Sampad, the Birmingham-based South Asian arts organisation, promises to deliver another season of varied entertainment with its new autumn schedule.
The programme includes dance shows like the Diwali Sabha, and live music performances from Indian and Pakistani artists such as songstress Humaira Channa, and jazz clarinettist Arun Ghosh. There will also be daytime events such as Asian Autumn, “an uplifting afternoon of South Asian music, showcasing the Midlands’ best homegrown talent.”
The programme for Artsfest 2011 is now online (in addition to the PDF brochure that came out a few days back).
As ever, there’s an unfeasibly huge amount happening. I’ve not had time to have a proper browse, but here’s what I’ve spotted after a swift glance through the listings:
2 for 1 entry to the Home of Metal exhibition at BMAG all weekend
Birmingham Young Poet Laureate, The Library Theatre, Saturday at 2pm – performances by the shortlisted poets
Birmingham Royal Ballet, Centenary Square, Saturday at 6.30pm - doing excerpts from their autumn season
Classical Fantasia, Centenary Square, Saturday at 8.15pm – the CBSO, Birmingham Opera Company and fireworks
BE Festival presents Move Me, Broad Street Stage, Sunday at 2.30pm and 5.30pm – an interactive contemporary dance event hosted by Barbara Nice.
Best of Birmingham from Kerrang & Q Radio, Centenary Square, Sunday from 5pm – with The Guillemots headlining
In Conversation With… is a whole strand of interviews with the likes of Tindal Street Press, Michael Seal, Ian Emes, Paul Kaynes, Keri Davies, David Massingham and Rosie Kay
The film strand at the Crescent Theatre is usually good too.
I’ll be spending Saturday in the Dancing for the Games-sponsored Dance Marquee before nipping off to the (not Artsfest-affiliated) The Boat That OxJamBrum Rocked, returning to catch the end of Classical Fantasia.
Looking at that list it’s mainly the bigger names that have stood out, which means there’s probably loads of decent stuff I’ve missed – let me know if you’ve got any recommendations.
Working with galleries: part 1 is an informal and practical discussion with Ikon Gallery director Jonathan Watkins, providing insight into how relationships and working processes develop between artists, curators and public art galleries. Using Birmingham-based and international artists as examples, Jonathan will discuss how these working relationships begin, progress and develop and will also talk about his experiences as a selection panel member for art prizes, exhibitions and commissions. This is a rare opportunity for you to find out how large art institutions operate and there will also be time for your questions.
I popped in to the launch of the Preclusion exhibition at the derelict/occupied Whitmarley building in Stirchley last night. For something that had come together so quickly (and a big well done to Harry for managing that) it was great to see a decent crowd down there (not quite shown in the photo below).
A genuinely guerilla experience, Preclusion is a totally unsupported spontaneous art exhibition.
A space has become available for a limited time and the secretive El Perro Radicale has chosen to take advantage of this opportunity to unveil a collection of locally and nationally produced art.
El Perro Radicale hopes that nothing precludes your attendance.
More confirmed artists including street art, street dance, guerilla poets and the following:
Jane Baker Photography
Lucy Grange Photography
Ryan Hughes Mixed Media Installation
Matthew HuntMixed Media Art
Lewys Jones Painting
Lucy Sparrow Felt Art and Street Art
Luke Thompson Painting
Martin Pickard Photography
Lizz Lunney Illustration
Wesley Wezism Painting
Pete Grange Photography
Ben Waddington Drawing
Preclusion will be at the derelict Whitmarley factory on Ivy Road, Stirchley (B30 2NX for the sat nav fiends out there) which is currently playing host to The Birmingham Social Centre.
There’ll be a grand opening on Friday 29th July at 6:30pm and the exhibition will be up until Sunday 7 August.
Are you, or do you know, a person under the age of 18 who’s free from 1-5 August? Then may I present the following:
Young Rewired Stateis a week long hack event (1-5 August 2011) where young and aspiring web developers across the country build their own web apps, visualisations and projects using government data, mentored by great companies with visits from rockstar geeks.
At the end of the week, all the projects are presented to press, government and industry at a big event in London, where judges will award prizes to the best apps and ideas.
I’ve met the people behind Rewired State and can vouch for how phenomenal they are at what they do.
More Hippodrome-backed craziness in the streets of Birmingham this year, from 9 July to 13 August.
Giant lobsters, a scary ice cream van and a man with a big red balloon over his head. There’ll be some extra stuff on Fridays this year too. Splendid. I’ve also just learnt that the area outside the Hippodrome is called the ‘Hippodrome Piazza’. Now there’s fancy.
Thanks to all who sent me info about what’s happening/happened where (especially Matt Murtagh). Here’s what I’ve been able to find. Looking at my calendar for this week, it doesn’t look like I’ll be able to get to anything which is a shame.
Also, if you could tell me the ones I’ve missed (head for the comments below) then that’d help a lot.
The shows
Exhibit This 2
8-9 June, 6-9pm
BCU 3rd Media Studies
Zellig
The Annual
13-19 June. Open 10-6 weekdays, 10-4 at the weekend
BA Art and Design
School of Art Bournville, Ruskin Hall, Linden Road
Birmingham School of Architecture
Gosta Green, Brum B4 7DX
Mon 13 to Tues 14 June – 10am to 6pm
Wed 15 -10am to 5pm
Thurs 16 to Sat 18 – 10am to 6pm
School of Vis Comms (Photography, Illustration, Graphic Design, Moving Image)
Gosta Green, Brum B4 7DX
Mon 13 to Tues 14 June – 10am to 6pm
Wed 15 -10am to 5pm
Thurs 16 to Sat 18 – 10am to 6pm
School of Art
Margaret St, Brum B3 3BX
Tues 14 to Sat 18 June – 10am to 6pm
Sun 19 June – 10am to 4pm
School of Jewellery
Vittoria St, Brum B4 7DX
Mon 13 to Tues 14 June – 10am to 6pm
Wed 15 -10am to 5pm
Thurs 16 to Sat 18 – 10am to 6pm
Thankfully Heath Mill Studios have written up 3/4 of it already, so here’s a digest:
Digbeth triple launch
At 5pm, Heath Mill Studios are opening their doors for the first time and Bay Leaf, a new Bangladeshi restaurant in the Custard Factory, are providing the food – I think this counts as their launch too.
At 8pm everyone’s going to leg it over to The Rainbow for the BASS Festival launch. Ghostpoet‘s performing and he’s meant to be good.
BE at the mac**
If theatre’s your thing then the BE Festival is launching at the MAC tonight with various things and stuff happening there. The festival itself doesn’t start for a good few weeks, but you can’t knock the enthusiasm to get started.
On top of all of that
They’re not launching anything, but Yo La Tengo, Welsh National Opera and Doc Brown are all in town (not all on the same bill, more’s the pity). Aren’t we lucky to live somewhere with so much stuff going on? Yes, we are.
Pecha Kucha is an evening of people giving presentations. Stick with me though:
Drawing its name from the Japanese term for the sound of “chit chat”, it rests on a presentation format that is based on a simple idea: 20 images x 20 seconds. It’s a format that makes presentations concise, and keeps things moving at a rapid pace.
For the office dwellers reading this that last bit probably sounds like a blessed relief. People tend to use the opportunity to delve into a particular obsession that’s Any road, it’s a global thing and there’s a Birmingham one that’s coming up to it’s fifth edition.
The next one will be on 20 July. I’m thinking about putting myself forward as a presenter but don’t quite know what I might talk about. I have a feeling it’d probably be about free kicks. Hmm.
Aaron Wright is something of a CiB alumnus having worked in the CiB Shop a year ago. He’s currently at the Live Art Development Agency in London and having a whale of a time from what I can gather.
Anyway, he emailed me to say there’s a couple of shows of particular note that are on in Birmingham in the next week or so.
This is at the MAC from today until Saturday. Aaron saw it in London the other week and says:
It was really great – innovative immersive theatre done with real style which was unusually matched with great content – one man starting a new life in Iceland. It’s only for 25 audience members at a time and you get to wear a nice boiler suit
This is on Saturday at the CBSO Centre. The blurb says:
BCMG presents an evening of political songs and new vocal settings, under the brilliant direction of Dominic Muldowney, former Head of Music at the National Theatre
Buy a drink, take a seat and be transported by our cabaret singers, Mary Carewe and Richard Morris, between 1930s Germany and contemporary Britain, during an evening of entertaining delights from both eras
Regional organisations getting together to introduce their members to each other is a VERY SENSIBLE THING. It’s actually kinda baffling that this doesn’t happen more often. More please.
Over the past few months a group of people have been taking part in MOB:
MOB is a project inspired by the current craze of ‘flash mobbing’ where seemingly unplanned ‘happenings’ take place involving hundreds of children, young people and adults. MOB is about creating new ‘disturbances’ that help share the values of the Olympics & Paralympics.
Among various other things (the full list is actually pretty exhausting), they’ve performed at Prince Albert School, spent a day with First Light Movies, did a photoshoot with Adrian Burrows and rode a red bus around the city doing good deeds.
