Arts / Shetland Arts to focus on funding artistic talent in isles
Chief executive Graeme Howell says ‘creative community of Shetland has some amazingly brilliant ideas’
PUTTING money into the hands of local creative talent is what Shetland Arts “want to focus on”, its chief executive has said.
Ten projects received a share of £46,000 through the charity’s Creative Shetland fund in February.
But Graeme Howell said that 47 applicants were actually looking for up to £350,000 in funding for their projects.
With Shetland Arts receiving two major funding boosts over the last six months – first from Shetland Charitable Trust (SCT), then Creative Scotland – it is looking to ensure Shetland’s creatives can get the money they need to deliver their works.
“The main thing we want to do with the Creative Scotland funding is continue to focus on commissioning,” Howell told Shetland News.
“We want to move that money through into creative’s hands through performances, or workshops, or anything like that.
“The thing we’ve learned over the last five years is the creative community of Shetland has some amazingly brilliant ideas.
“To continue commissioning them to do what their passions are, to do what they’re good at, is really what we want to focus on.”
Howell was speaking exclusively to Shetland News about the charity’s plans for the coming years, as well as:
- The renovation of Bonhoga
- Mareel’s cinemas
- Indoor gigs and Hogmanay plans
- The potential return of festivals such as Wordplay
Shetland Arts has come through a difficult winter which often saw the Mareel café bar closed due to a lack of staff, leading to strong criticism on social media.
However the café bar has returned to normal opening hours – staff sickness aside – since December.
Coupled with the return of indoor standing gigs at Mareel, and funding boosts of £1.05 million from SCT and £358,905 from Creative Scotland, that adds up to a “very positive time for Shetland Arts” Howell says.
“It really is a good time for Shetland Arts and the creative community in Shetland,” he said.
“We’re feeling very upbeat and positive. It feels like things are beginning to recover in terms of the shows that we want to put on.
“I’m so proud of what we’ve done over the last couple of years, particularly in terms of getting money out into creative’s hands.”
Howell said that had been a “real change in how Shetland Arts operates”, adding he felt it had a “really positive impact on the creative community in Shetland”.
The focus now is finding ways to deliver funding into the hands of creative people in Shetland.
Shetland Arts has previously said a three-year commissioning programme was being planned to launch this summer, and Howell said that was likely to follow along the lines of the Creative Shetland fund.
He said the fact there was a £350,000 ask against £46,000 of funding for that scheme showed “the challenges of being a creative in a remote community like Shetland”.
Howell had said last year that Shetland Arts would look to put a new structure in place once it knew what its funding situation was for the year ahead.
However he told Shetland News that had not happened yet.
“We’re obviously keen to put a structure in place for the next five years,” he said.
“We’re still working with colleagues on what that might look like. We’d rather get it right than rush it.”
He stressed they were “always looking for new trustees to help shape that” too.
Cinemas
At the cinemas there have been ups and downs so far this year. Bridget Jones brought audiences flocking back to Mareel, but Disney’s Snow White – and its poor reviews – scared them away again.
However a film about the hugely popular game Minecraft looks to have captured the attention of families, with screenings near-packed.
Howell said there was a “quiet optimism” in the cinema industry about 2025 after a “challenging” 2024.
“We’re operating at about 78 per cent of where we were pre-pandemic, but 2018 and 2019 were the most successful years cinema has ever seen in this country,” he said.
“So using that as your baseline might not be your best approach.”
Asked if it was frustrating to see a tentpole film like Snow White get critically panned when small cinemas often rely on releases like that, Howell said the industry was “long in tooth”.
“We’ve always had, ‘this film is going to save us’, ‘this film is going to kill us’, that’s the never-ending story.
“A Barbie and an Oppenheimer and a Dune, those are rare moments.
“We put on an incredibly diverse programme because we’re trying to serve a very broad audience.
“Cinema is a congregational moment. It’s about coming to see stuff with your mates, having a drink in the bar and getting torn into it afterwards.
“There’s a lot more to cinema than worrying about what reviews Snow White’s got.”
Mareel’s café and cinemas do not open on a Monday, but the rest of the building is for staff and students.
Howell said they were unlikely to change that for the tourist season in the summer, because they were “not seeing the demand” for it.
“There’s lots of other businesses that can serve that need in Shetland. It’s not something you can rely on,” he said.
“It’s [tourism] not our primary purpose – our primary purpose is to serve the residents of Shetland.”
Standing gigs
The return of indoor standing gigs at Mareel – made possible by 11 people completing training to become door staff in January – has been widely welcomed, with The Plonkys set to play a sold-out gig at the venue in late May.
The music festival Boppapalooza will also use the space for its headline gig a week prior as promoters flock back to the auditorium.
Howell said Shetland Arts were unlikely to organise many of their own standing gigs, adding that was “not something [they] did a lot of” before.
“Standing gigs have always been the kind of purview of the local promoters, and they’re very keen,” he said.
“We’ll continue to support what they want to do and see how the market evolves.”
One standing gig Shetland Arts did organise was its Hogmanay event, which in recent years has moved to the bar instead.
The Shetland Arts chief executive said they were going to discuss their Hogmanay plans in the coming months.
But he admitted the model they had used previously in the auditorium would “probably be too expensive to do now”.
Festivals and Bonhoga work
2024 was a fallow year for arts festivals such as Wordplay and offshoot Shetland Noir, with no word yet from the trust on whether either will return this year.
Howell said, however, that there were “announcements to come in the next couple of months”.
He said Shetland Arts were “keen to take a very flexible approach to festivals”.
“When there are things that are very relevant for us to celebrate in Shetland we will do those things, as opposed to the metronomic ‘we will do this every year’,” he added.
“I don’t think that gives a creative organisation the opportunity it needs to be creative.”
Shetland News reported late last month that work had now started on renovating Bonhoga art gallery and café in the West Mainland, with hopes construction would be completed by the end of the year.
Howell said they were hoping that the building would be able to open again in spring 2026.
Bonhoga closed in late 2023 for the work, which Shetland Arts initially hoped would be completed last year, with major works taking place to make the historic building more energy efficient and accessible.
The Shetland Arts chief admitted these things “take longer than you ever hope they will”.
But he said the work would “secure the site for the next 20-30 odd years”, which he called a “really brilliant thing for Shetland”.
“We had the opportunity to do the work because of the brilliant capital grant scheme that the charitable trust ran,” he said.
“We’d have been stupid not to take it.”
Anyone interested in becoming a trustee at Shetland Arts should apply here.
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