We’re delighted to announce the speakers for the National Conference 2026: Change On Our Streets! Find out more about the speakers below.
Clare Farrell, Extinction Rebellion
Clare Farrell is an active citizen in the truest sense – someone who pours her creativity, energy, and, at times, even her personal liberty into confronting climate and ecological breakdown.
As a co-founder of Extinction Rebellion, Clare has spent years using her voice to galvanise people into action. A BBC journalist once dubbed her a “samurai sword of truth” – a title she continues to live up to as she takes on heavyweight interviewers and media platforms with clarity, courage and conviction. Whether she’s debating climate science, protest law, workers’ justice or fashion sustainability, Clare is a fearless, forensic communicator who gives any journalist a run for their money.
Since co-founding Extinction Rebellion in 2018, Clare has continued to widen the cultural and democratic spaces for climate action. She co-created Hard Art alongside Brian Eno, Jeremy Deller and Es Devlin, to mobilise the cultural sector, and she is a founder of the Humanity Project, a UK-wide experiment in grassroots participatory democracy. Positioned at the intersection of climate, culture and democratic renewal, Clare brings a rare ability to connect the dots in this pivotal moment for humanity.
Morning Panel Discussion
Outdoor Arts: The Frontier of Where Art Meets Public Life
Amanda Parker, Arts Consultant and Columnist for The Stage (Chair)
Amanda Parker has led award-winning campaigns across education, broadcast, arts and culture – including as Director of the London Short Film Festival and Editor of ArtsProfessional magazine. As CEO of Inc Arts UK, Amanda led equity, diversity & inclusion campaigns across the UK’s creative and cultural sector.
She served on the London Task Force Covid-19 Arts and Culture Strategy Group, and London advisory group for the Government Arts Collection Committee. Amanda is a trustee of Intermission Youth and Royal Shakespeare Company; and visiting Researcher at UWE Bristol.
As CEO of Inc Arts UK, the national collective which from 2019 – 2022 Amanda advocated for the creative, contractual and economic rights of the UK’s ethnically diverse arts sector workforce.
Adriana Marques, Peabody Trust
Adriana Marques is an expert in community-led cultural regeneration and programming. As Assistant Director of Cultural Programming and Strategy, She leads Peabody’s approach to embedding culture across their neighbourhoods and communities, working on new housing developments and in their historic residential estates. Over the past eight years, she has led a wide-ranging cultural strategy in Thamesmead as part of Peabody’s long-term regeneration of the town. It has included delivery of new spaces for culture and communities, such as the renovation of the iconic Lakeside Centre run by Bow Arts, the establishment of arts organisation TACO! and its community radio station, RTM.FM, and a permanent artwork by Jasleen Kaur commissioned by five young local residents.
Adriana is also known for delivering the public art programme on the Olympic Park and leading the London Legacy Development Corporation’s cultural strategy. She has written a book for Arts Council England on best-practice public art in London and sits on a number of advisory panels and boards, including chairing the NLA’s Culture Expert Panel, the GLA’s Advisory Board for the Thames Estuary Production Corridor, and a Trustee of the national charity Creative Lives.
Chenine Bhathena MBE FRSA, Brighton & Hove City Council / Royal Borough of Greenwich
Chenine Bhathena is soon to head up the Culture, Heritage, Events and Tourism teams for Royal Greenwich, from mid-January 2026.
Chenine has been Director of Culture and Environment at Brighton and Hove City Council (2023-2026), where she has provided leadership and direction for multiple services that enhance the city’s quality of life, sustainability, economic growth and community cohesion. Her programme has included overseeing planning of a new 10yr events strategy, strategic oversight and evolution of high profile events across the public realm, in parks, stadiums and on beaches, and evolving the city’s role as a creative destination.
Chenine was the Creative Director and architect of the creative programme for UK City of Culture in Coventry 2021 (2018-2022), delivering a multi-year, high profile programme of co-created events of all scales. She also led the Mayor of London’s Culture & Placemaking Team (2013-2018) and conceived, designed and delivered the Mayor’s London Borough of Culture competition. As London 2012 Creative Programmer for the Olympics/Paralympics (2009-2013) she led London’s biggest ever City-wide outdoor festival. She currently sits on boards for the Certain Blacks and the Thames Estuary Production Corridor.
Joe Mackintosh, Out There Arts
Joe Mackintosh is the Artistic Director and CEO of Out There Arts – a National Center for Outdoor Arts and Circus based in Great Yarmouth on the East Coast of England. Joe has built the organization over 25 years. The work of Out There includes the Out There International Festival of Street Arts and Circus, The Drill House Creation Centre, Artists Housing, the Ice House, Local, National and International partnerships for creation, touring and community participation, and a wide range of year-round events that engaged 120,000 people In Real Life in the last year.
Great Yarmouth is a disadvantaged area and Out There has a strong emphasis on socio-economic regeneration, community empowerment, and growing participation and engagement with those otherwise least engaged in Culture including the large diverse migrant community in the neighborhood around the Drill House. Out There was largely grown through International Work including 23 EU projects between 2007 and 2021. Post-Brexit, Internationalism through Reciprocation remains central to the organisation’s mission.
Parmjit Sagoo, Inspirate
Parmjit Sagoo is Executive Producer and Artistic Lead at Inspirate, a Leicester based arts organisation. She produced and co-created Inspirate’s national touring work Ancient Giants and curates and directs its flagship festival An Indian Summer, which showcases and explores contemporary South Asian arts and culture. Parmjit is a highly experienced creative producer, director, arts practitioner, mentor and advisor, working across arts, community, health and educational contexts. She brings a rich interdisciplinary perspective to her practice, with collaboration and holistic approaches sitting at the heart of her work. Through her leadership, Parmjit fosters spaces where artists and communities can enquire, imagine and create together, creating inclusive, innovative and culturally resonant artistic experiences.
Afternoon Panel Discussion
Positioning Outdoor Arts in Local Cultural Strategies and Ecologies
Cllr Dr Antoinette Nestor, Cambridge City Council (Chair)
Cllr Dr Antoinette Nestor is the Cabinet Member for Culture, Economy and Skills, working to strengthen equity, inclusion and opportunity across the city. She is also a Senior Teaching Associate in Law and Legal Methods in the Department of Land Economy at the University of Cambridge, and a Fellow and Director of Studies at Girton College. Dr Nestor holds degrees from Trinity College Dublin, UCLA and University College Dublin. Her work engages questions of social justice, institutional accountability and community empowerment.
Antoinette completed her PhD at the School of Law, Trinity College Dublin where she specialised in community economic development lawyering. She holds a Bachelor of Civil Law degree from University College Dublin (UCD) and a Master’s Degree in Law from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) where she pioneered the Public Interest Law & Policy specialisation. She is also a trained legal interpreter and translator, and further holds a diploma in journalism.
She is also heavily involved in climate change issues locally and internationally. She has attended meetings organised by the United Nations as well as COP26, COP27 and COP28.
Ali Pretty, Kinetika
Ali Pretty is the Founder and Artistic Director of Kinetika, established in 1997 to unite communities through extraordinary silk-based designs and public spectacles that inspire social action and enrich local environments. Prior to founding Kinetika, Ali had a distinguished career in carnival arts and a deepening commitment to community engagement.
Ali has spearheaded and collaborated on numerous large-scale events for diverse audiences worldwide, including WOMAD (1989-1992), the Atlanta Olympics (1996), the Athens Torch Relay – London (2004), the Beijing Cultural Olympiad (2008), the FIFA World Cup in Abu Dhabi (2009), the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Pageant (2022), the Cultural Olympiad for the Paris Olympics (2024) and Beach of Dreams (2025).
Renowned for her artistic direction and hand-painted silk designs, Ali’s work is celebrated for its unique style and its ability to foster community engagement, leaving lasting legacies.
Aretha George, Hounslow Council / 18 Hours
Aretha George is Head of Culture at Hounslow Council and Chair of 18 Hours, an East Sussex based organisation delivering high quality events, cultural experiences, education, and research. With nearly three decades of experience in the arts, heritage and culture sector, she has worked across national funders, strategic bodies and delivery organisations. She is passionate about supporting outdoor arts programming, and championing their ability to broaden access and remove barriers to cultural experiences and participation.
Her current work focuses on shaping policy, strategy, and partnership projects that address community engagement, audience development, and inclusion, and strengthen infrastructure for artists and cultural delivery. She is a personal development coach accredited by the International Coaching Federation.
Professor Flora Samuel, University of Cambridge / Public Map Platform
Head of Architecture Department of Cambridge University, Professor Flora Samuel’s strength is in connecting ideas and people from different backgrounds and fields – the scholarship of integration and application, making connections across disciplines and sectors, contextualising specialisms in the larger context and making sense of them to non-specialists. Her current work focuses on inclusion through planning policy and processes evidenced through digital map making with communities and others, summarised in her most recent book Housing for Hope and Wellbeing (2023). With Eli Hatleskog Flora won a RIBA Presidents Award for Research in the Communities Category for their project Mapping Eco-Social Assets
For Flora climate change is a social justice issue. She leads the Public Map Platform, a major Green Transitions Ecosystem grant, now entering its second phase. Based on Ynys Môn (Anglesey) in North Wales the project is demonstrating the profound connection between creative practice and the development of Green Transition Behaviours. She is also leading on the development of the Cambridge Room, a place where the community, university, local authority, industry and practice come together to debate the future of their cities. In both projects the team are developing participatory mapping techniques that can be operationalised through the planning system.
LaToyah McAllister-Jones, Citizens for Culture
LaToyah McAllister-Jones is a cultural leader with a background in community-rooted arts and participatory decision-making. She spent over six years as Executive Director of St Pauls Carnival, helping to develop its year-round work, community impact and strategic direction, and now serves as Deputy Chair of Bristol Old Vic, bringing a civic and community perspective to one of the UK’s leading theatres.
Alongside her organisational leadership, LaToyah is co-founder of Citizens for Culture, a project placing citizens’ assemblies at the heart of regional cultural policy. Her work focuses on how deliberative processes can bring people together across social, racial and political divides, and how cultural organisations can be held accountable to the communities they serve.
At OutdoorArtsUK’s Change On Our Streets conference, LaToyah will share insights from building citizen-led cultural planning and reflect on what outdoor arts, carnival and community celebration can teach us about inclusion, accountability and creativity in divided times.
