Created in Birmingham

What it is about next Thursday? As well as the aforementioned Digital Cities dialogue in Eastside and the Birmingham Strategic Partnership’s Tackling Climate Change movie, food and a chat evening there’s also The Birmingham Music Network‘s monthly networking meeting. Actually, if you ditch the climate change stuff you could do the other two as the Music Network runs from 4-6pm with Digital Cities starting at seven. And since this is an Arts blog that seems a fair recommendation.

The meeting is held at the Technology and Innovation Centre (TIC) in Millennium Point. For directions call 08712 262725. The Music Network is run by Mark Badger who talks about it in the interview I did with him in December.

Digital Cities, the second of the Lower Eastside Dialogues “aiming to set the agenda for the emerging learning and cultural quarter” is next Thursday 22nd Feb. Chaired by Dave Hart of Digital Central the speakers are Maggie Ellis, Head of Production at Film London, Peter Packer, Media Consultant, Strategy Adviser to UK Film Council and Liz Rosenthal, Programme Director and Consultant at Digimart, Montreal

The talks start at 7pm at the Screen Media Lab, Units 2 + 3, Progress Works, Bromley Street, Digbeth, Birmingham B9 4AN (map) and will be followed by a discussion with the audience.

I went to the last one, The Design of Regeneration, and was quite impressed, not just with the talks which helped to clarify in my mind the architectural approach to the Digbeth redevelopment plans but also the quality of the discussion which followed. This one looks to be more focussed on the film industry but I’m sure it’ll spill into other areas.

The third dialogue on March 22nd, about Heritage and Regeneration, also looks very interesting and I suspect will be of interest to anyone who’s watching the city transform.

For further information and to book places contact Roger Shannon.

World TTV Day is this Saturday Feb 17th. Photographers are encouraged to take their two cameras out and go TTV crazy for 24 hours in their area. But what is TTV? And what does it have to do with Birmingham?

© harri b

Through the Viewfinder is a photography technique that started to gain popularity on Flickr last year. At its most basic it involves pointing one camera through the viewfinder of another to produce an image that is slightly different to the norm. The most common setup is a digital camera on the top and a vintage twin-lens box camera on the bottom, usually a Kodak Duaflex from the 1950s which can be picked up fairly cheaply on eBay. The images are then cropped to the dimensions of the viewfinder and often cross-processed to give an otherworldly feel to the already warped image. TTV aficionados will usually build their own light shield, known as a contraption or ‘trap, bringing another creative aspect to the art. These can be as simple as a cardboard tube taped to the Duaflex or something much much more. A selection of traps can be found in this thread and here’s mine. Yes, I’m a TTV addict.

Walsall based photographer and musician Harri B was the first person in the region to get the TTV bug and brought his contraption to a Flickrmeet last summer where it was met with bemusement and then great enthusiasm when the results were posted. There are now, by my count, eight TTVers in the region. Clicking on the following images will take you to more of their photos.

Some dabble in the technique and move on while others, like myself, get seriously hooked. But TTV is only one facet of the experimental photography going on in Birmingham. Folk are building their own cameras from scratch, using extremely expired film, playing with broken or toy cameras or just pushing the boundaries where they find them. Some of this activity can been found in the West Midlands Hard Core Flickr group but that only scratches the surface. In more fanciful moments I like to think this sort of thing reflects the “Art and Industry” motif of the Birmingham Coat of Arms – building stuff and making art with it.

Issue 5 of Ten4 magazine, the creative industries publication produced in Birmingham, will be in the stores on Thursday. You can buy it from Borders or Virgin nationally or pick it up free at various outlets and bars in the city including the Custard Factory, Jibbering Records of Moseley and The IKON. Look for the above cover by The Boy Fitz Hammond.

Simon Peplow is an illustrator and graduate from BIAD. His clients include Surburban Bliss Clothing, Pointer Footwear, Capsule, Plan B, Lodown, Sidewalk, Ten4, Polished T, Rant, Modart, Good For Nothing, Fused and The Illustrated Ape magazine. He’s recently been invited to exhibit at the Australian design expo Semi-Permanent.

“My inspiration comes from a number of things, primarily skateboarding because it has given me the freedom to travel, observe, investigate and interact with different environments. Many of which, tend to be avoided by the general public.”

Peplow is one of the founding members of The Outcrowd, a collective of “like-minded pencil wrestlers loosely based in the Midlands” whose work can be found at the Studio 4 gallery in The Framers in the Custard Factory.

He also has a blog, City Dreamer, where he regularly posts his illustrations and cartoons and from which the the above were taken.

Hat tip to the Ten4 blog

Radio To Go is a regular podcast featuring music from the West Midlands selected and presented by Robin Valk, a broadcaster and software consultant who, according to his bio, worked for BRMB in the 70s presenting amongst other things their rock show. Which makes perfect sense as his astonishing voice really evokes that era of the gentleman DJ. The music selection is oddly refreshing, going for what a cynic might call MOR, eschewing novelty for solid musicianship in the rock spectrum – not something I hear a lot of online. It’s not my personal cuppa but there’s certainly a place for this and Robin seems very well connected to a vibrant scene in the region. Here’s the RSS feed.

Found this on the Rhubarb Rhubarb news page:

Fine Art Midlands are holding an exhibition of their work at the Chameleon Gallery, Walsall from 21st to 24th of February. The group of former University of Wolverhampton students are of mixed ages and backgrounds, whose aim is the cultivation and furtherance of self-expression in the visual arts and the promotion of interest in it.

The work, which is all 2 dimensional, covers a variety of media including photographs, painting and prints. The group includes Trish Durnell who will be showing examples of her Sgrafiti technique! and Nick Ranga and Steve Sharp who both use text in their work, Steve exhibiting photos of his billboards with their ironic messages.

All work is for sale, admission is free and the opening times are from 10.30 to 5.30 on weekdays and from 10.30 to2p.m. on Saturday,24th of February. The Chameleon Gallery is at 23-25 Sandwell Street, Walsall, WS1 3DR. Tel. 01922 646724.

OPEN EVENING ON TUESDAY 20TH FEBRUARY 7-9 P.M. ALL WELCOME

Straightheads is a forthcoming feature film co-financed by Screen West Midlands and filmed on location in the area. Due for release in April the trailer emerged last week and has gone down very well on YouTube, presumably because the film stars Gillian Anderson whose online fanbase is not insubstantial.

A dark and sexually charged thriller, Straightheads is the debut feature from director Dan Reed who, according to Film Birmingham, honed his skills as a filmmaker in the city during the 1990s. He’s running a Straightheads Blog where he’s currently rather blown away by the success of the trailer but there’s a lot of other interesting stuff on there too.

Other links: Verve Pictures (distributor), IMDb, Wikipedia.

The Birmingham ElectroAcoustic Sound Theatre, aka The B.E.A.S.T., is one of the city’s secret gems. Based at the University of Birmingham’s music department it’s essentially a speaker system taken to an extreme level, comprising of 30 speakers separately amplified and individually controlled from a custom-built desk. This allows the performer to “create an infinite number of possible sound images and sculpt the spatial, dynamic and dramatic implications of the music in a particular concert environment to interpret and realise the composer’s intentions.”

It’s been in existence since 1982 and was recently upgraded. Usually based in the University it also tours the world and is doing a series of concerts at the CBSO Centre on Gas Street from 2nd – 4th March. Following these is a free Sunday afternoon workshop.

The concerts feature “acousmatic music from InvisiblEARts“. Wikipedia has a nice entry on acousmatic music if, like me, you’re new to the concept.

Obviously the whole point of The B.E.A.S.T. is to experience it live, but there are a few audio clips of the sort of sounds it’s used for if you fancy a taster.

Hat tip to D’log

Arron Bird, aka Temper, has become the first graffiti artist to be commissioned to create a piece of public art – a centrepiece sculpture for the central atrium of The Cube development behind the Mailbox. Interestingly he’s never worked with sculpture before.

Having started doing illegal art with graffiti crews in Wolverhampton in the 80s Temper is now represented by The ArtLounge where his paintings, created freehand using aerosols, fetch up to £10,000 and have been exhibited worldwide, including a solo show at the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery.

The Storm Reminded Us by Temper. 122cm² selling for £6995.

Temper’s website
9 page profile (PDF)
Temper’s page at ArtLounge
The ArtLounge gallery is at 28-30 Wharfside Street, The Mailbox, Birmingham, B1 1XL. Tel: 0121 685 2555

Birmingham’s graffiti art scene is, by it’s nature, hard to get a hook on for outsiders but it’s all around us if you look hard enough. One place to start is the Graffiti and Street Art pool on Flickr which also has a handy map. There are also specific areas where graffiti is condoned or at least tolerated. The car park next to the Custard Factory has some nice work and occasionally hosts events while the recreation ground in Selly Oak behind the youth centre is a marvel to behold.

Hat tip to B:iNS

The Birmingham Mail ran a feature recently on the comic book creative community in the area. It’s a bit of a surface scratching piece, plugging the Out Of The Bedroom show that just finished, but it does give a nice snapshot of a number of people who are actively doing stuff in the region so I figured it worth pushing your way.

via D’log.

TAK! is a design studio, with an emphasis on website design, based in the Custard Factory who have a rather impressive portfolio. Their work for Thomas Tallis, a specialist art school, is up for a SXSW Award for the Tallis Talk service, a simple but effective IM-style forum in which staff and pupils can discuss school-realted issues. Personally I set the bar very high for professional web design and I’m impressed with what they do.

Part of my immediate attraction to TAK! comes from their own website. While coming from the usual portfolio paradigm it manages to give a genuine sense of personality, and while they employ Flash a lot it’s never gratuitous or annoying. The cherry on the top is their blog, hidden under the title Playground, which works on all the right levels. Here you can find out what they’re up to but also what they think is interesting, from fonts to robotic snow ploughs.

If every business website communicated on this level the world would be a better place. Birmingham creatives – please take note.

Hat tip to Ten4

The Plus International Design Festival for 2007 was announced on the Ten4 blog yesterday. It runs from 17-21st October and is seeking participants.

We are delighted to announce the launch of Plus 07, a unique design-led festival showcasing all that is innovative, pioneering, and novel in the world of international design. The festival will provide a platform for contemporary professional designers; serve as an arena for experimental work; and a meeting point for the international creative community. Plus also offers a forum for informed academic debate on design.The ‘07 Plus International Design Festival comprises an exposition; conference; exhibitions; workshops; business forums, seminars, walking tours; and many other events. Calls for entries are now being sought for four aspects of the Festival:

Exposition
Plus is seeking to show national and international work by some of the most influential design agencies, freelancers, rising stars and students working in the areas of print, web, video and animation.

Conference
Plus welcomes ideas for talks around the theme of Moving Type. Speakers are sought from the areas of: typo/graphic design; letter making; multimedia; animation; computer games; television; cinema; the arts and creative industries in general; printing; publishing and advertising.

Experimental Exhibitions
If you use graphic or typographic elements in you work – either by profession, passion or accident! – then would would love to hear from you. Exhibitors are sought from across the creative and craft-based industries: typo/graphic design; letter making; calligraphy; multimedia; animation; computer games; television; cinema; photography; illustration; graffiti writers; fashion; music; artists; ceramicist; jewellery makers; stone carvers; silversmiths; glass engravers. Applications are welcomed from individuals, institutions and co-operatives; collaborative work between designers, artists and craftspeople is encouraged.

Workshops
Workshop leaders are sought from across the creative and craft-based industries: typo/graphic design; letter making; calligraphy; multimedia; animation; computer games; television; cinema; photography; illustration; graffiti writers; fashion; music; artists; ceramicist; jewellery makers; stone carvers; silversmiths; glass engravers.

Full details are in the info pack (PDF) and the deadline for applications is 31st March.

This looks to be very interesting, especially the Experimental Exhibitions. More info on the website or by phoning Caroline Archer on 01923 800425.

You probably saw this theme coming…

hartlandmartin

Matt Murtagh

nobody knows anything

Pete Ashton (whoever he is…)

Photos found on the Birmingham Flickr Community. All copyright as applies.

The snow has slowed down my blogging, mainly because I’ve been out photographing it! Normal service will be resumed soon.

Googling for info on some flyers picked up in Jibbering Records I stumbled across Quoonsweird, a collection of videos on YouTube of live music and poetry performances in the Moseley Area. It’s mainly open mike and acoustic stuff and there’s a lot of things I’ve never heard of here.

The open mike scene in Birmingham is certainly active but very hard to get a handle on, taking place in the back rooms of random pubs off the beaten track.

The Chaos Acoustic Club seem to crop up a lot though never at the same venue. Their most recent one, to my knowledge, was at the Rainbow in Digbeth on Feb 1st. More info on them as I find it.

Also at the Rainbow is a monthly open mike night on the first Tuesday of each month run by Wrote Under Publishing who have events lined up until July. From their MySpace they seem very intriguing…

Wrote Under Publishing was formed in Autumn 2005 by a group of performance poets, writers and artists from the West Midlands. All met through a love of performing at the various open mic and live music gigs in the area.

The idea is to reach out to the community and promote and champion local underground talent including ourselves. To do this Wrote Under has set up two successful open mic events in the Birmingham area of Digbeth – the Sunday Xpress @ The Market Tavern and the First Tuesday @ The Rainbow. Anyone can join in, it’s free and friendly.

When at a gig – please note our impressive merchandice stall. This has been set up by the collective to showcase our material that we have produced over the years – CDs, DVDs, Books, a quarterly poetry magazine, greetings cards, craft and other haberdashery.

Their next Sunday Xpress is on 25th Feb followed by a First Tuesday on 6th March.

Any other open mike or similar events, please let me know!

Update

Matt Scriven of the Island Bar on Suffolk Street informs me they run an Open Mike every Thursday along with a more structured Acoustic night on Tuesdays.