Abi Gilmore

Abi Gilmore is a Senior Lecturer, Arts Management and Cultural Policy at the University of Manchester whose research focuses on the values and practices of cultural participation, management and cultural policy and their impact on and relationship to place. She has been a Co-Investigator on major national studies of ‘everyday participation’ and on the impact of Covid-19 on the arts and cultural industries.

Prior to her role at Manchester, she was the founding Director of the Northwest Culture Observatory and regional Research Officer with Arts Council England. She has had the privilege of holding Trustee and Chair positions on a number of arts charities including Brighter Sound, Abandon Normal Devices, and the Macclesfield Barnaby Festival and is a non-Executive Director of Addo Creative.

Abi is currently seconded part-time as a UKRI Policy Fellow working on cultural placemaking and cultural investment with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and based in the Chief Scientific Advisor’s Office/Arts, Creative Industries, Heritage and Tourism Analytical Hub. She is also an Affiliate Researcher for the AHRC Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre and a Co-Investigator on the Strategic Hub for Local Policy Innovation Partnerships.

Abi has recently published a monograph Culture, Participation and Policy in the Municipal Public Park (Palgrave) and Cultural Policy is Local with Victoria Durrer, Leila Jancovich and David Stevenson.