Holding Space is a mentoring programme for artists and freelancers working in the young audiences sector in Scotland. Each selected mentee is offered up to five paid sessions with an artistic mentor to explore a specific area of practice between October 2021 and October 2022.
As this is artistic mentoring, the project focuses on freelancers with an artistic practice within theatre and dance and who have a specific area or question they would like to explore with a mentor. This encompasses those who create performances, playwrights or those involved in any aspect of the creative process such as sound designers or costume designers.
Ten mentees and mentors have been selected after call outs in partnership with Birds of Paradise Theatre, Solar Bear and Bijli Productions to ensure the programme is open to artists across the sector. Artists were selected by a panel consisting of three independent artists and industry professionals - Briana Pegado, Eoin McKenzie and Priyanka Jha.
Holding Space is supported by the PLACE programme, a partnership between the Scottish Government - through Creative Scotland - the City of Edinburgh Council and the Edinburgh Festivals.