at the Bluecoat.

Men in heels by Alastair Upton, Chief Executive at the Bluecoat

• Nov 26, 2010
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It's not every day you see the leader of the city council Joe Anderson stagger into the Bluecoat at mid day, wearing a suit but swaying on bright red high heels.

The Bluecoat has been full recently of the strange, exotic and delightful. At the launch of Dada Festival last week speeches were being given while people came and went for the city's long-night many dressed in white fairy costumes for the Christmas lights parade. When the soprano formally started the event three young school children stopped and starred open mouthed shocked at what the human voice could do while an elderly woman was clearly transfixed forgetting where she was supposed to be off to.

This had followed a week of improvisation that had meant you could never quite be sure what you would find as you rounded a corner, women with tangerines on their heads or dancers covered in bubble wrap.

With this vibrant atmosphere it is not perhaps surprising that the Bluecoat's visitor numbers rise and rise. 20% up this year, which were up 10% on 2008. Already we have had 80,000 more people than this time last year and will top 700,000 by year end.

With the Bluecoat being a formal and informal home for different arts and cultural groups, the range of people using the Bluecoat for their events the variety of people coming and going is wonderfully diverse. 

The Bed-In has been a brilliant example of this. With over 60 different artists and groups responding to the John Lennon/Yoko Ono peace-theme, artistically, politically and communally. Joe Anderson was here as part of the Bed-In highlighting the issue of violence against women. Yesterday he found out what it was like to walk in women's shoes.

At the Bluecoat you can never quite be sure what you night find, but it's great so many people are walking our way with or without high heels.

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