Chris Bailey Named New Chair of Board at Pilot Theatre

York based Pilot Theatre have announced that they have new chair of our Board of Trustees. Following their open recruitment process the Board unanimously appointed Professor Chris Bailey who will take up the position from November 2014.

Professor Bailey has held senior management positions in art and design higher education for over thirty years, most recently as Dean of Arts, Environment and Technology at Leeds Metropolitan University. As Professor of Cultural History at Northumbria and Leeds Metropolitan Universities he has published research on cultural policy, design history and IT pedagogy in the visual arts. He established three research centres, for one of which he initiated an influential longitudinal study of cultural engagement on Tyneside and carried out studies of the Visual Arts for Arts 2000.

He has undertaken consultancy for UK based and overseas clients including Re:source, the Darlington Trust, County Carlow in Eire, and Johannesburg Development Authority and Witwatersrand University in South Africa. He advises the Hong Kong University Grants Committee on research grants in the cultural sector and recently served as a member of the European Community Panel to select the European Capital of Culture 2017.

Chris has held numerous voluntary positions in the cultural sector in the UK, including many roles over many years at West Midlands Arts. During this period he chaired five fundamental reviews of WMA, chaired the Ethnic Monitoring Committee, the Arts Policy Committee and the Public Art Working Group. He served on numerous working groups for the Council of Regional Arts Associations, participated in the Wilding Review of Arts Funding and the creation of the National Arts and Media Strategy. He has been a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts since 1992, was Chair of Live Theatre in Newcastle for five years and Vice Chair of Culture North East. He was a member of the Boards of Harrogate International Festivals and Northern Ballet.

Artistic Director, Marcus Romer, said "We are absolutely delighted to be working with Chris as we move forward as an organisation. His experience and knowledge of the sector is immense, and he is a strong advocate for the arts, learning and innovation. As an NPO we can build on the successes of our previous work with the Board and plan and develop our strategies for the future with a renewed strength and confidence."

Professor Chris Bailey said "I am very pleased to have been invited to chair the Board of Pilot Theatre. Under its Artistic Director, Marcus Romer, Pilot has always been a company with an ambitious vision and strong commitment to its audiences. Not surprisingly, Pilot's work gets rave reviews when it appears in venues around the country, while in York many associate it with awe-inspiring promenade productions such as Blood + Chocolate. Pilot stands for innovation in these and its other strands of work which include education, conference and film production.

As someone with a background in arts funding and education I recognise that it is companies like Pilot that nourish communities and make cities great. I look forward to working with the Board to support Marcus and the team at Pilot as they bring to fruition the programme of work which was recently so strongly endorsed by the Arts Council."

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