Press announcement – photo and interview schedule for LJMU Honorary Fellowships
Recipients include Liverpool comedian and actor known for his charity work John Bishop and Liverpool born actor Paul McGann. There is also the leader of the £1 billion Liverpool ONE regeneration project Rodney Holmes, triple Olympian Kate Richardson-Walsh, the artist who crafted the Liverpool city centre Hillsborough Memorial Tom Murphy, a serving police officer who established the Anthony Walker Foundation Dominique Walker, the Director of a leading UK strategic dance agency Karen Gallagher, an international adviser on education in the arts Sir Ken Robinson, the Creative Director and Co-Founder of award winning property company Urban Splash Jonathan Mark Falkingham and the ‘double act’ who lead Liverpool’s much-loved Everyman and Playhouse theatres Deborah Aydon and Gemma Bodinetz. There is also a Corporate Award for The Royal British Legion.
The Fellowships are given in recognition of outstanding achievement by an individual in a given field or profession and to those who exemplify the University’s ethos to ‘dream, plan and achieve’.
Vice-Chancellor Professor Nigel Weatherill said:
“Each of the new Honorary Fellows have brought dedication, commitment and passion to their professions and in turn have empowered the communities around them through the arts, business, regeneration or sport. This aligns with LJMU’s commitment to changing lives through our teaching and learning, research, knowledge transfer and outreach activities. A modern civic university translates into supporting people, communities and causes, while addressing the issues that matter most. The Honorary Fellows of 2014 are exemplary role models in these areas and I am delighted that we will welcome such inspirational individuals to the University during our summer graduation ceremonies.”
The following Fellowships will be conferred during LJMU’s graduation ceremonies at the Liverpool Anglican Cathedral between 14 and 18 July 2014.
Important information
- Please arrive 15 minutes before the appearance times listed below
- Please confirm attendance to guarantee press passes via Clare Coombes/ Siobhan Coghlan 0151 231 3369 or press@ljmu.ac.uk
- Photos and filming of the ceremonies and acceptance speeches are permitted inside the cathedral but please book a place in advance
Honorary Fellowships photo and interview schedule
Monday 14 July
Photo opportunity
Who: Jonathan Mark Falkingham MBE receives his Honorary Fellowship in recognition of his services to entrepreneurship and regeneration.
When: 2pm, Monday 14 July 2014
Where: Rankin Steps, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral
Tuesday 15 July
Photo opportunity
Who: Paul McGann receives his Honorary Fellowship in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the arts.
Who: The Royal British Legion receives a Corporate Award for services to the Armed Forces.
When: 10.00am Tuesday 15 July 2014
Where: Rankin Steps, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral
Photo opportunity
Who: Sir Kenneth Robinson receives his Honorary Fellowship for outstanding commitment to education.
When: 2.00pm Tuesday 15 July 2014
Where: Rankin Steps, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral
Wednesday 16 July
Photo opportunity
Who: Rodney Holmes for services to the regeneration of the Liverpool City Region.
When: 10.00am Wednesday 16 July 2014
Where: Rankin Steps, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral
Who: Deborah Aydon and Gemma Bodinetz receive their Honorary Fellowships in recognition for their outstanding contribution to the dramatic arts.
When: 2.00pm Wednesday 16 July 2014
Where: Rankin Steps, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral
Thursday 17 July
Photo opportunity
Who: Karen Gallagher MBE receives her Honorary Fellowship in recognition of her outstanding services to Dance.
Who: Kate Richardson-Walsh will receive her Fellowship in recognition of her outstanding contribution to sport.
When: 10.00am Thursday 17 July 2014
Where: Rankin Steps, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral
Thursday 17 July
Who: Tom Murphy receives his Honorary Fellowship in recognition for his outstanding contribution to art and design.
When: 2.00pm Thursday 17 July 2014
Where: Rankin Steps, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral
Friday 18 July
Photo opportunity
Who: John Bishop receives his Honorary Fellowship in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the arts and charitable causes.
When: 10.00am, Friday 18 July 2014
Where: Rankin Steps, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral
Photo opportunity
Who: Dominique Walker receives her Honorary Fellowship in recognition of her work celebrating and empowering community diversity.
When: 2.00pm, Friday 18 July 2014
Where: Rankin Steps, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral
Please see below for Honorary Fellow biographies
Jonathan Mark Falkingham MBE receives his Honorary Fellowship in recognition of his services to entrepreneurship and regeneration
- Jonathan is Creative Director and Co-Founder of award winning property company Urban Splash, which has gained over 350 awards for design, architecture and urban renewal. Founded in Liverpool, the company now operates nationally and is behind many of the UK's most challenging regeneration projects.
- An architecture graduate of the University of Liverpool (UoL), Jonathan has a longstanding commitment to good architecture: he is a former lecturer at both LJMU and UoL, a longstanding Trustee of the Royal Institute of British Architects and was awarded an MBE for services to Architecture and regeneration in 2013.
- His first professional foray into architecture came in 1989 when he established Liverpool and London based architectural practice shedkm. He then founded Urban Splash in 1993 with LJMU Honorary Fellow Tom Bloxham MBE and the pair have led the transformation of some of the city’s key areas; most notably Ropewalks with projects such as Concert Square & Tea Factory. The company also redeveloped the former Bryant and May factory in Speke – now home to a multitude of businesses.
- Closer to home, he combined his love of heritage buildings and his passion for modern design to regenerate a 17th century farmhouse to create his new home, which was awarded a RIBA Excellence Award in 2005 and was shortlisted for the RIBA/Manser Medal (national best house project of the year).
Paul McGann receives his Honorary Fellowship in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the arts.
- Paul is a Liverpool born actor and a member of the legendary Liverpool family, 'The McGann Brothers' who have all established successful careers in acting.
- He studied at the prestigious Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts (RADA) and has enjoyed an illustrious career. Highlights include The Monocled Mutineer, appearing alongside Richard E.Grant in the student cult film Withnail and I and becoming the eighth Dr Who. It was his role in The Monocled Mutineer which sparked Paul's continuing interest in the Great War, and led him to meet soldiers who fought in the Battle of the Somme, including Harry Patch.
- He is the public face of LJMU’s Merseyside at War 1914-18 project, which provides local people with the chance to upload family war histories to an online archive.
The Royal British Legion receives a Corporate Award for services to the Armed Forces.
- The Royal British Legion helps the whole Armed Forces community through welfare, companionship and representation as well as being the Nation's custodian of Remembrance.
- The Legion recently opened a brand new Advice and Information Centre in the heart of Liverpool's city centre for Service personnel and veterans to 'Pop In' for support and advice. Based on Williamson Street, it was the first of 16 brand new centres that the Legion opened in major cities across the UK, as part of its biggest ever transformation to bring its work closer to the Armed Forces community. Each centre offers a welcoming space for Service personnel and veterans to get practical help and advice, and for members of the public to find out more about the wide range of services and community activities provided by the Legion.
- During the Centenary of Britain entering the First World War, the Legion is involved in a number of commemorative events.
Sir Ken Robinson receives his Honorary Fellowship for outstanding commitment to education.
- Sir Ken is a Liverpool born author, speaker and international adviser on education in the arts to government, non-profits, education, and arts bodies.
- He was director of the Arts in Schools project (1985–89). The project worked with over 2,000 teachers, artists, and administrators in a network of over 300 initiatives and influenced the formulation of the National Curriculum in England.
- He was chairman of All Our Futures: Creativity, Culture and Education, the report of the National Advisory Committee for Creative and Cultural Education and the central figure in developing Unlocking Creativity, the strategy for creativity in education and business in the Peace Process in Northern Ireland.
- A popular speaker at TED conferences, Robinson has given three presentations on the role of creativity in education, viewed via the TED website over 20 million times (2014). He speaks to audiences throughout the world on the creative challenges facing business and education in the new global economies. He was knighted in 2003 for services to education.
Rodney Holmes receives his Honorary Fellowship for services to the regeneration of the Liverpool City Region.
- Rodney was responsible for the £1 billion Liverpool ONE regeneration project, which has won numerous national and international awards, including being shortlisted for the 2009 RIBA Stirling Prize, since it opened during Liverpool’s European Capital of Culture year in 2008.
- After retiring from Grosvenor, he chaired the economic development agency, The Mersey Partnership, where he oversaw its merger into the Liverpool City Region Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP).
- He is a member of the LEP Advisory Council, a Trustee of the Playhouse and Everyman Theatres Trust, director of the Mersey Gateway Crossings Board and director of The North West Fund.
Executive Director Deborah Aydon and Artistic Director Gemma Bodinetz receive their Honorary Fellowships in recognition of their outstanding contribution to the dramatic arts.
- Deborah and Gemma are the team who have run Liverpool’s intimate and much-loved Everyman and Playhouse theatres for over a decade.
- Deborah and Gemma have rebuilt the Everyman and Playhouse’s national and international reputation through a consistently acclaimed programme which involves artists of the highest calibre and strongly features new commissions, collaborations and transfers. The development of talent has been central to this programme, and the theatres’ youth and outreach programmes are viewed as national exemplars.
- The Everyman re-opened in early 2014 to rave reviews after a huge re-build and was recently named the best new building in the North West by RIBA. The new Everyman was created on the original site and now includes a technically advanced and highly adaptable 400-seat theatre, smaller performance spaces, rehearsal room, public foyer, café and bar along with supporting office and ancillary spaces. The judges said that it was a place where people feel instantly at home, and that was a major part of the Theatre winning the award.
Karen Gallagher MBE receives her Honorary Fellowship in recognition of her outstanding services to Dance.
- Karen is the Artistic Director of MDI one of the UK’s leading strategic dance organisations, whose mission is ‘inspiring people through dance’.
- Based in Liverpool, MDI supports dance artists through a professional development programme and aims to reach people who might not traditionally get involved in dance, including people living with asthma and dementia.
- Karen is known for her dedicated and outstanding work in the field of dance in Merseyside and was awarded an MBE for her services to Dance in 2012.
Kate Richardson-Walsh will receive her Fellowship in recognition of her outstanding contribution to sport.
- Kate is a triple Olympian, who has competed at the Sydney, Beijing and London Olympic Games.
- She has captained the England and Great Britain Hockey Team for ten years, securing a total of 313 caps for GB and England.
- After the London Olympics, Kate was elected onto The British Olympic Association (BOA) Athletes’ Commission, created to bring the perspective and expertise of athletes to the many initiatives and programmes operated by the BOA.
- More recently she was elected onto the European Athletes Commission where her role is to represent the ‘athletes voice’.
- Kate also gives regular inspirational talks to LJMU students on the importance of gaining the right professional skills to work within the highly competitive sports sector.
Tom Murphy receives his Honorary Fellowship in recognition for his outstanding contribution to art and design.
- Tom is a Liverpool artist who created more than thirty of Liverpool’s iconic sculptures. His work includes: Liverpool’s City Centre Hillsborough Memorial, Blitz Memorial, Noel Chavasse and the Liverpool VCs Memorial, Bill Shankly at LFC and Dixie Dean for Everton.
- A former lecturer, Tom's work is known internationally, particularly his statue of John Lennon at Liverpool John Lennon Airport and two sculptures commissioned by LJMU: Chancellor Henry Cotton and Sir John Moores at Avril Roberts Centre.
- Tom’s sculptures of Ken Dodd and Bessie Braddock at Lime Street Station, will be joined by a Thirty foot long Memorial Frieze for The Liverpool Pals Regiments to be unveiled in August.
- An accomplished painter, Tom has painted several key Merseyside figures including the official retirement portrait of Mr John Moores Jr.
John Bishop receives his Honorary Fellowship in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the arts and charitable causes.
- John is a Liverpool comedian and actor, known for his charity work. He was working as a sales rep until, in 2006, he left his job to become a full-time comedian. Within three years he was playing to sold-out arenas. As part of his charity work, John raised £4.2m for Sport Relief 2012 when he cycled, rowed and ran from Paris to London, with training support from LJMU's Professor of Applied Sport and Exercise Science, Greg Whyte. John has also competed in numerous charity football matches including Soccer Aid and in 2014, he once again took part in Sport Relief as a team captain for the Clash of the Titans event where he competed against Sebastian Coe and his team.
Dominique Walker receives her Honorary Fellowship in recognition of her work celebrating and empowering community diversity.
- Dominique is an LJMU Graduate, serving police officer and sister of the late Anthony Walker. With her family, she established the Anthony Walker Foundation (AWF), which works to prevent youth involvement in hate crime by working with all young people across racial groups to feel secure in their identity and empowered to welcome and celebrate diversity in their communities.
- The AWF has also established a bursary at LJMU, to support students that are currently under-represented in Higher Education.
- As Dominique climbs the ranks at the Merseyside Force, she has voiced her ambitions to become the country’s first black female chief constable, after seeing the positive way that the force handled her brother’s case.
