Biography – Andy Paxton

Andy Paxton is experienced and enthusiastic in all aspects of Project Management, with 20 years experience in project development, co ordination and management in the Voluntary, Statutory and Business sectors.

He has served on the board of a number of charities and has remained an executive trustee for one for over 18 years and is passionate about long term commitment creating long term change.

Andy was a founding member of UseLess Ltd and is also founding co partner of The Magical Tea Machine Ltd, a festival catering business using wood, wind and solar power, serving fresh baked cake from a wood fired oven, and hot drinks in real mugs, in a rustic tent venue.

His significant previous arts and project experience include:

Dannys Secret – www.dannyssecret.com a children’s fantasy adventure book written for 8-12 year olds chronicaling the life of a boy lost in so many ways, and yet with the support of a very unusual family of children, and a home you simply wont believe.

The First Bridlington Advent Beach Huts Co developing and staging, a 24-day artistic retelling of the advent story using a beach hut as the venue. Over 250 people visited the last night (despite hail and strong winds) but crucially it gained a number of live regional TV slots. Its now an annual event, but I'm sadly no longer involved due to other projects.
 

Zombie Nightmare - Indpendant Horror movie made in rural Scotland. A cast of 7 and crew of 3 I directed, did the make up and lighting. Its available on You Tube if you dare look at it here:

World War 1 Trench re enactment with dugouts, pillboxes full battle mock ups and pyrotechnic explosions for 30 young people. The media recorded as part of the project formed a month long exhibition at Hull History Centre as we extremely popular with all ages. The Heritage Lottery Fund still described the project 4 years later as “a stand out piece of work.’

Rock Challenge – An international dance competition for schools.  Over 3 years we became the first ever youth project to be allowed to fully compete and produced an 8 minute full dance performance re telling Alice in wonderland contemporized as a teenagers party gone wrong. The closing scenes had Alice die with her fading heart beat fading the scene. We won awards for innovative set design and execution, and stage crew areas I had been responsible for.

Hull Freedom Trail - www.hullfreedomtrail.com I was a founding co leader of the project which in 2007 fundraised £160k, sourced and drove 5  4x4 vehicles from Hull through Europe and North West Africa to Sierra Leone, donating them to organisations involved in reuniting modern day slaves with their families. I was a car team leader and responsible for 6 young people from a number of different youth projects from Hull and assisted the making of an aired TV documentary with Claudio Von Planta.  http://vimeo.com/7090249

Odd Socks Theatre Company – Run in partnership with Act Now the 2 years drama project spin off culminated in a performance in Hull Truck Theatre called ‘A Fairystail Story’ A highly creative amalgamation of numerous old tales and stories were characters from distance tales and lands combined with dramatic results. The lead was Cinderella, but she was recast as a sassy lesbian go-getter and ran off with snow white leaving Prince Charming to marry an ugly sister.  Spectacular fun. Workshops included improvisation and a lot of street theatre.

Wedding festivals – I have set up and run a number of DIY wedding festivals, including my own. These involved full site catering, Tee pees, music and dance venues and even a couple of churches. The most unusual location was in North Yorkshire by the Settle and Carlisle Railway. I own everything in this picture including the 34ft tipi.

Bigga Brova Project – The start of a 3 year run of TV spin off summer Youth Projects, the first had 2x 50ft barges in Hull marina, one as a ‘house’ boat and the other set up as a TV studio and editing studio. The project ran for a week and gained regional TV coverage and many newspaper articles. This was a multi partnership project with Andy as the lead.

Cyber Café – Set up in 2000, when they were a very new concept, I developed and managed Hulls first true Cyber Café serving food and drinks as well as fast broadband internet access. The methodology, policies and procedures I set up for the Cyber Café project were published in a CDF / DfES manual called ‘Switched On – How to set up and run a Cyber Café for disaffected youth’, in 2003

KEY SKILLS  Experienced artist with lead ability in 31 artistic disciplines

                     Self-aware youth and community worker

                     Creative Initiator

                     Managing dynamic situations, people, financial resources and logistics

                     Strategic planning + Analytical thinking

                     Fundraising, Marketing and Profile raising 

                     Skilled in Quality Assurance and Self Assessment processes

                     Highly competent in Media and IT

                     Natural leader

PERSONAL INTERESTS – Andy plays acoustic and bass guitar, and enjoys playing with his band ‘Dakota’. He enjoys creating and bringing projects into reality – the most recent have included refurbishing a large Victorian house, a recycled wood chicken coup + run, building a timber framed garage and an art car motor home conversion. On a smaller scale he enjoys the intricacies of scratch built model projects. His love for craft sees him turn his hand to silver smiting and glass craft whenever he can. Andy owns a 1968 VW type 3 fastback that keeps his engineering skills up to date. He is an experienced snowboarder and mountain biker, and enjoys photography, both moving image and stills. He has just finished writing a children’s fantasy adventure book called ‘Danny’s Secret’. Andy loves to travel, and has done so widely, and has a particular passion for Eastern European countries.

Varied references available on request

Resources Andy has to offer projects

34ft Authentic Native American Tee pee with fire pit and full internals

2 x 60ft x 30ft Marquees with full flooring and lighting

Full sound and light rig suitable for theatre or stage work

Festival site decoration – Festoon lighting, bunting, lanterns, blackboards etc.

Full outside catering facilities, hot drinks and hot food

Numerous craft resources – see attached*