Stendhal Festival achieves its goal of creating jobs in local area after years of hard work

When the organisers of Stendhal Festival first pitched the idea of a music and arts festival in Limavady, one of the key goals they set was to make the festival sustainable enough to create jobs.

By their own admission it has taken organisers Ross Parkhill and John Cartwright a little bit longer than they would have preferred, but for the first time since its inception in 2011 Stendhal Festival has a paid working staff.

This has been made possible thanks to partnerships between Stendhal Festival, Cultural and Creative Skills and Help Musicians N.I. as the organisations have come together to allow Stendhal to hire two full time interns.

“It has been a long road to finally being able to say that we have created jobs in Limavady, but we are here,” said Ross Parkhill.

“When we started Stendhal the country was in the grip of the credit crunch and unemployment was shooting up every day and Limavady was hit particularly hard.

“We knew even back then that our idea for a festival in the town could create full-time employment so finally reaching that goal is a giant leap forward for us.

“We created a multi-award winning festival on a 100% volunteer basis for over six years so we are really excited to see how much we can improve the event now that we have a dedicated staff working towards that goal.”

The job roles, one in Festival Operations, one in Media and Marketing have been awarded to two young women from the Limavady area, Kathryn McShane and Helena Semple.

Organiser John Cartwright said they have already been a major help with organising this year’s event.

“From an event standpoint these jobs will help our operations run a lot smoother and will allow us to broaden our search for ways to make the festival even better.

“Helena and Kathryn have settled in really well and we have already seen the benefits of having people work full time on the festival.”

John added: “We rely so heavily on volunteers giving us freely of their time it is really rewarding to finally be able to offer people a monetary reward for the work they do. The hope is now that we can have another successful festival and safeguard these positions for as long as possible.”

Sara Graham, Nations Director at Creative & Cultural Skills said: “The NI Creative Employment Programme offers funding to create new entry level jobs for young people in the creative sector. The programme is managed by Creative & Cultural Skills and supported by the Arts Council for NI Lottery Fund. So far it has invested £187,500 to help create 60 new jobs, into which employers have invested a further £387k in wages.

“This is a significant contribution to the NI economy and these jobs are making a huge difference to young people passionate about building a career in our vibrant creative sector. We are absolutely delighted at the ambition of Stendhal Festival to get involved and create two fantastic new positions in the North West. The final round of programme funding closes on the 16 June, so please do contact Creative & Cultural Skills if you are a creative business and interested in participating.”

Ross Concluded by saying a special thanks to Creative and Cultural Skills and Help Musicians NI: “Without the assistance of our partners at Creative and Cultural Skills and Help Musicians NI we would not have been able to achieve this landmark moment for our organisation.

“Genuinely from the bottom of our hearts we thank them for helping us attain what has been one of our key goals for the past eight years and for helping us create jobs in Limavady.”