The 2012 Cultural Olympiad was a programme of cultural events across the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and ...

that accompanied the

2012 Summer Olympics The 2012 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012) was an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, th ...

and

2012 Summer Paralympics The 2012 Summer Paralympics, branded as the London 2012 Paralympic Games, were an international multi-sport parasports event held from 29 August to 9 September 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. They were the 14th Summer Paralympic Ga ...

. The

Olympic Charter The Olympic Charter is a set of rules and guidelines for the organisation of the Olympic Games, and for governing the Olympic movement. Its last revision was on the 17th of July 2020 during the 136th IOC Session, held by video conference. Ado ...

, the set of rules and guidelines for the organization of the Olympic Games and for governing the Olympic Movement states that

"The
LOCOG The London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) was the organisation responsible for overseeing the planning and development of the 2012 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games. It was jointly established by the UK Gov ...
shall organise a programme of cultural events which must cover at least the entire period during which the
Olympic Village An Olympic Village is an accommodation center built for the Olympic Games, usually within an Olympic Park or elsewhere in a host city. Olympic Villages are built to house all participating athletes, as well as officials and athletic trainers. Afte ...
is open."

London 2012 Festival

The London Olympic Games' Cultural Olympiad included 500 events nationwide throughout the UK, spread over four years and culminating in the London 2012 Festival. The cost of the events was over £97 million with funding provided by

Arts Council England Arts Council England is an arm's length non-departmental public body of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It is also a registered charity. It was formed in 1994 when the Arts Council of Great Britain was divided into three s ...

Legacy Trust UK Legacy Trust UK was a charitable trust in the United Kingdom, established in 2007 to support a range of cultural and sporting activities in connection with the 2012 Summer Olympics and 2012 Summer Paralympics in London, with the aim of creating ...

and the

Olympic Lottery Distributor The Olympic Lottery Distributor was a non-departmental public body in the United Kingdom set up by Parliament to use money raised by the National Lottery to fund the London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games in 2012. The Olympic Lottery Distributo ...

. Those involved in the festival, which ran from 21 June to 9 September 2012, included Oscar-winning actress

Cate Blanchett Catherine Elise Blanchett (; born 14 May 1969) is an Australian actor. Regarded as one of the finest performers of her generation, she is known for her versatile work across independent films, blockbusters, and the stage. She has received n ...

, director

Mike Leigh Mike Leigh (born 20 February 1943) is an English film and theatre director, screenwriter and playwright. He studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) and further at the Camberwell School of Art, the Central School of Art and Des ...

, musician

Damon Albarn Damon Albarn (; born 23 March 1968) is an English-Icelandic musician, singer-songwriter and composer, best known as the frontman and primary lyricist of the rock band Blur and as the co-creator and primary musical contributor of the virtua ...

, artists

David Hockney David Hockney (born 9 July 1937) is an English painter, draftsman, printmaker, stage designer, and photographer. As an important contributor to the pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists o ...

, Lucian Freud, Rachel Whiteread, and writer

Toni Morrison Chloe Anthony Wofford Morrison (born Chloe Ardelia Wofford; February 18, 1931 – August 5, 2019), known as Toni Morrison, was an American novelist. Her first novel, '' The Bluest Eye'', was published in 1970. The critically acclaimed '' S ...

. Twelve British artists were commissioned to design posters for the games:

Martin Creed Martin Creed (born 21 October 1968) is a British artist, composer and performer. He won the Turner Prize in 2001 for exhibitions during the preceding year, with the jury praising his audacity for exhibiting a single installation, ''Work No. 22 ...

Bridget Riley Bridget Louise Riley (born 24 April 1931) is an English painter known for her op art paintings. She lives and works in London, Cornwall and the Vaucluse in France. Early life and education Riley was born on 24 April 1931 in Norwood, Londo ...

, Rachel Whiteread, Chris Ofili,

Tracey Emin Tracey Karima Emin, CBE, RA (; born 3 July 1963) is a British artist known for her autobiographical and confessional artwork. Emin produces work in a variety of media including drawing, painting, sculpture, film, photography, neon text and ...

Bob and Roberta Smith Patrick Brill (born 1963), better known by his pseudonym Bob and Roberta Smith, is a British contemporary artist, writer, author, musician, art education advocate, and keynote speaker. He is known for his "slogan" art, is an associate professor ...

Anthea Hamilton Anthea Hamilton (born 1978) is a British artist who graduated from the Royal College of Art and was one of four shortlisted for the 2016 Turner Prize and responsible for the show's most popular exhibit, Project For Door. She is known for creatin ...

Fiona Banner Fiona Banner (born 1966), also known as The Vanity Press is a British artist. Her work encompasses sculpture, drawing, installation and text, and demonstrates a long-standing fascination with the emblem of fighter aircraft and their role within cul ...

, Michael Craig-Martin,

Gary Hume Gary Stewart Hume (born 9 May 1962) is an English artist. Hume's work is strongly identified with the YBA who came to prominence in the early 1990s. Hume lives and works in London and Accord, New York.

, Sarah Morris and

Howard Hodgkin Sir Gordon Howard Eliott Hodgkin (6 August 1932 – 9 March 2017) was a British painter and printmaker. His work is most often associated with abstraction. Early life Gordon Howard Eliot Hodgkin was born on 6 August 1932 in Hammersmith, Lond ...

. The Cultural Olympiad comprised a number of programmes including: Artists Taking the Lead, Discovering Places, Film Nation: Shorts, New Music 20x12, Stories of the World, World Shakespeare Festival. Many of these involved public participation; for example, Discovering Places encouraged people to explore their local environment and identify 2012 species, Film Nation was aimed at young people making short films, and Stories of the World involved young people working with 50 museums across the UK. The Bandstand Marathon on 9 September 2012 was the closing event of the London 2012 Festival, and saw live music events take place at more than 200 locations across the UK. Participating bands were invited by

Coldplay Coldplay are a British rock band formed in London in 1997. They consist of vocalist and pianist Chris Martin, guitarist Jonny Buckland, bassist Guy Berryman, drummer Will Champion and creative director Phil Harvey. They met at University ...

to perform their 2008 single " Viva La Vida" simultaneously at 2pm to celebrate the end of the games.

Artists taking the lead

Artists taking the lead consisted of 12 major Arts Council funded

public art Public art is art in any media whose form, function and meaning are created for the general public through a public process. It is a specific art genre with its own professional and critical discourse. Public art is visually and physically acce ...

projects one for each of 12 UK regions. Each project received £500,000 funding. Nowhereisland at Ringstead Bay 2012-07-25

Paralympic Cultural Festival – Unlimited

Alongside the

, the Paralympic Cultural Festival (or Unlimited Festival) brought hundreds of deaf and disabled artists together, and Unlimited featured 29 new commissions, including artist Sue Austin's film documenting her performances in a self-propelled underwater wheelchair, and

Paul Cummins Paul Cummins MBE (born 26 September 1977) is an English artist from Chesterfield, Derbyshire, who produces landscape installations using ceramic flowers. Education / work Cummins worked as a maker of architectural models, and then studied ce ...

' 'English Flower Garden'. Ticketed events were held at the

Southbank Centre Southbank Centre is a complex of artistic venues in London, England, on the South Bank of the River Thames (between Hungerford Bridge and Waterloo Bridge). It comprises three main performance venues (the Royal Festival Hall including the Nati ...

, as part of the London 2012 Festival, featuring the debut performance from the

Paraorchestra Paraorchestra, sometimes referred to as British Paraorchestra, based in Bristol, is an integrated orchestra of professional disabled and non-disabled musicians - the first ever orchestra of its kind in the United Kingdom. The Paraorchestra was ...

. The place widely regarded as an inspiration for the modern Olympic games,

Much Wenlock Much Wenlock is a market town and parish in Shropshire, England, situated on the A458 road between Shrewsbury and Bridgnorth. Nearby, to the northeast, is the Ironbridge Gorge, and the new town of Telford. The civil parish includes the villa ...

, also featured with a May Day event called ''M21: From the Medieval to the 21st Century'' in collaboration with DASH (Disability Arts in Shropshire); artists included

Simon McKeown Simon Mckeown (born 1965) is a British artist, and lecturer at the University of Teesside. On 4 December 2010, he was named DaDaFest Artist of the Year for 2011. In 2012, he was part of the Paralympic Cultural Festival (or Unlimited Festival), ...

. The Unlimited commissions drew much mass-media and popular attention, as did the

2012 Summer Paralympics opening ceremony The 2012 Summer Paralympics opening ceremony was held on 29 August 2012, starting at 20:30 BST and marking the official opening of the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London, England. The show – named ''Enlightenment'' – had Jenny Sealey and Bra ...

called Enlightenment, featuring Stephen Hawking.

New Music 20x12

New musical works commissioned from 20 composers performed around the UK and at the

, London. Artists included

Howard Skempton Howard While Skempton (born 31 October 1947) is an English composer, pianist, and accordionist. Since the late 1960s, when he helped to organise the Scratch Orchestra, he has been associated with the English school of experimental music. Skem ...

, Mark-Anthony Turnage,

Irene Taylor Trust Irene is a name derived from εἰρήνη (eirēnē), the Greek for "peace". Irene, and related names, may refer to: * Irene (given name) Places * Irene, Gauteng, South Africa * Irene, South Dakota, United States * Irene, Texas, United State ...

Luke Carver Goss People *Luke (given name), a masculine given name (including a list of people and characters with the name) *Luke (surname) (including a list of people and characters with the name) * Luke the Evangelist, author of the Gospel of Luke. Also known ...

Joe Cutler Joe Cutler (born London, 17 December 1968) is a British composer who grew up in Neasden and studied music at the Universities of Huddersfield and Durham, before receiving a Polish Government Scholarship to study at the Chopin Academy of Musi ...

, Graham Fitkin,

Mark Prescott Sir Mark Prescott, 3rd Baronet (born 1948), is an English race horse trainer with over 2000 winners to his name, including Alpinista, winner of the 2022 Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe. He is based at Heath House Stables, an historic 50 box yard at ...

, David Bruce, Aidan O'Rourke,

Emily Howard Emily Howard (born 1979) is a British composer whose work is best known for its inventive connections with mathematical shapes and processes. Early life Howard was born in Liverpool, England. After completing a degree in mathematics and comp ...

Conor Mitchell Conor Mitchell is a Northern Irish composer, librettist and theatre-maker. His play, ''The Dummy Tree'', was commissioned by the Royal National Theatre for their 2009 New Connections series. Conor has been a great supporter of Youth Music Theatr ...

Sheema Mukherjee Sheema Mukherjee is a British composer and sitar player. She is best known for her work with musical collective Transglobal Underground and The Imagined Village. She is the niece of sitarist Nikhil Banerjee. In 2005, ''Billboard'' referred to he ...

Michael Wolters Michael Wolters is a British composer of German origin. He was born in 1971 in Mönchengladbach, Germany, grew up in Niederkrüchten, a small German village on the Dutch border and now lives in Birmingham, UK. After working as a care worker in ...

;

Oliver Searle Oliver may refer to: Arts, entertainment and literature Books * ''Oliver the Western Engine'', volume 24 in ''The Railway Series'' by Rev. W. Awdry * ''Oliver Twist'', a novel by Charles Dickens Fictional characters * Ariadne Oliver, ...

Aaron Cassidy Aaron Cassidy (born ) is an American composer. Education Cassidy was born in Illinois. He received a Bachelor of Music degree, with distinction, from the Northwestern University Bienen School of Music in Evanston, Illinois, where his main in ...

, EXAUDI, Richard Causton and Jason Yarde and Wonderbrass.

World Shakespeare Festival

Most of the programming was part of a strand titled the World Shakespeare Festival, which included translations, adaptations, and re-workings of Shakespeare's plays. Programming themed around the plays of

William Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...

was a major part of the London 2012 Festival. It was produced by the

Royal Shakespeare Company The Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) is a major British theatre company, based in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. The company employs over 1,000 staff and produces around 20 productions a year. The RSC plays regularly in London, St ...

and sponsored by the Arts Council, BP and

Lottery A lottery is a form of gambling that involves the drawing of numbers at random for a prize. Some governments outlaw lotteries, while others endorse it to the extent of organizing a national or state lottery. It is common to find some degree of ...

with about 60 participating organisations including the BBC,

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

, National Theatre, the

Barbican Centre The Barbican Centre is a performing arts centre in the Barbican Estate of the City of London and the largest of its kind in Europe. The centre hosts classical and contemporary music concerts, theatre performances, film screenings and art exhib ...

, the

Almeida Theatre The Almeida Theatre, opened in 1980, is a 325-seat producing house with an international reputation, which takes its name from the street on which it is located, off Upper Street, in the London Borough of Islington. The theatre produces a diver ...

and Shakespeare's Globe. This festival began on 23 April 2012 and finished in November 2012. It included approximately 70 productions related to Shakespeare's plays, over half of which were performed in a language other than English (particularly those which formed part of the

Globe to Globe Festival The Globe to Globe Festival ran at Shakespeare's Globe from 23 April to 9 June 2012 as part of the World Shakespeare Festival, itself part of the 2012 Cultural Olympiad The 2012 Cultural Olympiad was a programme of cultural events across the Unite ...

at Shakespeare's Globe). Shakespeare also featured in the BBC's "Shakespeare Unlocked" 2012 season (particularly ''

The Hollow Crown ''The Hollow Crown'' may refer to: * a passage in Shakespeare's play ''Richard II'' * ''The Hollow Crown'' (anthology), a 1961 work by John Barton * ''The Hollow Crown'' (TV series), a BBC adaptation of Shakespeare plays * ''Hollow Crown '' ...

'' and in the 2012 Summer Olympics opening ceremony. The World Shakespeare Festival also included the Worlds Together Conference, an international interdisciplinary conference exploring the role of Shakespeare and arts learning in young people's lives. At the grass roots and with the support of the performers' union, Equity, many events occurred around the country, not least the première of a new play entitled Shakespeare's Queen Elizabeth the Second, which was also performed in Stratford-upon-Avon and open air celebration of Shakespeare in, literally, John O'Groats and many locations south. Equity-backed events also occurred in London, for young people and school children, every two months from 2010–2012.

Poetry Parnassus

Poetry Parnassus was a week-long series of events at the Southbank Centre at the end of June, featuring poets from around the world in what has been described as "the biggest gathering of poets in world history", with one poet representing each of the 204 competing Olympic nations. Led by artist-in-residence

Simon Armitage Simon Robert Armitage (born 26 May 1963) is an English poet, playwright, musician and novelist. He was appointed Poet Laureate on 10 May 2019. He is professor of poetry at the University of Leeds. He has published over 20 collections of poet ...

, it was a festival of readings, performance, and debate that attracted an audience of more than 13,000 people. The opening ceremony for the event included a ''

Rain of Poems Rain is water droplets that have condensed from atmospheric water vapor and then fall under gravity. Rain is a major component of the water cycle and is responsible for depositing most of the fresh water on the Earth. It provides water ...

'' where 100,000 English translations of the 204 poets' poems were dropped from a helicopter.

Tales from the Bridge

''Tales from the Bridge'' was a vast poetry soundscape (among the largest ever created) commissioned by the Mayor of London for the 2012 Cultural Olympiad. The project was "installed for eight weeks along the entire length of the Millennium Bridge and experienced by an estimated four million people". Collaborators for the project included Martyn Ware (

The Human League The Human League are an English synth-pop band formed in Sheffield in 1977. Initially an experimental electronic outfit, the group signed to Virgin Records in 1979 and later attained widespread commercial success with their third album ''Dare' ...

) and

Eric Whitacre Eric Edward Whitacre (born January2, 1970) is an American composer, conductor, and speaker best known for his choral music. In March2016, he was appointed as Los Angeles Master Chorale's first artist-in-residence at the Walt Disney Concert Hall ...

, whose composition prefaces the piece. The flowing narrative of the main section drew on "the fascinating history of the Thames and the people, stories, life and times on both banks of the river", providing "a contemplative auditory platform that links the City of London in the north with the Southbank and vice versa". Composed as a complex overlapping hybrid prose poem, and performed using subtle sonic textures and multiple interleaving voices, the text was conceived, written and vocally choreographed by

Mario Petrucci Mario Petrucci (born 1958) is a poet, literary translator, educator and broadcaster. He was born in Lambeth, London and trained as a physicist at Selwyn College in the University of Cambridge and later completed a PhD in vacuum crystal growth at ...

. The project was shortlisted for the 2012 Ted Hughes Award.

References

TESTIMONIES. An Olympics legacy in a digital age

External links

2012 Cultural Olympiad official website

Unlimited, the 2012 Paralympics Cultural FestivalWorld Shakespeare Festival
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