Extant Evolve – the next 25 years!
To mark Extant’s 25th anniversary in 2022, Extant is changing and taking on the task of succession planning for new leadership within the company. Our focus therefore will alter in 2023-2026, from producing high impact touring productions, to innovations in organisational development necessary to spawn new disabled leadership talent to innovate the arts sector. We aim over the next three years to lead this in an intelligent, robust, and responsible way, that documents our vast, unique experience and harnesses this in new ways of incubating learning and ultimately creates systemic change for the arts sector.
Extant has come to be known for its radical pioneering work, and during 2023-2026 we aim to take a pro-active lead in creating an answer to the under-representation of disabled leaders in the arts, offering the company as a nurturing and advocacy hub where the next visually impaired Artistic Directors can learn in a safe supportive environment and where they can expand their creative ideas, increase their knowledge about the industry and co-create the future of the company.
The next three year period for Extant will be about Building Sustainable Change in the following three ways :
- By continuing our position as a bespoke ‘go-to’ organisation that delivers unique arts experiences and training for visually impaired performers and audiences informed by a visually impaired lived experience.
- By becoming a training hub for the next visually impaired Artistic Directors of the future
- By consolidating the work of the company over the last 25 years into formal research and evaluating this transition phase to support sector awareness of new succession modelling.
Activity
In 2023-2026 we will create two consecutive 15-month Trainee Artistic Director opportunities (TAD) for visually impaired talent. Our current Artistic Director and CEO will move into a more supervisory and research role in the company, consulting with the TADs while working on a PHD to document the back-catalogue of Extant’s work over the last 25 years which will leave a legacy archive for the future.
Extant will work with Middlesex University and Queen Mary University London Business School on supporting the PhD, evaluating the training of the new Trainee Artistic Directors, and work towards the creation of a new MA at Middlesex in innovation in company organisational development, using this model proposed by Extant as it’s main source of reference.