The British Council works with best festivals in Yogyakarta to develop promotional and marketing concepts and bring festivals in Yogyakarta to the higher level © British Council Indonesia

British Council encourages innovations in Indonesia Arts and Culture Promotion through Yogyakarta City Branding & Festival Management, a capacity building programme that supports festival managers & city government in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, to better manage, promote and support the city’s wealth of high quality cultural festivals.

Since June 2014, British Council has been working closely with best festivals in Yogyakarta to develop promotional and marketing concepts and bring festivals in Yogyakarta to the higher level. Two previous workshops have been delivered to fulfil the needs of festivals managers and organisers, continuing two Forum Group Discussions that were held before the programme started.

The first workshop in December 2014 has successfully been delivered by Shona McCarthy, Director, Derry~Londonderry City of Cultureas the facilitator, while the second workshop, held in early March 2015 invited two speakers from the region to share their experiences on organising international festivals: Joe Sidek, Director, George Town Festival, Penang, Malaysia and Janet de Neefe, Founder/Director, Ubud Writers and Readers Festival.

During the workshops, the festival directors have covered fundamental things on building up the collaboration such as mapping out the brand DNA of Yogyakarta, stakeholders and funding challenges and strategic planning process for creating sustainable festivals and many more.

The two workshops have also stimulated the participants to unite in a forum in order to realise the joint promotion initiative under the brand name of ‘jogjafestivals’. Through this programme, British Council hopes to give contribution to build a new image of Yogyakarta as “the Festival City” as currently the forum is preparing for the grand design of ‘jogjafestivals’ and aiming to launch this pilot programme by this year.

For the third workshop, British Council is proud to invite James McVeigh, Head of Marketing and Innovation, Festivals Edinburgh to share the concept of joint festival promotion and marketing as well as the impact of Festival City for the economy and tourism to 18 (eighteen) festival directors. The workshop will be held in Yogyakarta on Wednesday - Friday, 22 - 24 April 2015.

During his visit, James will also talk at one day seminar for festival organisers in Solo that will be held on Saturday, 25 April 2015 at ISI Surakarta. 

 

ABOUT JAMES MCVEIGH

Born and raised in Ireland, James travelled to his first festival at the age of four with his family of nine in an old Morris Minor, leaving him with a love of festivals and a dislike of car travel. He joined Festivals Edinburgh as Head of Marketing and Innovation following senior management roles with a number of organisations, including Salisbury International Festival, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Society and Arts Council England where he had lead responsibility for regional funding programmes of £25m. His interest in festivals as a key element of the cultural infrastructure has led him to develop various festival policy contexts and international festival partnerships including the European Festival Research Programme. 

In his current role with Festivals Edinburgh, a uniquely collaborative organisation, he works to sustain and develop the position of Edinburgh as the world’s leading festival city—which now sees the Festivals host each year over 25,000 world class artists, more than 1000 accredited media and audiences of 4m+ while generating £260 million (€305m) for the Scottish economy. James is also a Trustee of the Edinburgh UNESCO City of Literature Trust and sits on the board of New Media Scotland.

 

ABOUT FESTIVALS EDINBURGH

Festivals Edinburgh is the strategic umbrella organisation set up by the Directors of Edinburgh’s Festivals in 2007.  Its sole focus is to maintain the Festivals’ and the Festival City’s global competitive edge, via major collaborative projects and strategic initiatives. The Festivals Edinburgh Board is made up of the 12 Festival CEOs or Directors; and each Festivals Edinburgh work strand is directed and supported by collaborative working groups made up of staff members from the Festivals themselves. All work is dependent not only on the core Festivals Edinburgh team but on a strong commitment to collaborative working and on a sense of shared ambition and responsibility across all 12 member festivals. 

 

LIST OF PARTICIPATING FESTIVALS AND ORGANISERS IN YOGYAKARTA FESTIVAL FORUM

  • Artjog/Heri Pemad Art Management
  • Asia Tri Jogja
  • Bedog Arts Festival / Miroto
  • Biennale Jogja / Yogyakarta Biennale Foundation
  • Cellsbutton/ House of Natural Fiber
  • Festival Film Dokumenter
  • Festival Kesenian Yogyakarta / Dinas Pariwisata dan Kebudayaan DI Yogyakarta
  • Festival Layang-Layang Nasional / Perkalin (Perkumpulan Pekarya Layang-Layang Indonesia)
  • Jogja Blues Explosion / Jogja Blues Forum
  • Jogjakarta International Performing Arts Festival (JIPA)
  • Jogja-Netpac Asian Film Festival
  • Kasongan Arts Festival
  • Kustomfest
  • Ngayogjazz / Wartajazz
  • Pesta Boneka / Papermoon Puppet Theatre
  • Tembi Musik Festival / Forum Musik Tembi
  • Yogyakarta Contemporary Music Festival
  • Yogyakarta Gamelan Festival

WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT THE PROGRAMME

"This City Branding & Festival Management Workshop is very useful especially for festivals' organizers, not only to share experiences and enhance our knowledge about festivals, but also to raise organizers' awareness of their huge potential as their role to promote a city (that is rich in cultures and arts) by optimizing things they have been doing and to work hand in hand with all stake holders. With this workshop, we realize that if we want to promote our city potential, what we have to do is to move altogether to build sinergy and to make networks as widely as possible to create a brand for the city,”

              - Ajie Wartono, Board of Creative, Ngayogjazz

“Jogja festivals is a festivals information platform in Jogjakarta that allows to interact with global community, festivals diversity as regional asset has a broad range in knowledge, culture, and socioeconomy enhancement. British Council as the facilitator gives space for festivals organizers in jogja to brainstorm ideas through workshops with city branding experts and festivals directors around the world, to give insights and establishing the programs of Jogja festivals,”

               - Aan Fikriyan, Vice Director, Kustomfest

“To meet the festivals' producers in jogja in this workshop ensures me that the people of this city are indeed very creative. We need to intensively meet and renew our strategy to attract more people outside jogja to experience the creative dynamic of this city,”

               - Yustina Neni, Director, Yayasan Yogyakarta Biennale

 

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