Hasan Bakhshi is Director, Creative Industries in NESTA’s Policy & Research Unit where he leads on creative industry policy and research. His recent projects have included the Digital R&D Fund for Arts and Culture with Arts Council England and the Arts and Humanities Research Council, and Creative Credits, an experimental business-to-business innovation vouchers scheme piloted in Manchester.
Prior to NESTA, Hasan worked as Executive Director and Senior International Economist at Lehman Brothers, and as Deputy Chief Economist at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. He has eight years experience as an economist at the Bank of England. Hasan has published widely in academic journals and policy publications on topics ranging from economic growth to the economics of the creative and cultural sector.
He has also consulted for a number of organisations, including the BFI, Film London and the European Commission. Hasan has a BA in Economics from Cambridge and an MPhil in Economics from the University of Oxford.
He is also Honorary Visiting Professor at City University and Research Fellow at the ARC Centre for Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation at the Queensland University of Technology.
Claude Grunitzky is the founder of TRACE Magazine, and co-founder/chairman of TRUE, a New York and Paris-based think tank and transcultural marketing agency.
In February 2003, Grunitzky and two business partners completed a multimillion-dollar financing deal led by Goldman Sachs Group. As a result, the TRACE brand is now being leveraged globally across various television, event and interactive platforms. TRACE, which now reaches an audience of more than 50 million people across 140 countries, was successfully sold to a French investor group in July 2010.
Grunitzky was raised between Lomé, Togo; Washington, DC; Paris and London. Growing up, Grunitzky, who speaks six languages and carries three passports, was exposed to many different cultures. These foreign interactions shaped his transcultural philosophy and informed the creative energy of his media ventures.
Grunitzky has created media projects all over the world, written for leading newspapers The Guardian, Libération, NRC Handelsblad, Globo, and co-produced a documentary for the BBC.
An MIT Sloan Fellow and a French American Foundation Young Leader, Grunitzky sits on the board of Humanity in Action, a foundation that works internationally to build global leadership, defend democracy, protect minorities and improve human rights. The recipient of many distinctions, he was named a finalist for the Ernst & Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” award in 2007.
Andy Pratt is Professor of Culture, Media and Economy in the Department of Culture, Media and Creative industries, within the School of Arts and Humanities at King’s College, London.
Previously Andy was Reader in Urban Cultural Economy at the London School of Economics, and Director of the Urban Research Centre. Andy has a background as a social scientist in Geography and Urban Planning. His current research interests concern all aspects of the cultural economy in both international and urban contexts. He has written extensively on cultural and creative industries and policy (some 90 academic articles and chapters), and he has advised UNESCO and UNCTAD on policy, as well as many national and urban governments. He is interested in how the cultural and creative industries are organised and financed, where they are located, what it is like to work in them, and how they are governed; and, what the impacts are on the rest of economy and society of their growth
19 year old Dirujan Sabesan began his company CreativeNerds as a hobby aged 15. Since then the idea of a web design agency has turned from a bedroom dream into a office based design power house. Based in London and in full time education during the course of setting up and running the business with his co-founder Sam Thornton, Dirujan has worked with the likes of UK artists such as Tinchy Stryder, N-Dubz, Ironik, Mike Hough and Bodyrox.
Late 2009 he and his co-founder Sam helped build the SB.TV brand online, creating the official SB.TV logo and website and since then they have grown from strength to strength in working with clients such as Sony Music and Universal Music. He is now the Digital Media Manager at SBTV and Digital Manager at Spirit of London Awards.
Diri has worked with CIDA before, appearing on the panel for Creative Entrepreneurs, alongside Wretch 32. For more information about Diri, take a look at this Flavour magazine article.
Sara Shamsavari is an Iranian born visual artist, musician and activist whose works have been described as “unflinchingly honest portraits” (Brownbook UAE) “noble and inspiring”(Volt) “revealing a unique empathy with her subjects”(iD) and carrying “acute socio-political messages”(Flavorpil).
Born in Tehran in the midst of the Iranian revolution, Sara and her family fled persecution, eventually settling in London, where she received treatment and overcame childhood cancer before the age of two. Surviving both the revolution and illness engendered a profound desire to make a difference through artistic endeavours. Graduating from Camberwell School of Art with a BA (Hons), Sara produced work in a range of mediums including painting, photography and film, favouring photography for its ability to create an instant bond between the artist and the outside world.
Her work has been exhibited in London, New York, Hong Kong and Paris in galleries, museums and public spaces including the Institute of Contemporary Art, Selfridges & Co, Espace Pierre Cardin (Studio 55) London City Hall, and Danny Simmon’s Corridor Gallery. Her work and profile have featured and reviewed in numerous publications including i-D, Dazed, Aesthetica, Volt,The Big Issue and Brownbook UAE.
Araceli Camargo has a masters in English from Kings College London. She started her career in theatre production then moving into producing fashion brands. After the collapse of Lehman’s she thought it would be necessary to provide a space for people who wanted to create a better way of life and better economy. This prompted her to open THECUBE in London, 2009 and WECREATE NYC in 2011.
For the last year Araceli has been studying how neurological discoveries can be used to help entrepreneurs become better thinkers.
Natalie Wade is the Founder and Director of Small Green Shoots, a cutting edge organisation that produces high quality music and arts projects nationwide. With more than a decade’s worth of experience in the music industry, Natalie’s expertise includes event management, product and project management.
A passion for unsigned music, creative ideas and youth participation has seen Natalie deliver a variety of projects for organisations such as Universal Records, Arts Council England, the Greater London Authority, Rinse FM, the National Lottery and the Performing Rights Society Foundation, as well as help facilitate artists such as Tinie Tempah, The XX, Modestep, Jamie Woon, Devlin and Maverick Sabre, to name a few.
Natalie has a degree in Media and Sociology from City University, a CIPD (Distinction) in Event Management from Kings College London and tutors the Live Events and Promotions course at DV8 Training.
Pim Baxter is Deputy Director at the National Portrait Gallery, where she has also headed up the Communications and Development team since 1997. Over these years she has gained extensive knowledge of strategic planning and her role has included fundraising and sponsorship, communications, event and project management, leading a capital project, advocacy, public speaking and personnel relations. She has worked across the arts including in opera, visual arts and theatre. Prior to the National Portrait Gallery she spent eight years with the National Theatre.
Pim has a wide range of mentoring experience - with the City University Cultural Leadership Programme, Arts Marketing Association and Arts & Business. She is currently on the Board of three arts organisations – the Gate Theatre, Notting Hill, Arts Inform (an organisation which specialises in the development of work-related learning initiatives in the arts) and ALVA (the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions). She is a member of the Women Leaders in Museums group and will take on the role of Co-Chair in January 2012.
In March 2010 Pim was chosen as one of the Cultural Leadership Programme’s 50 ‘Women to Watch’ nominated within the creative and cultural sector.
Paul Kirkman studied Philosphy at Edinburgh University before joining HM Treasury. In between three spells at the Treasury he was Private Secretary to the Director General of the Confederation of British Industry, studied for an MA in Art History at Goldsmiths College and was Head of Policy & Planning at the Natural History Museum. Paul joined the Department for Culture Media and Sport in September 2005 as Head of Museums & Libraries. He was a Clore Fellow in 2009 and led the DCMS’s work on the 2010 Spending Review. He is now Head of Arts and Creative Industries at DCMS.