Ocean, London?s largest independent music venue and home to several community music projects, has gone into voluntary administration. The Hackney venue is now undergoing a restructuring review with the administrators Pricewaterhouse Coopers. The £23m venue operates three separate performance spaces including a 2,000 capacity auditorium, which was designed to present major national and international music acts.
The income generated from such commercial activity was intended to be used to support community workshops and a training programme for young musicians. A spokesperson for Arts Council England, which invested £14.3m in the building as well as providing some revenue funding, said that a study is now underway into what went wrong at the venue, including a review of the links between its commercial activities and community work. ?Discussions are ongoing but we?re pretty optimistic. We don?t expect the venue to close.?
Published: 29-11-2004