Giving back: Interview with Jude Kelly
As artistic director of London’s renowned Southbank Centre, Liverpool-born Jude Kelly is recognised as one of the most powerful women working in the British arts scene today. An award-winning director of over 40 productions for stage and screen including a number for the Royal Shakespeare Company, in 2015 Jude was recognised for her services to the arts with a CBE in the New Year Honours list.
A creative role at the recent International Festival for Business 2016 (IFB2016) brought Jude back to her hometown with the aim of helping the festival better connect with the people of Liverpool. Your Move caught up with Jude to discuss her work with the festival, her memories of growing up in Liverpool and the responsibility she feels to use her position to help women of future generations.
When you were appointed creative director for IFB2016 you said you wanted to make the festival connect with the people of Liverpool. Do you feel you achieved this?
With or without me the festival brought thousands of people to Liverpool and Liverpool is an amazing place. Just the opportunity to make them walk about and see the architecture both old and new is fantastic. We tried to make visitors link up with all the cultural activities here and show them what the nightlife is like – there was a strong push to say, ‘this is a place that could have abiding memories for you, not just of your business but of you enjoying your own life’. Liverpool is nothing if not full of life. Another thing is that the more the festival speaks of new ideas, of innovation, then the more people associate Liverpool with a place that’s courageous, brave and modern. The third thing is the warmth of the welcome. Liverpool people really are affectionate and chatty. The hosts here are wonderful, it doesn’t feel corporate. When you go to some of these other international conferences it can all feel so professional but cold. We set out to be professional but human and warm. I’m certainly having discussions about coming back next year. I feel very loyal to this and I think it’s an outstanding idea which can keep building.
How did growing up here in Liverpool shape your career in the arts?
I was in Liverpool all the way through my childhood and teenage years and it has given me so much which I have been able to build on for my future. I now just really want to do the same and give something back. I did so many things in Liverpool, both as a child and as a teenager. When I was a little girl I went to ballet classes on Upper Parliament Street and saw my first play at the Everyman. By the time I was a teenager I was hanging around the Philharmonic pub, singing backing vocals with Adrian Henri and that crowd. One of the most wonderful memories I have is going on rainy Sundays to the museum and seeing this giant crab! You know, things that you remember forever.
How has Liverpool’s cultural offering changed since your childhood here?
Liverpool, of course, went through a period where it was really challenged – challenged economically, challenged politically and it was challenged in its very soul I think, in terms of its confidence. A huge amount has changed since that point, sometimes you have to get to the bottom to find out what you’re fighting for. I now think Liverpool has a really rich cultural life again but it can still strengthen it. We’ve got the Tate, the Everyman, the Playhouse, FACT and many great things but I think you’ve always got to attend to the ecosystem. It’s about allowing the small things to grow and it’s about opportunities at educational level for children to feel that their imagination really counts. I think it’s so important that Liverpool recognises that its cultural offering for its own people makes it possible for them to think ‘the world is my oyster here’. You don’t want to feel as though you have to leave your city to experience life. Your city has to give you life and I think Liverpool does that for people but needs to do more of it.
Will the result of the recent EU referendum affect the arts here in the UK?
It could definitely affect the Southbank Centre. There is a huge number of European people working in the Southbank Centre and all over the arts and there is a huge number of Brits working all over Europe. If you start saying people have to leave or come back then it will definitely change a lot of things. At the moment we do some big programmes with Europe and they would maybe have to come to an end. As a nation we’re no less creative today than we were before voting to leave the EU. We are still as creative, as dynamic and as exciting but it definitely sends a message to Europe that we’re more insular than I think we are or want to be.
Men dominate positions at the top of many of the UK’s major art and cultural institutions. Do you feel a certain sense of responsibility as a female in charge of the Southbank Centre?
If you’re in a position like I am as a woman, I feel I do have a responsibility to help the next generation of girls and women because someone got girls the vote – I didn’t, someone got girls an education – I didn’t, so what can I do? When I was little I couldn’t look around and see any women directors of plays, which is what I wanted to do. I couldn’t see any women at the top of organisations apart from Indira Gandhi who was Prime Minister of India and Golda Meir who was the Prime Minister of Israel. It was very strange because it made you think ‘Are we not allowed? Are we not welcome?’. Gradually you realise there are historical reasons and then you start saying, ‘I’m going to get past these reasons’. Girls must be helped to realise that their potential is not contained within an idea or that they need to be as great as they can be for second best. They need to feel they can be as great as they can be, full stop.
