SESSION 9
BLIND AND PARTIALLY SIGHTED AUDIENCES
Friday 27th August, 11.30am - 1.30pm - Online
Access Coventry is a series of online training sessions targeted at professional artists and the small-scale independent arts sector based in Coventry and Warwickshire.
These training sessions are aimed at equipping artists with knowledge and practical strategies to provide for different audiences with different access needs.
This ninth session in our series focuses on how to create events for blind and partially sighted audience members.
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Our Keynote Speakers Are:
Roz Chalmers
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Roz is an audio describer of over 20 years’ experience, working across a wide spectrum of the performing arts, including drama, comedy, musical theatre, circus, opera, ballet and contemporary dance. She has trained describers in the UK, Portugal, Hungary, Norway, Hong Kong and the US. During the lockdown she trained by Zoom, working with describers in the UK, Hong Kong, India and South Korea and providing description for digital productions, both recorded and live streamed, and auteur videos.
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Charles Bloch
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Charles works at the Belgrade Theatre, where he is the Customer Relationship and Data Supervisor for both the Communications and Box Office Department. Charles is trained in Digital Marketing and is very analytical, and really enjoys enhancing his customer's experience. Charles is a huge disability advocate, as he is registered blind himself and often works in partnership with national charities, such as Scope and Guide Dogs, to improve people's perception of inclusion and rights for disabled people.
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Our speakers will be sharing their knowledge and experiences of common barriers audiences from lower economic backgrounds may encounter and how they are working towards overcoming these. At the end of the session, you will gain an understanding of good practice and identify some simple steps to take to make your events more accessible.
Each training session is designed to help you up-skill and increase your understanding of the experiences or access needs of audiences. To get the most out of this course we encourage you to attend as many of the events as you can.
Access Coventry is the first step of many on our citywide journey of creating a manifesto aimed at making Coventry a more accessible place to experience culture.