Latest additions. See the What’s New page on the Creative Stoke website [ http://www.creativestoke.org.uk/whatsnew.html ] for full web links and any images…

New! 19.06.09 Those involved in the heritage side of the cultural economy may be interested in Heritage Counts 2008, the annual English Heritage survey of the state of England’s historic environment and the services and attractions associated with it. There’s a special report on the West Midlands, along with previous West Midlands reports dating back to 2002.

New! 18.06.09 A new Midlands festival is being launched in Stratford-upon-Avon, the Falstaff International Film Festival. The submissions deadline is 15th September 09.

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New! 19.06.09 Details are now online for Stoke-on-Trent’s British Ceramics Biennial “Fresh” competitive show for work by recent graduates.

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The show will happen at the Emma Bridgewater Pottery, Stoke-on-Trent, from 3rd Oct to 13th Dec 09. Entrants must have…

“graduated in or after 2008 from Higher Education Institutes studying ceramics or related clay-based activities (including postgraduate programmes) at colleges within the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland.”

Deadline: 29th June 09. Application form here (Word .doc).

New! 19.06.09 Details are now online for Stoke-on-Trent’s British Ceramics Biennial project strands, with details of the artists who have been invited to participate…

BCB: Place will see artists make “new site-specific works, raising the profile of ceramics in the city, and giving new identity to locations.” BCB: Explore will see artists “take part in research within the ceramics industry”. BCB: Public will see community workshops across the city. BCB: Start will “support the setting up of nine new creative ceramics businesses between 2009 and 2013″. And BCB: Scrapbank will be a Recycle Resource Project in Burslem, where “discarded and surplus materials, tools, equipment and ceramics will be collected, sorted, and distributed for re-use in the BCB projects and programme”.

New! 18.06.09 Script, the regional development agency for dramatic writers in the West Midlands, is running a screenwriting workshop at the New Vic Theatre in Newcastle-under-Lyme, on 4th July 09. The day (10am to 5pm) and will be run by TV/Film Producer Claire Ingham, with Dan Lawson (Screen WM)…

“What kinds of feature films are currently being approved in the UK? Who’s funding them, and how do you get your foot on the ladder as a new writer? An overview of the films that have been made in the last few years: trends, funders, writing schemes – and how to gain access to development funding, commissioners and producers.”

Cost: £60 (workshop + ticket for The Wicked Lady), or £50 (workshop only). Booking forms here.

New! 18.06.09 The venerable academic journal Midland History has quietly made some 350 back-issue articles freely available online in full-text PDF form (the section Existing Subscribers / Browse issues by Year now freely offers up the linked PDFs). Among the scholarly articles are “Surviving the Slump: An Oral History of Stoke-on-Trent Between the Wars” by Angus McInnes.