Photo: Cambridge Live Managing Director Steve Bagnall and Festival Director Alessandra Caggiano sign the agreement. Hugh Parnell, Chairman of the e-Luminate Foundation and Sara Garnham, Chair of Cambridge Live, are in attendance supporting the move.
The event enters into the Cambridge Live portfolio and will be run by this organisation in its future editions.
Founded in 2012 by Alessandra Caggiano and Hugh Parnell, the city light festival has grown and developed through the years to become a much awaited event in the local area; indeed, from a modest first event in 2013, the Festival has built year after year more installations, more performances, more outreach events, and it has increased its audience gradually but steadily to the thousands than now pour into the city centre over 6 nights in the month of February.
However successful, e-Luminate Cambridge was still largely organised by volunteers but now the festival will enter into a new chapter where it will become part of the exciting range of events run by Cambridge Live. This move will help the festival thrive and grow and provide a stable footing for future development.
Steve Bagnall, Managing Director of Cambridge Live said: “Cambridge Live recognises e-Luminate Cambridge as a major event in the city’s cultural calendar and we are pleased to welcome Alessandra Caggiano into the organisation to lead on the events future plans.”
Alessandra adds: “I could not be happier that my vision and the achievements of the many volunteers and supporters who helped building e-Luminate Cambridge have been recognised in such a positive way and I very much look forward to start working with the fantastic team at Cambridge Live.”
Hugh Parnell, Chairman of the e-Luminate Foundation and co-founder of the Cambridge e-Luminate Festival, echoes “This is an excellent outcome, stabilising the Festival for the foreseeable future under the Cambridge Live banner and ensuring Alessandra’ inspiration and hard work will endure with a legacy for years to come”
The two organisations recognise that they have a similar shared vision for arts and culture in the city and by combining can ambitiously scope an even brighter future for the event.
Rachel Waterfield, Head of Sales & Marketing at Hawthorn said “As one of the key sponsors, working alongside Alessandra from the beginning, Hawthorn have been proud to see this inspired event grow from strength to strength. We are thrilled that e-Luminate will now become part of Cambridge Live’s vast portfolio of cultural experiences and look forward to continuing to provide our technical production expertise to the e-Luminate team.”
Ross Ashton, Artistic Director of the Festival in its last three editions said: “I am very excited that Cambridge Live are now becoming involved with the e-Luminate project. Their skills and networks will add immeasurably to the scope of the project and will allow us to have much more confidence for the future.”