Who’d have guessed this year would be the crazy, challenging, difficult one it has been! But, for me personally and as an apprentice, I’d add another adjective onto that list… rewarding. At the start of the first lockdown, I didn’t have any idea where the following months would take me or take the Artz Centre.
This past weekend we celebrated the success of Christmas Solo. Our first Live Streamed event, and an event that should have been impossible. This time last year we weren’t geared towards live-streamed events because why should be? All we’d ever known was in-person events. Yet on the 19th of December we were able to bring performing back to the Artz Centre, and if you ask me… here’s why.
All year long, as an organisation we have refused to buckle under the weight of the Pandemic. The stress and pressure it has put on all organisations, is what has galvanised our team. We each tried to do our best to level up over lockdown, and not just wait for it to all be over. For us, when several doors closed, several other doors opened.
On a personal level, I’d really struggle to recognise who I was before lockdown. I know in Chapter 5 I mentioned the quote id read: ‘in three months from now you’ll be someone else’ well nine months later I feel like I’ve changed so much. The challenges and opportunities that the pandemic has thrown at me are what I think have allowed me to evolve the most.
So now I look at Christmas Solo, and I can see that I wouldn’t have been able to play my part in it without all the evolution I’ve undergone this year. For instance… a show like that is stressful man! It can be both physically and mentally demanding. But this year when we re-built the Artz Website from the ground up… that’s where I learned how to approach stress akin the level of Christmas Solo. So I came in more prepared.
Plus, this year more than ever we’ve hosted so many community projects off-stage. One of the biggest being ‘Mike’s Million’ and while on that walk… there was so much time for self discovery. That time, and even being faced with the question of ‘why are you going on a 30 mile walk in the first place?’ Helped me to consider a lot about who I am and what I value. Understanding that sense of self better has been a big part of using my voice more this year. I feel like over the last 12 months I’ve understood more about what I believe in, and I’m getting better at championing those beliefs. Now when you take that into a production environment, I’ve been able to collaborate with an honesty and a personal integrity that I think has been invaluable for my own journey. If I think there’s a better idea than one being presented, I feel like I can present it. Equally, if I feel like I can be absolutely schooled by someone who knows better, I’m comfortable enough with myself to let that happen. After all, it is only going to end up benefitting us both in the long run.
One last ‘growth moment’ so to speak… (and there’s been more, trust me! But these are really the big three I think) would be how I’ve had to step up to the plate this year and I’ve felt like I am starting to crave out what’s unique about what I bring to the table. Everyone has their shining traits. The things that make them them. But I also think, in a team such as ours, everyone has skills that they bring to the team. Dan Ezzatvar mentioned The Avengers in his interview with Mark on The Leadership Club, and I think it works really well here. In the Avengers… everyone has their own superpowers, and they’re on their own journeys. Then they band together to fight the big bad. now… use your imagination here… but when they aren’t fighting Thanos, do you really think Falcon or Spiderman are making their own supersuits???? No way, they’re surely going to their mate Iron Man to make them fully kitted out suits. And do you think Captain America or Scarlett Witch are going to a personal trainer at their local Bannatynes? Definitely not, they’ll be getting lessons from Black Widow because she’s an expert fighter.
Now for me, I suppose its taken some time to figure out just what I can do to help not only move the Artz Centre forward (that’s what we all do anyway) but also help move the centre into new places that I can really take a level of accountability for. Its great just ‘doing stuff’ but actually, I’ve noticed how this year the work I’m specifically doing has become a little more refined to the tech-sector. My remit, has carved itself out so to speak. And that isn’t to say that there aren’t so many non-technology related things that I am not passionate about when it comes to work. But I think everyone benefits when they feel like theres something they can bring to the table that helps the team level up. At Christmas Solo, it was a tech heavy event. So being the proper proper tech-nerd I am… it felt right to be a big player in it. Same with Sing It and Move it and so many of the other technologically creative solutions we have found this year.
Finally then… I’m going to wrap up with the one point I’ve not made yet… but it is easily the most important one. I feel really satisfied with my contributions to Christmas Solo. But I don’t for one second think my contributions are the be all and end all. It was an event that really came down to the power of the Artz Family. Technicians, camera operators and stage hands who wanted to give it their all because their care about what this event meant. Performers who may have needed this event to remind them of what they love to do. Parents at home who tuned in, many for the whole three hours! And who flooded social media with the story of Christmas Solo. I mean… it says a lot when you can have a friend from Essex on the phone texting you updates on how the livestream is looking all night long, just because he cares about seeing the Artz Centre and all those in it succeed. So to everyone who played their part in Christmas Solo, thank you.
Who knows what next year will bring. But one thing I know for sure is… the Artz Family will come out of this crazy, challenging, difficult and rewarding time on top and better because of it.
Merry Christmas
– Joe