Three creative tech projects are awarded funding by the Studio Innovation Fund
We are delighted to announce that three projects have been awarded £10k each from the 2024 Studio Innovation Fund.
This year’s £30k fund was designed to support collaboration and partnerships between Studio Residents and external individuals and organisations to explore creative technology solutions that address pressing social issues.
The 2024 Innovation Fund projects are:
The Un-Truths
Jack Stoddart is the creative lead of Ramshacklicious, a theatre company that creates unique, inclusive, contemporary theatrical experiences for the outdoors and repurposed spaces. Partnering with Common Wealth Theatre, this project aims to empower people to access and create innovative, cutting edge visual, musical, and digital performance that supports alternative and unheard voices to be heard.
Make Good Humans
James Levelle, filmmaker and adventurer, has partnered with web and brand designer, Joseph Lavington, to prototype a one-stop-shop web-tool to revolutionise volunteering. This project will explore building an interactive online map and use creative approaches to capture the stories and voices of grassroots groups to connect them with interested volunteers, starting in the BANES area.
A Matter of Opportunity
Jenny Ford, founder of Materials in Mind has partnered with Nick James, Director of Sustainability at Futureground, to address the countless un(der)-used buildings in communities by exploring a new creative use of an increasingly common 3D space capture technology. Their aim is to disrupt currently closed and complex building curation and reimagination processes to unlock increased social, environmental and economic value.
Proposals were assessed by Jane Prophet, Co-Director Centre for Cultural and Creative Industries, Anna Garner, Principal Business Development Officer at B&NES, and Nona Hunter, Creative Industries Lead & Create Growth Programme Manager at West of England Combined Authority.
The Studio Innovation Fund was first launched in 2021 to help creative tech start-ups recover after the Covid-19 pandemic. The fund has now supported a total of 21 creative tech projects that address social causes, with £100k of funding. These projects have helped young people re-engage with learning through the creative use of AI; helped visually impaired people connect with each other through sound and movement; made theatre productions more accessible for neurodivergent artists; and raised awareness of the unethical patenting of botany and the indigenous communities affected via AR and performance.
The fund has had a significant impact on our Residents’ businesses and the wider community. It aims to support Studio Residents who are typically freelancers, micro-businesses, social enterprises and third sector organisations, based in Bath & North East Somerset (B&NES), to progress their creative technology project ideas. Supported by Bath Spa University’s strategic Centre for Cultural and Creative Industries, the fund utilises a UKRI Policy Support Fund grant from Research England.
Find out more about the Studio Innovation Fund here.