainment calendar.
Newcastle-born Danny Robins is taking his paranormal hit Uncanny to arenas following a string of sold-out theatre tours.
The writer and broadcaster, who recently returned to his old stamping ground at the People’s Theatre during its production of his hit play 2:22 A Ghost Story, brings The Haunted Arena Tour to Newcastle’s Utilita Arena on November 1. Tickets go on sale November 16 at 10am.
Kaiser Chiefs will headline Mouth of the Tyne Festival in Tynemouth on Saturday, July 10, with special guests Rosadocs and Polyvinyl. They join Olly Murs, previously announced for Thursday, July 8.
Meanwhile, Courteeners will headline Newcastle’s In the Park Festival at Exhibition Park on July 8, supported by The Coral and Seb Lowe.
And Digital Newcastle hosts The Big Indie Fest on March 27, featuring tributes to Oasis, Arctic Monkeys, Blur and The Stone Roses and loads more.
In theatre news, as rehearsals continue for Jack and the Beanstalk, Newcastle Theatre Royal has announced Robin Hood as its 2027/28 pantomime (Nov 23-Jan 9, 2028), with the venue’s resident festive lead Danny Adams taking the title role.
He’ll be joined by Clive Webb as Friar Tuck, Chris Hayward returning for his 20th season as Dame, and South Shields singer Joe McElderry.
Festival launches competition for young illustrators
A competition for young illustrators – with prizes including cash and the chance to exhibit - has been announced as part of next year’s Northern Festival of Illustration.
Entries are open now and close on January 31, 2027.
The biennial festival, launched in 2015 and based in Hartlepool, celebrates illustration and visual storytelling.
Traditionally it showcases the work of established and emerging artists, and champions the role played by illustration across the creative industries through workshops, exhibitions and events. Read more
National Glass Centre equipment sold at auction
An auction of equipment from Sunderland’s closed National Glass Centre has reportedly raised more than £30k.
According to the BBC, the University of Sunderland expects the sale, which included kilns and furnaces, to have raised £33,266.
The auction went ahead despite objections from campaigners who questioned the disposal of equipment partly funded by public money. The university says other specialist equipment will be donated to Sunderland Culture for its planned Glassworks project.
Forgotten figures could get their place in history
Gateshead-born historian David Olusoga has welcomed changes to England’s national blue plaque scheme which will allow more overlooked figures to be recognised. Previously, buildings that had been demolished or substantially altered were ineligible for plaques.
The rule change opens the door to commemorating people associated with lost music venues, former factories and demolished homes, helping to recognise a broader range of contributions to England’s history.
Comeback for Sunderland Airshow?
Sunderland’s annual airshow could return after the city’s Reform UK-led council confirmed efforts are underway to revive the event.
The popular seafront spectacle, which attracted hundreds of thousands of visitors to Roker, last took place in 2019 before being suspended during the pandemic.
In 2022, the then Labour-led council cancelled it indefinitely, citing environmental concerns and the city’s carbon reduction commitments.
Councillor Ciera Hudspith, cabinet member for culture, tourism and heritage, has now confirmed the authority is exploring options to reinstate the airshow, although no date has been announced.
