Sophie Regan #RUOSTURNS10

Tell us how you were/are involved in Right Up Our Street. Tell us about your experience.

I was an Arts Administrator and Volunteer Co-ordinator when I worked with RUOS - which included everything from taking minutes in meetings to helping to set up gazebos at events. It was such a joy to get stuck in in a very practical way to support the amazing work that the RUOS team do in bringing art to everyone.

What was your most memorable Right Up Our Street moment?

It has to be seeing the Museum of the Moon in Doncaster Minster as part of the DN Festival of Light in 2018. We had talked about 'the moon' for so many months in the lead up to the festival and I had seen photos of Luke Jerram's piece in various other settings but seeing it in person in the Minster was pure magic.

Has your involvement in the project changed your approach to working in the arts?

Absolutely. Working for RUOS gave me lots of invaluable experience of working on large scale events, which has been so helpful in my current work for darts. I was still quite early on in my career when I worked for RUOS and I learned a lot from working within such a small team - when there aren't very many of you, you have to try your hand at lots of things you wouldn't get a chance to try out in a bigger team!

In your opinion, how does having a project like Right Up Our Street benefit the borough of Doncaster?

RUOS benefits Doncaster in so many ways, big and small. It creates opportunities for local artists to hone their craft and develop their skills, it encourages local people to have a go at everything from visual arts to poetry writing and it brings those large scale magic moments through the DN Festivals. It's so important that everyone has access to the arts and RUOS has shown that it's not just big cities that get to host festivals and art installations - we can and should have them in Doncaster too.