West Midlands Creative Alliance is a partnership programme, funded by the LSC, (and is the only artist-led LSC initiative we are aware of), seeking to enable artists to successfully develop their practice.

The programme runs over three months, with groups of 30 or so artists working together, creating new work for a show at the end of the programme. we then map business skills around planning, marketing, networking and self employment around the artists practice.

The programme runs with three 'strands', visual arts, administered by, Lara Ratnaraja, Nicola Shipley and other mentors, photography by Seeing the Light, Rhonda Wilson and Max Kandhola, and our strand, unsurprisingly named the 'off the wall' group. Our mentors include Lee Griffiths and Sandra Hall, as well as the legendary Harry Palmer

We are now on our fifth 'cycle' and the programme has proved more successful than we had hoped with our former graduates gaining confidence, commissions, collaborations, but most importantly a focus on the future and the skills to enable to map themselves into it. We're noticing a lot more arts activity in the city as a consequence of the programme and are committed to maintaining the project into the future.

Visit www.creativealliance.org.uk for more details and to register your interest. the programme is free, but we operate a selective process and will only take on participants who are committed to completing the programme.