Cheeseburn Open Weekend 25, 26, 27th May 2019

I'm looking forward to a busy few days working at Cheeseburn Open Weekend on Saturday, SUnday and Monday.

Cheeseburn Sculpture is a unique destination for contemporary art in the North East of England. Each summer our programme features three curated gallery exhibitions together with new sculptures, installations and performance throughout the gardens.     

In 2019 Cheeseburn will be open from 11am to 4pm on 

 25th/26th/27th  May 2019 

This weekend you'll be able to see the following:

Gillian Dickinson North East Young Sculptor of the Year 2019

Visitors are invited to explore the proposals in the Stables Gallery by 10 young artists who have been shortlisted to become the 2019 Gillian Dickinson North East Young Sculptor of the Year.

Each artist is supported and mentored by Cheeseburn Curator Matthew Jarratt and the winning artist will receive £6500 to realise their idea at Cheeseburn in spring 2020.

The award is in its 4th year and was conceived by Joanna Riddell at Cheeseburn in 2015 and The Gillian Dickinson Trust has recently renewed their funding support for Cheeseburn to deliver this important opportunity for young artists for another 3 years.

The Gillian Dickinson Trust is North East charity which works to promote creativity in young people. www.gilliandickinsontrust.org.uk

Winner of the 2018  Gillian Dickinson North East Young Sculptor of The Year

Clare Townley was selected as the winner of the 2018  Gillian Dickinson North East Young Sculptor of The Year. Clare has spent 9 months producing her installation at Newbridge Studios in Newcastle after graduating in 2017 from Newcastle University.

The large scale dystopian installation is called  “Nostalgie de la boue: Plastic Friend”  and  is constructed from recycled plastic and includes a swing where visitors can contemplate the impact of plastic on the rural environment.

The installation will be featured along with our Stables Gallery exhibition of proposals from 10 young artists who are bidding for the 2019 Young Sculptor of the Year Award. Visitors will be able to vote for their favourite proposal at Cheeseburn Sculpture across two open weekends in May 18th/19th and 25th/26th/27th.

Funding from the Gillian Dickinson Trust has enabled Cheeseburn Sculpture to develop this annual award to support new and emerging artists who are from the North East or committed to working in the North East.

Cheeseburn Sculpture Curator Matthew Jarratt said:
“ The funding  from the Gillian Dickinson Trust is providing a fantastic annual opportunity for young artists in the North East to get their professional careers started and to realise ambitious new artworks. We were so impressed by the quality of  proposals from the young artists and really excited to work with Clare to support her to produce an installation which asks questions about our relationship with plastic and its impact on the landscape.”

New Sculpture and installations

This summer Cheeseburn are delighted to site new sculpture and installations in the gardens and project spaces at Cheeseburn by 16 artists including Lucian Anderson, Lisa Delarny, Erin Dickson, Brigitte Jurack, Peter Hanmer, Joseph Hillier, Bennett Hogg, David Mach, Becky MacKenzie, Keith Roberts, Jeff Sarmiento, Ayako Tani, Clare Townley, Olivia Turner, Cate Watkinson and Alice Wilson.

Performance and Dance Interventions

Cheeseburn is planning a series of special pop-up dance performances and interventions in the gardens which build on our work in autumn 2018 with dancers Simona Yovcheva,Maria Vincentelli and Lizzie Klotz.

Look out for press and follow us on social media for more news:

Twitter @CheeseburnArt

Facebook @Cheeseburn

I hope to see you there!

Introducing Circus Between Worlds Artist - Charlie Dearnley

Charlie Dearnley’s interdisciplinary practice uses performance to explore themes of spirituality and mortality. Using text as a basis, Dearnley performs (often collaboratively) utilising dance, song, and digital media in acknowledgement of the inadequacy of words alone to convey experience.
http://www.charliedearnley.com/

For Circus Between Worlds, Charlie Dearnley will be performing a prayer, using dance to explore the expressive intent of this call.

Interpreting the Hancock Museum collection through dance

Yesterday I spent the day participating in Icon Dance’s workshop at the Great North Museum, Hancock.

It was billed as "a fun and creative exploration of the Great North Museum’s Ancient Greek Collection", and certainly delivered this.

Jilly, Karen, Helen and Niki

There were three other ladies taking part, all of whom were lovely and had very interesting backgrounds. Niki has recently completed a PhD at Newcastle University and was researching the Social history of festivals in rural communities. She is just about to start a position as a Research Associate at the University. Prior to this career path, Niki was a visual artist. Jilly is a friend of Niki's and they are bee keeping partners. Jilly is a dance enthusiast. Karen completed her Archeology Masters course in 2015, and her aim is to work in museums. We made a really good team.

After briefly meeting choreographer Martin Joyce, dancers Alex and Emma, and the Creative Learning Producer, Laura, we spent the morning doing various exercises with Laura.

She took us to the Ancient Greek Collection and we viewed the specific vessel that would be the main focus of our dance.

One of the first group activities was for one of us to stand in the middle of a circle and make a pose. Then one of the other participants had to make three changes to the pose that they thought would make. We repeated this so everyone got a turn at making the changes and being in the middle.

Another exercise was to work in pairs, and mirror each others actions. We were not allowed to speak to the each other to say who was leading, and so had to watch closely. At times it was very difficult to work out who was leading and who was following.

Thinking about the vessel in the collection, we had to think of words to describe how it looked, felt, tasted and smelled. We then devised short dance routines that in relation to these words.

Evidence of me dancing!

After lunch we met Andrew Parkin, the Keeper of Archaeology, who gave us a short introduction to the Greek Gallery/Collection, and spoke in detail about the history and purpose of the vessel we had been examining. It was a vessel for mixing wine and water and was used in symposiums that were meetings for men only, and involved lots of drinking and treating each other brutally; often fighting and causing harm to each other. Following the stories of it's history, my opinion of the object and what it referenced was changed drastically.

We then went back to the dance room to discuss words that summed up the vessel, and then, in pairs, developed a sequence consisting of 3 static poses and transitions between them. Throughout the sequence we had to maintain some form of physical connection to each other.

The dancers and choreographer then joined us, and they watched what we had developed and we watched what they had developed. They had devised a dance routine working its through the room, and had included references to the entire Ancient Greek collection. They had left a short part of the dance for us to choreograph, so we pooled our ideas together from the whole day, and provided instructions for them.

 

The day ended with the dancers doing the full dance to the members of the public.

 

The whole day was a totally unique experience and it made me appreciate the collection in a way I would otherwise have not been able to.


Thank you ladies!

Pollokshields Playhouse

While in Glasgow this Saturday I discovered an exciting project with huge potential. Pollokshields Playhouse is, as its name suggests, in Pollokshields, just opposite Tramway. 

It is:

"A place to share new ideas; A place to test new possibilities in your community for the future of your community. A place to celebrate, a place to meet. A place to perform, sing, dance, show, make, talk! It is is a new outdoor venue being build by the community for the community."

This project is being delivered by Pollokshields Community Council with support from a selection of organisations and funding bodies.

You can help to build the Playhouse. 

No experience is necessary. You can drop-in on one of the drop-in days to get involved with basic construction and making. All tools and health and safety equipment will be provided. Sessions will be run by BAXENDALE 

Once the playhouse is built, the community are invited to create the programme. People can come forward with ideas that they can programme in – it can be music, talks, film, performance, or creative workshops. The aim is to develop a programme that reflects the area, that brings people together, that tried out new ideas, and that takes risks.

For more information 

Visit the website: http://www.pollokshieldsplayhouse.com

Email:  letmein@pollokshieldsplayhouse.com

Call: 07827228692

Visit the Facebook Page at Pollokshields Playhouse

Follow @G41Playhouse on Twitter 

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Initiated to generate discussion about the form of public spaces within the community, Pollokshields Playhouse is a grassroots project that seeks to connect people with under-used public space. Through the temporary animation of a redundant and derelict site the project will provide a unique opportunity for testing new possibilities for the future of Pollokshields and Port Eglington."

Pollokshields Playhouse is a work in progress, and is reliant on the involvement of others to help create it.

Go inside and help to build your Playhouse on Wednesdays 12-5pm and on Saturdays 10-4pm.

Janice Parker : It's What I Do, Tramway, Glasgow

I was invited to 'It's What I Do', a talk with Janice Parker, an award winning independent choreographer and dance-maker.


It was billed as:

'An examination of practice

An event

Artist, mover, activist, explorer

An investigation, a mapping

A particular process of dance making

30 years, from psychiatric hospitals to main stages


Janice Parker talks to Jo Verrent in lively conversation – questioning, reflecting, interacting, illustrating and laughing. Now what could be better than that?'


I had never seen any of her performances live, and knew little about her, but with a little research it was clear that she is an incredible performer who gives a great deal to what she does and to the people she works with. 

'She creates performance, devises and facilitates performance based projects, is active in dance development, regularly teaches and collaborates with people of all ages and abilities, mentors professional dance artists and organisations, occasionally writes about dance, and performs.

Her work is responsive to context, situation, place and, most importantly, the person.

She works with people of all ages and abilities often mixing the community and the professional dance worlds. Much of her current work is in collaboration with disabled performers. She is committed to bringing the work of disabled artists to more prominence and has created a rich body of collaborative work. Her choreography might easily involve a hundred or more performers in large scale works, or be an intimate solo portraits focusing on the voice of a single performer.

She creates live performance, movement for theatre, dance for camera, cross media installation, lectures and text. Her art-work is fundamentally an intervention. She is an artist interested in context and placement and in the outcomes of collaborative and socially engaged practice.'

http://www.janiceparker.co.uk/

Expecting to walk into a room with a group of chairs facing a couple of chairs, positioned ready for an artist talk, I was surprised by the reality. I was greeted by Parker, who pointed out the coat stands and encouraged me to 'talk to my neighbour'. Looking around the room, it became clear that most people knew each other, and knew Janice, and it became like a social gathering of friends. A chronological archive of Janice Parker's projects and work was presented on number of tables lined along the back wall. Parker then announced that we had 15 minutes to explore the archive. Items included scripts, newspaper cuttings, promotional material for the works, and letters of thanks to Janice from people who had participated in one of her workshops.


Once the 15 minutes had elapsed, we were instructed to gather around Janice and Jo Verrent for a 20 minute discussion about Parker's work. As I knew very little about Parker's work, I was disappointed that the projects/works were not described or explained, and so it was difficult to follow what was being talked about. I was pleased that some short video clips of different performances were shown, giving a sense of the movement that is central to her work. The still images that had been shown before did not do this.


When the alarm sounded after 20 minutes, Parker explained that the final part to the evening was an opportunity for us to write down our thoughts on her work, and what it was to be part of it. I felt cheated; I had paid for a ticket to get an incite into the work of Janice Parker, but was treated as though I already knew about the work. I think it was a case of misrepresenting or mis-advertising the event. It should have been described as some kind of participatory group discussion about Parker's work for those who have either participated in her workshops and projects, or those who have encountered her work before. In this case, it would seem a little unfair to have to pay to be part of the feedback group.

Although I was disappointed by the event itself, it is quite clear that Janice Parker is an incredible woman who does some amazing projects that have a real impact on the people involved and the audience.