a new and exciting Artist led collective based in the West Midlands
who are holding their first event, a two-dayer, this weekend (20 and 21 Sept) at The Churchill Citizens Club, 1073 Warwick Road, Acocks Green B27 6QT. The Something Foundation blog is a bit sketchy on details but the folks at Fierce Earth say:
Saturday the building will be taken over by the artists for an exhibition of a variety of visual arts including painting and installations.
Sunday sees an unusual event – an all day party from 2pm. It features live music from King Pleasure and the Biscuit Boys and a Hog Roast! Tickets will be £10 and you will be able to pay on the door. To reserve your place please e-mail: thesomethingfoundation@hotmail.co.uk
kaos-arts is led by artist Karen Osborne who specialises in innovative participatory arts projects which help improve places inside and outside, offering a wide portfolio of arts based projects for people of all ages, backgrounds and abilities
The new show consists of three ballets by Russian composers:
‘Concerto’ is a pure dance piece from master choreographer Kenneth MacMillan.
‘The Firebird’ is a magical Russian fairytale in which love conquers evil.
‘Raymonda Act III’ is the quick-footed classical finale from a longer ballet, originally the wedding celebrations of the hero and heroine.
Which all sounds lovely and excellent. Definitely worth a go if you’ve not got anything else planned for 8 October and want to try something different.
If you want to snaffle some tickets then email your name, address and the number of tickets you want (don’t take the proverbial) to newattenders@brb.org.uk.
Russell Hall Design
Russell Hall is “a freelance graphic designer based in the West Midlands, currently working for a variety of clients on mainly print based projects. Have a look at my portfolio site www.russelljhall.com to see some of my work”. This here is his blog
Likemind Coffee Morning at Saint Caffe (Friday September 19, 2008)
“Likemind is a free-to-attend, open-to-all monthly coffee morning with no agenda other than to have a chat with people you may not otherwise meet”. It’s hosted by the lovely people at Supercool Design and Saint Caffe (St Paul’s Square). I will make it down this month, I will…
I don’t want to come across like an advert for football on Sky, but there are three things happening in Birmingham this weekend and they’re all (to coin a phrase) kind of a big deal:
Project X Presents (Sat 13th, 8pm to 3am) – this promises to be very cool indeed. Comedy, music, visuals, weird buzzing boxes… A new city centre venue to explore, sensible drink prices and only a tenner. Check out the website for pics of how it’s all been coming together over the past week.
Of All The People In All The World (today, 6.30pm until 5 Oct) – Stan’s Cafe bring their big, crazy and thought-provoking show to Birmingham. “112 tonnes of rice – 6.7 billion grains – one for everyone on the planet”.
Artsfest (all weekend) – the UK’s biggest arts festival. If you can’t find anything to enjoy then… well, I don’t know. It’s not as if people haven’t been trying to help you find the good stuff.
There’ll probably be some collective memory shenanigans coming up so if you go to any of these things and take photos/video/blog about them then chuck a link here and it’ll go into the pot.
Oh, and tag anything Stan’s Cafe-related with ‘thericeshow’ for it to feed into the clever little website for The Rice Show.
This quote from Graphiquillan stuck with me and has given D’log food for though too:
I’m often frustrated by the stamp of the council’s logo on everything creative that is sanctioned. Whenever I see that logo, there’s a switch that flips in my mind, and (probably unfairly) signals to me: “Hmmm, probably a bit dull. Move along.â€
Would this logo:
turn you off from an arts event? Do the council need to tag everything they touch? Aren’t they entitled to let us know when they get behind something cultural?
I was only saying to someone the other day that things had gone quiet at Eastside Projects. The new artist space/gallery was slated to open (much) earlier in the year but seemed beset with delays.
No matter, because the opening party has been announced for Friday 26 September.
The first exhibition will be ‘This is the Gallery and the Gallery is Many Things’ which will run until 11 November. Over that time:
the exhibition and gallery space will evolve from a highly constructed ‘empty’ space to a layered and complex gathering of artworks, events and processes in various stages of convergence and divergence
It looks like there’s going to be some talks by various artists too, the first being by Peter Fend at 4pm on 27 September.
Creative Republic managed to snatch victory from defeat the other night – the star turn couldn’t make the ‘Creative Masterclass with Michael Wolff‘ so instead we were given a chance to ponder what the Birmingham’s presentation of our very important (as we’re constantly being told at the mo) creative scene.
Stef Lewandowski kicked things off with a pretty scathing presentation of Birmingham from a tourist-eye view. He had walked the city, camera in hand, trying (and generally failing) to find signs of creativity. He’s keen to point out that his negativity was slightly exaggerated but it was interesting that the vast majority of his criticisms went unchallenged.
Stef’s presentation is online. The slides are good quality but you’ll have to excuse the audio in places:
Sat in groups, we were then given the chance to chew over some of the points raised before reporting back to the rest of the class people there.
The chat has continued away from the event though.
As well as uploading the slides and audio, Stef has put up a blog post called ‘A creative director for Birmingham?‘ with many of the photos used, text to explain them and a few extra thoughts too. The comments following his post are worth a read too.
Paul Groves’ post ‘Creating a stir in Birmingham‘ rounds up the thinking and suggests that despite “a lack of clarity and vision in recent times” we now seem to be getting “the sort of lively and informed discussion that is long overdue”.
Dave Harte has picked up Stef’s theme on his Birmingham Post blog with ‘Birmingham – The Uncreative City?‘ suggesting that, as well as making some good moves in rejuvenating the city, mistakes have been made – privatising public spaces, pricing out independent retail and approving uninspiring architecture.
The idea is for some of the thoughts collected over the course of the evening (and since) to go towards informing a future event with Michael Wolff and perhaps a submission to the Big City Plan itself. There’s still plenty of time for anyone to join the discussion.
Artsfest is a big sprawling beast of a festival and a difficult one to wrangle from a listings perspective. A few people have chipped in with their take on how things could/should be presented but for me, while all of them help in some way, none of them really hit the nail on the head. Still here are they:
I’m pretty sure that the small team running Artsfest wouldn’t have the budget or reach to put something like the above together, so it’s great to see the local community take it upon themselves.
In case it’s of any use to anyone, here’s what I’m planning to do. Or at least what I think looks interesting.
Friday evening
Friday’s fun takes place against the backdrop of Light Night, of course.
Stan’s Cafe are opening the doors of AE Harris Factory (110 Northwood Street, B3 1SZ) for Of All The People In All The World (6.30-9pm)
From 7pm (not sure until when) there are two interesting things happening at the Council House. Definitely worth seeing are Willard Wigan’s astounding micro sculptures. Sonia Bhamra will be Painting With Light in another room which might be worth a look if you’re there
Gallery 10 at BM&AG has Comfortism who, I think, mixes up poetry, theatre and stand-up with the odd bit of audience participation. Could be interesting
At 8pm there’s a parade from the Pavillions to Centenary Square
The Town Hall present Late Night Light Night and they’ll be open from 8pm for perfomances by Soweto Kinch, The Sub Ensemble, Manga and Maylight (who I’m looking forward to seeing)
Saturday
Saturday’s the tricky one. There’s loads happening so the best thing might just be to go for a wander around the city centre and see what you stumble across. That said…
From 3.30pm to 4.30pm there’s Raw Magic which is “a visual installation and promenade performance built into a maze of tents, for audiences to explore and choose which direction they would like to take”. Some of the people here were involved in the very popular B1 Labyrinths from this year’s Fierce Festival
From 8pm to 10pm BRB, CBSO and Birmingham Opera Company share the Centenary Square stage for one of the weekend’s big items. Plus there’ll be fireworks.
After that it’s Project X Presents for me. It’s not Artsfest-related but it does look pretty exciting, so that’s where I’ll be.
Sunday
If I’m functioning at 12pm then I’ll want some ‘beautiful heartwarming acoustic/electronica music’. At the Custard Factory, Elliot Jack will be playingjust that.
After that I might wander into the Custard Factory Theatre for some short flicks courtesy of Shortcuts
if this represents an opportunity for artists to present a series of temporary large works on the cleared site?
It’d be more exciting than the actual proposed plan for the area which crams in the usual suspects – ‘mixed use scheme’, ‘enhancement of the canals’, etc and yawn.
D’log expounds:
Such shows would have an audience, in the countless people approaching Birmingham on the trains from/to the north. There’s no traffic nearby to distract, so light could be used to dramatic effect and (if structures were tall enough) could reflect in the canal. At the very least, AWM might consider laying the site with wildflower seed turf as a temporary measure, rather than letting it become a mess of scrubby buddliah and weeds for the next three years. What if the 2009 West Midlands Meadow Gallery could be held on this highly visible inner-city site? Perhaps followed by another Festival of Xtreme Building?
In October VIVID present three film programmes from ICO Essentials (a series of national touring programmes) around the themes of play, pop and modernity.
Here, via some copy and paste magic, is what’s going on:
Wed 08 Oct
Essentials: Play honours the irreverent, impudent, subversive and fun in artists’ film. Featuring work by Hans Richter, John Smith and George Kuchar. Curated by James Harding.
Wed 15 Oct
Essentials: POPpresents iconic Pop films from the 1950s and 60s alongside work that preceded the Pop Art movement and work from its many legacies. Including work by Peter Roehr, William Klein and Peter Whitehead. Curated by Tanya Leighton
Wed 22 Oct
Essentials: Modernity presents work by artists who adapted the evolving languages of cinema and the technologies of the moving image to convey the experience of modernity; the social, environmental and psychological impact of the new rationalizing forces in industry, architecture and design. Including work by Len Lye, László Moholy-Nagy, Mary Ellen Bute, Ferdinand Kriwet and Mark Leckey. Curated by Michelle Cotton
£5/4 per screening or £10/8 for all three!
Tickets are available from info@vivid.org.uk or by calling 0121 766 7876
Ipso Facto Films are filming big outdoor scenes in Birmingham this weekend (Fri 12th and Sat 13th) and they’re after extras. If you fancy getting involved then click the link to register as an extra.
No cash will change hands but you’ll be fed. There’s no mention of talcum powder or amphetamines.
Donald Savage report and evaluation
Remember Donald Savage’s Invisible Arts Exhibition Programme? Well the evaluation report is out with input from luminaries such as Mr Whatby (Conservative Counselling) amongst others
The Rice Show
A kind of automatic collective memory/aggregator thing for the upcoming Stan’s Cafe production ‘Of All The People In All The World’. Anything tagged thericeshow should show up on there
Rich Batsford – Project X Presents: Digital Dystopia Sat Sept 13
“You are cordially invited to the one and only performance of our unique Project X Presents event Digital Dystopia”. Just a week to go, there are some snippets of info about what’s going on here. I’m quite excited about this
Birmingham Words – Storytelling in Birmingham
The Traditional Arts Team have some upcoming storytelling events in Birmingham, happening once a month at the Kitchen Garden Cafe in Kings Heath
Birmingham Jazz News: September Newsletter
A couple of chances to check out Maylight with Lizzy Sparks – for free at the Town Hall as part of Light Night then at the Rainbow later in the month. There’s a preview of Oct too, with the very exciting prospect of The Heritage Orchestra performing Amon Tobin’s music
7inch september listings
A nice big long list of events for September, lots of filmic stuff and some other things too. Plus a call for someone with money to burn to convert Kings Heath’s recently closed bingo hall back into a cinema… anyone?
Film Dash is a 48-hour challenge I’m organising for Birmingham’s film makers.
The essence of the idea is this:
On Friday 17 October film makers will be told the criteria for their short film
Teams (or individuals) will have 48 hours to script/shoot/edit/whatever their films
On Sunday 19 October the films that make the deadline will be screened
The other details for the challenge are still coming together. Over the coming weeks there will be annoucements as to the screening venue, the rules and perhaps even information about judges and prizes.
The competition is meant to be all-inclusive and fun. It doesn’t matter whether you’ve got a stack of expensive camera equipment or just a mobile phone to film on and remember – experience is no match for a good idea. This is all about imagination, playfulness and telling a story.
Information about the challenge can be found on the Film Dash blog.
Everyone who wants to take part needs to email SUBSCRIBE to filmdash@gmail.com so I can confirm details and get some idea of how many people are planning to get involved.
