At the end of September 2014, the two UK-wide organisations that specifically support and represent local creative cultural activity, Voluntary Arts and Arts Development UK, will be launching a major new initiative to:

• collect evidence of existing innovative local collaborative practice to sustain and develop local cultural infrastructure and then promote best practice;

• provide a space for discussion of potential solutions to the problems facing local cultural infrastructure and organisation and the debate on the nature of the cultural commons that we aspire to in the future;

• empower and support the voice of those ‘local’ ambitions in debates on future national cultural policies, structures and funding.

The main task of this contract is to undertake an initial mapping and scoping exercise to gather, collate and edit input from Arts Development UK members, as well as Voluntary Arts staff and advisers (across the UK and Republic of Ireland). We want to collect a range of models of innovative local collaborative practice to sustain and develop local cultural infrastructure, including examples from urban, rural, prosperous, disadvantaged and diverse communities – identifying local examples that could be used in influencing national cultural policy, structures and funding.

The task will involve a period of research and information-gathering, follow-up by phone, and analysis, to create a summary document detailing the overall findings and identifying potential case studies. Several of these case studies will then be selected by Voluntary Arts and Arts Development UK, to be developed by the consultant for online publication. The consultant will work closely with the Chair of Voluntary Arts, Peter Stark OBE, and the Chair of Arts Development UK, Jane Wilson, who are jointly leading theOur Cultural Commonsinitiative.

For more information and to apply