Paul Brown, Chair of the Board
Paul is currently Chair of the board for Ransack Dance Company. He is originally from Pontypool and has a background in IT project management. Paul is currently retired, but in his previous career he was employed by a multi-national Insurance company as a Project Manager. Projects were selected at corporate level to achieve one or more of the following increase profits, reduce costs or meet legal obligations. Paul’s role was to produce a project plan which acted as the boundary and was ultimately used as the criteria to determine if the original idea had come to fruition. This was based on pre-determined aims, objectives, targets and of course budget. He worked largely on projects which looked at increasing revenue by supporting the marketing group and increasing the company size by integrating newly acquired companies into our organisation. This was largely in Europe but also involved companies in Mexico, USA and Australia.
Sophie Angell – Jones, Board Member
Sophie Graduated from Liverpool John Moors University with BA Hons in Physical Education and Dance and QTS in 2001. She started her teaching career at the Netherhall Sports college in Cambridge which she thoroughly enjoyed, but after 4 years she decided to move back to Wales. Sophie initially engaged with Ransack through her previous role as Head of learning and skills and NQT mentor in dance at Treorchy Comprehensive School in Rhondda Cynon Taf. She is now currently teaching at Whitmore High School in Barry and is the Lead practitioner for Dance at the Central South Consortium and WJEC author.
Nick Banwell, Board Member
Ann Sholem, Board Member
During a forty-year, international career in ballet and contemporary dance, Ann has
worked as a dancer, choreographer and artistic director. With Roy Campbell-Moore, she founded National Dance Company Wales (formerly Diversions) in 1983 as a dancer, teacher and choreographer and became its Artistic Director in 2005, commissioning many international choreographers including Stephen Petronio (US), Christopher Bruce (UK) and Itzik Galili (Netherlands). She presented the Company in Wales, the UK and with support from British Council across the world. In 2012 National Dance Company Wales performed with English National Ballet and Scottish Ballet in Dance GB as part of the London 2012 Olympic celebrations and then performed at the Royal Opera House in London in 2013
cementing its status as a Welsh and UK success story. From 2014 she worked internationally as a dance-artist, running choreographic workshops and management seminars. She was the Creative Producer of the annual Wales Dance Platform that presented independent Welsh dance-artists in three prestigious Cardiff theatres.
In 2007, she was celebrated as Welsh Woman of the Year in the Arts and Media and in 2013 with Roy Campbell-Moore received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Theatre Critics of Wales.
Siân Moore, Board Member
Siân studied Theatre: Performance at Falmouth University, graduating with a first-class honours degree. She went onto create her own theatre company. ‘Small Talk’, devising and performing in their touring three-women theatre show ‘Life on one Wheel.’ After leading a range of drama workshops in primary and secondary schools alongside her performance work, she developed a keen interest in education and trained to become a primary school teacher. She went on to teach year 6 classes at Bannerman Road Community Academy School in Bristol, becoming Maths Curriculum Lead for the school. Siân has supported Ransack in many ways in our early days, working as a volunteer to help at our Arrive Dance Platforms and community dance showcases and creating marketing materials for our showcases and productions. We’re glad that she has stayed with us as we have developed and to now have her support officially, as one of our board members.
Kate Long, Board Member
Kate has worked in the creative industries with roles crossing between theatre, dance, film and visual arts. As a freelance producer she was responsible for delivering large festivals and international creative projects across the UK, and has extensive experience running a cultural organisation in her role as Director of the Memo Arts Centre. Kate has been an advocate for dance development throughout her career, as a producer, mentor, and a Board member of many cultural organisations. Kate has experience of fundraising, income generation and managing large scale projects, including building projects. Her passions have always been to give artists and young people opportunities to achieve their aspirations and to empower creatives to develop and succeed.
Sarah Rogers, Artistic Director
Since gaining an MA in Theatre and Media Production from Hull University Nick Banwell has enjoyed a career in theatre management spanning four decades Working firstly in No 1 Touring, Theatre-in-Education and Regional Repertory in England, he has extensive knowledge of the presenting sector in Wales as Director at the Borough Theatre Abergavenny for over 20 years and then latterly as Director of Creu Cymru before retiring in 2019. A past member of ACW's Dance Panel and South Wales Area Committee he has also been a board member of the Independent Theatre Council, Creu Cymru and Dance Blast, a dance project he partnered Carlson Dance Company in establishing whilst at The Borough Theatre in 1998.
Our Artistic Director, Sarah Rogers, is the founder of Ransack Dance Company, setting up the company in 2013. Sarah directs our team of dancers, musicians and film artists to create our production work, and has choreographed and directed all of our productions to date, including designing and co-delivering our audience development workshops with our dancers. She also directs our community-based projects and shows such as our annual inclusive performing arts summer school and our ‘Youth Explore’ and youth company performance work. Sarah is the driving force behind Ransack’s strategic development in partnership with our board of directors. She plans our company activity, designs new projects, forms strategic partnerships with other organisations and runs the day to day business tasks of the company, including project management and finances.
Prior to setting up Ransack, Sarah trained at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, graduating with a BA Hons in Dance Theatre in 2010. She has performed as a dancer for a range of choreographers including Rosemary Butcher, Charles Linehan, Kerry Nicholls, Darren Johnston Will Dorner and The Configur8 Project and in 2012 she completed an Apprenticeship with Earthfall Dance Company. She has also most recently worked as a dancer for National Theatre Wales’ production of GALWAD which was performed on location and broadcast live online and to Sky Arts. Recent choreographic work outside of Ransack includes working as choreographer with Mercury Theatre Wales on their production ‘Finding Home’, and with The Big Pembrokeshire Pantomime Company on their production of Jack and the Beanstalk. Alongside her professional directing and performance work Sarah is an experienced community dance practitioner and educator and has directed a number of youth groups. Previously she has been Education Manager at 2Faced Dance Company which included directing their youth dance company, and she currently is a dance tutor working on Artis Community’s ‘Creative Learning Body’ schools dance project. In addition, she is also a Dance Ambassador for National Dance Company Wales and a dance tutor for Dance Blast, Abergavenny, which includes directing their adult inclusive company ‘Monmouthshire County Dance Company.’
