Ipswich - Culture

Culture

Ipswich is home to many artists and has a number of galleries, the most prominent of which are at Christchurch Mansion, the Town Hall, in Ancient House and the Artists' Gallery in Electric House. The visual arts are further supported with many sculptures at easily accessible sites. The Borough Council promotes the creation of new public works of art and has been known to make this a condition of planning permission. The town also has two museums - Ipswich Museum and the Ipswich Transport Museum.

The New Wolsey Theatre is a 400 seat theatre situated on Civic Drive. Although the Wolsey Theatre was built in 1979, The New Wolsey Company took on the management and running of the Wolsey Theatre in 2000, opening its first production in February 2001.

DanceEast, which has the primary aim of advocating innovation and development of dance in the East of England is now resident in their new premises as part of the waterfront development . They are building new premises as part of the waterfront development. These are the first custom built dance facilities in the East of England at a cost of around £8 million.

The Eastern Angles theatre group are based at the Sir John Mills Theatre in Ipswich, named after the famous actor who lived in Felixstowe as a child. In 2012 it celebrates its 30th anniversary. As well as its rural touring Eastern Angles are well known for their alternative Christmas Shows including Mansfield Park & Ride, The Haunted Commode and Round the Twist.

Since 1991, there has been an annual arts festival called Ip-Art which brings together many events across art disciplines and different venues, notably a free music day in Christchurch Park, which in 2006 had over fifty different acts performing over seven stages.

Key Arts is an artist-run space using the redundant St Mary at the Quay Church on the waterfront. They hold a comprehensive programme of events and residencies during the year and have been running since 2006.

Norwich remains the regional centre for TV broadcasting, but both BBC East and Anglia TV have presenters and offices in Ipswich. The town has three local radio stations, BBC Radio Suffolk covering the entire county, where the East Anglian Accent can be heard on its many phone-ins, the commercial Heart East Anglia which was founded in 1975 as Radio Orwell covering the A14 corridor in Suffolk and Town 102 which was founded in 2006 and is the first full time commercial station specific for Ipswich. The younger audience is catered for with Suffolk based Kiss 105-108. On 15 August 2007, Ipswich Community Radio launched full-time after successfully gaining a licence in early 2006.

The town's daily evening newspaper is the Ipswich Star which is the sister title to the county's daily morning newspaper the East Anglian Daily Times.