For UK Based Photography and Lens-based Artists (two commission opportunities)

For information on the opportunity and how to apply, please click here

Deadline for submissions: Sunday 5 May 2024, 23:59 GMT
Fee: £3500, plus £1000 travel and accommodation bursary
We do not accept any late submissions.
(Please note that the FORMAT team works weekday office hours only and is unable to respond to queries at weekends)

The Dancing Through Time commissions are an opportunity to make new artwork supported by the QUAD/ FORMAT and Déda Teams. Two commissions are available for two UK-based photography and/ or lens-based artists to work alongside the Dancing Through Time project team (based at Derby QUAD) to each develop a commissioned artwork and/or documentary-focused project that will follow, reflect, comment upon and celebrate the Dancing Through Time archival and heritage focused project. Information on that project is below.

Your project proposal can cover a range of approaches – such as for example: a focus on the people involved in the dance and music scenes of the time, or perhaps the more ‘underground’/ punk scene and the people who led them (and all things in between – such as Pop, Disco, Mods, Northern Soul and Ballroom). You may want to examine and explore the long-lost music and dance venues that were common in Derby in the 1960s and 1970s or perhaps the impact of social and political climates on the music and dance scenes of the period. It can include interviews with single participants or groups of people. We are open to different approaches, use of the medium and welcome proposals that include moving images, still photography, use of archives, VR, AR and more.

The commissioned projects will be exhibited as part of the FORMAT International Photography Festival biennale which will take place between 13 March and 6 April 2025 in various venues in the city of Derby. Some exhibitions may last until June 2025.

We support and provide adjustments for people with disabilities – if you have a disability and need help with the application process or would like to submit your application in an alternative format please get in touch at  [email protected]

We particularly encourage applications from disabled/neurodivergent creatives, LGBT+ creatives and people from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds.

Dancing Through Time Overview

Dancing Through Time: from Pop to Punk in the City of Derby is an exciting new heritage project that will explore the social clubs, dance clubs, dance movements and music scenes in Derby from 1960 to 1979/80. This project is a partnership between: QUAD/ FORMAT and Déda. The project will celebrate the unique social history of Derby people and places and is generously funded by The National Lottery Heritage Fund, thanks to National Lottery players.

Many people of Derby and Derbyshire and further afield will have memories of Derby’s famous venues such as the Locarno, Clouds (which was previously called Cleopatra’s) and those venues considered more ‘infamous’, such as the Ajanta cinema – venues all now unfortunately long gone, repurposed anew as restaurants, or in some cases demolished, lost to time.

By covering the early 1960s to the late1970s we will chart the social-economic history of Derby against the backdrop of great societal change in the UK – from the summer of love and a more permissive 1960s, through the dour 1970s – including the 3-day week, political unrest and blackouts, to the rise of Thatcherism and the pending miner’s strike of 1984.