BBC exec gets top job at £11m cultural hub
BBC executive Jenny Baxter has been appointed as project director for Factory Manchester – the £11m multi art form cultural project being developed in Manchester, opening in 2019.
Manchester City Council said that Baxter will arrive from a senior role at the BBC where she is currently chief operating officer for BBC England based at MediaCityUK and will join the project in the early autumn.
She has held a number of other leadership positions at the BBC including controller of production for BBC News and previously, head of roreign news, having spent her early career at the corporation in production and programme-making.
Designed by leading international architectural practice OMA, the Factory will combine digital capability, hyper-flexibility and wide-open space, encouraging artists to collaborate in new ways, and imagine the previously unimagined.
It will be a new kind of large-scale venue that combines the extraordinary creative vision of Manchester International Festival (MIF) with the partnerships, production capacity and technical sophistication to present innovative contemporary work year-round as a genuine cultural counterweight to London.
Sir Richard Leese, leader of Manchester City Council, said, “We are very pleased to have secured such a creative, experienced leader for this hugely significant cultural project, especially as she comes from one of our great creative partners here in Greater Manchester, the BBC.
“Jenny will work with our artistic partners MIF as well as Arts Council England and our partners in government, to ensure this new building benefits the whole cultural ecology of the North.”
Baxter said: “The Factory will showcase world-class creativity in the heart of this region and I am thrilled to be appointed to lead its development. It will be a stunning building that is going to make a key contribution to the UK’s ambitious cultural future.”
