Professor Ben Walmsley

Profile

I am currently the University’s Dean of Cultural Engagement, where I oversee the cultural engagement strategy for the University of Leeds, working across the institution and with cultural and policy partners to support and showcase the impact of arts and culture on higher education and communities, and broker collaborations between the University and the arts and cultural sector. I also chair the steering group of the University’s Cultural Institute. 

From 2019–2024 I was the inaugural Director of the Centre for Cultural Value – a £2.5m research centre funded by AHRC, Arts Council England and Paul Hamlyn Foundation to develop a shared understanding of the differences that arts, culture and heritage make to people’s lives and to society. At the Centre for Cultural Value, I am currently leading an ESRC project to scope out a national observatrory for cultural sector data. In 2020/21, I was the Principal Investigator on an AHRC-funded grant investigating the impacts of Covid-19 on the UK’s cultural industries and on an ESRC project aimed at improving the collection, collation and analysis of cultural sector data. Since 2017, I have led the AHRC-funded International Network for Audience Research in the Performing Arts (iNARPA) and in 2014–15 I was the Principal Investigator on a NESTA/AHRC/Arts Council England funded project Respond – a collaborative project run with Yorkshire Dance and Breakfast Creatives to develop, test and evaluate the impact of a responsive online platform designed to broaden and deepen audience engagement with contemporary dance. In 2013/14, I worked as Co-Investigator on an AHRC-funded project to explore cultural value as a complex system through a case study of the LoveArts Festival in Leeds.

I joined the University of Leeds in 2012 and in my wider School and University roles, I research and supervise PhDs in areas related to cultural value and engagement, arts management, arts marketing, audience research and cultural policy, with a particular focus on audience engagement and enrichment, change management in the arts, and cultural value and leadership. From 2018–2021 I was Director of Research and Innovation in the School of Performance and Cultural Industries and from 2015–2018 I was the School’s Director of Postgraduate Research Studies, where I also served on the University’s PGR Exams Committee. In 2014, I was awarded a University Student Education Fellowship to explore the experience of international taught postgraduate students. Prior to this, I worked as Operations Manager and then Producer at the National Theatre of Scotland, before moving to Leeds Metropolitan (Beckett) University as a Senior Lecturer in Arts and Entertainment Management in 2008.

I have published widely on cultural value, arts marketing, arts & entertainment management and cultural policy in a number of leading arts management and cultural policy journals. I edited the acclaimed book Key Issues in the Arts & Entertainment Industry (Goodfellow, 2011) and in October 2019 I published a research monograph on audience engagement for Palgrave Macmillan's new book series, New Directions in Cultural Policy Research. I am currently an Editorial Board member of Cultural Trends and from 2017–2021, I was Co-Editor of the peer reviewed journal Arts and the Market.

Beyond the University of Leeds, I am an Expert Advisor to the UK Government’s Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), a member of West Yorkshire Combined Authority’s Culture, Heritage and Sport Committee, a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, and a Visiting Professor at NUI Galway and at Kedge Business School in France. From 2020–2023 I was the Independent Chair of Flux, Rotherham’s Creative People and Places programme, and from 2015–2023, I actred as Vice-Chair of Transform theatre festival in Leeds. Between 2010 and 2017, I was engaged as an Artistic Assessor for Arts Council England and from 2017–2019 I was a trustee of The Audience Agency. Since 2014 I have been the Academic Director of the Arts Fundraising and Philanthropy programme, which is now one of Arts Council England’s National Portfolio Organisations. From 2014–2020 I directed the highly acclaimed National Summer School for Arts Fundraising and Leadership and the corresponding PG Cert in Arts Fundraising and Philanthropy. In this role I developed a MOOC for arts and cultural leaders on fundraising and change management. I am currently leading the evaluation of the National Theatre's Speak Up programmes and recently led the research programme for LEEDS 2023.

Responsibilities

• Associate Director (Policy), Centre for Cultural Value

Research interests

My research interests cohere around theories and practices of cultural leadership and audience engagement, and are therefore broadly located within the fields of arts marketing and management and cultural policy. I am particularly interested in the experiences of theatre audiences and the impact that theatre-going has on their lives, as well as how arts and cultural organisations engage with audiences and co-create meaning with them. My other research interests include cultural leadership (especially charismatic and quiet leadership); arts fundraising and philanthropy; organizational behaviour and change management in the arts; and strategic arts management and evaluation. 

• Centre for Cultural Value
• COVID-19: Impacts on the cultural industries and implications for policy
• International Audience Research Network
• Respond
• Transforming the Cultural & Heritage Sector’s Data Infrastructure: A pilot study to establish a cultural data observatory

Qualifications

• PhD
• MBA
• BA (Hons) in French and German

Student education

I have taught on a range of programmes across our BA (Hons) Theatre and Performance, MA Culture, Creativity and Entrepreneurship and PG Cert Arts Fundraising and Philanthropy. I was Programme Leader for MA Culture, Creativity and Entrepreneurship from 2012-2015 and for PG Cert Arts Fundraising from 2015-2018.

Research groups and institutes

• Audience, Engagement & Experience

Current postgraduate researchers

• Yun Cheng, Blair
• Anahi Ravagnani
• Ms Sarah Reynolds
• Agnieszka Wlazel
• Lizzie Ridley (Forbes-Ritte)
• Vanessa Arias Bujía
• Ava Podgorski