CAN Do Creatives is a FREE training course for artists, creatives, and community leaders, who use arts in community projects, who want to learn new skills, develop a freelance career, launch a business or find a job in the arts and creative industries.
With the impact of COVID on the arts and creative sector, there’s more need than ever for artists to upskill, network, grow their profile, and share strategies and approaches to building a career in what is a highly competitive sector.
There are some great opportunities out there and CAN Do Creatives is here to help artists get them.
“I want to SERIOUSLY thank you guys for what you’ve taught me… Honestly, I cannot get over the doors that CAN opened for me.”
The course covers some of the basics needed for a successful creative career including:
- Presentation skills
- Job applications and interviews
- Project design and planning
- How to budget
- How to register as self-employed
- Fundraising
- Marketing your work
- Health and Safety
And more than that, learners are supported to create a professional online profile and short film introduction to them and their work.
Through CAN’s long-established relationships, people on the course are introduced to a whole range of Greater Manchester-based arts organisations as well as new networks of artists and creative people so they can access opportunities like jobs, mentoring, commissions, freelance roles, or further education or training.
“I’ve just got an internship where I am teaching art skills, so I am getting to try out the skills that I Iearned in the creative facilitation workshop. I have never done anything like that before and the skills I’ve learnt on the course are really helping.”
CAN Do Creatives first ran between September 2020 – February 2021 with learners ranging from musicians, dancers and cabaret artists, to writers and poets, sculptors, visual artists, and people working in technical theatre.
“CAN Do Creatives has really pushed me to do art again. It was a really good decision for me to do the course.”
“I approached an agency who commission artists to do portraits for a fee, which shows a boost in my confidence. Without CAN I wouldn’t have approached them.”
“This course really gave me the time and space to think about the kind of artist and creative I want to be. So grateful to have been given this opportunity.”
Discover more about the people who took part in 2020/2021
Eligibility
- You must be aged 19 or over
- You must be living in Greater Manchester
- You must have permission to work in the UK
- You must be unemployed/not working
- You cannot be studying full-time
- You must not have enrolled on a course funded by ESF community grants since 2019. If in doubt, please just check with us.
When and where will it take place?
The free course will run between October 2021 to March 2022. Training will take place at the Green Fish Resource Centre in city-centre Manchester, or online.
The deadline for applications is Wednesday 6 October 2021.
For more information and an application form, please contact Katherine Rogers, Exodus Creative Producer Katherine@can.uk.com or 07533 568 672
