Newcastle’s Live Theatre is seeking an Executive Director and an Artistic Director who will work together as joint CEOs. The new appointees will replace outgoing Chief Executive, Jim Beirne, who announced he was stepping down in February but agreed to stay on to steer the company through the pandemic when it struck in March, and Artistic Director Joe Douglas, who leaves Live Theatre this November.
The phased recruitment will see the appointment of an Executive Director in December 2020 and then the recruitment of the new Artistic Director from January 2021.
The new Executive Director will be an experienced arts leader who will maintain Live Theatre's key stakeholder relationships and develop new partnerships, be commercially 'savvy' and oversee the property portfolio and finances. The new Artistic Director will be a creative professional with a significant track record of creating exciting work in a variety of settings, who want to engage with new approaches to making work and engaging communities.
Live Theatre recently received £430,000 from the Culture Recovery Fund to support the organisation through to March 2021, and one of the first tasks for the new leadership team will be to steer the next National Portfolio Organisation submission to Arts Council England.
“Live Theatre has always been innovative, entrepreneurial and bold, and an ambassador for the cultural sector regionally and nationally,” said Lucy Winskell OBE, Chair of the Board, “and with the new partnership of Executive Director and Artistic Director it will continue to be so. In addition to the creative programme and our outreach into diverse communities, we have built our reputation for breaking new ground by creating a model for long term sustainability. The Trustees will all do everything we can to support the Executive and Artistic Directors and to create the conditions for success.”
The deadline for the role of Executive Director is 10:00 on Monday 30 November 2020 and the deadline for the role of Artistic Director is 10:00 on Monday 18 January 2021. For more information, including details of the salaries, see the jobs section of the company’s web site.