What a month – all is taking off and it’s with a flurry of excitement that I’m writing.
I have secured a residency of sorts with the New Ferry Butterfly Park in that they are really on board and I can start work with them straight away, I’m even getting my own key to the Park to come and go as I please.
I will be curating a Temporary Art Trail of Contemporary works during the summer. I am now researching artists whose work will compliment the site to invite them to exhibit work. There’s no money involved but I’m hopeful that some will see the benefits of being able to use such an amazing space. If the work is for sale we’ll have to organise a commission fee for the Park as it’s all volunteer run and low on funds.
I’m also looking into using an empty shop in the local village to use as an artists studio/visitor centre for the Park. There is no visitor centre of any kind on site so it would be fantastic to be able to get them a space that could run artist workshops and also hold all the information people would need and then be able to direct them to the Butterfly Park when it’s open.
I have arranged meetings with Merseytravel (the site is adjacent to a railway station and indeed used to be part of the rail sidings in days gone by)I’ve also arranged a site meeting with the local Councils Lottery Programme manager.
I’m researching the history of the park for my archive work, its amazing when you start reading into its history and the old maps I’m finding are equally interesting.
What else…
Bought a very large van to go and collect my work form CoExist in Southend, the lovely Amy let me sleep in her spare room and we’ll definitely stay in touch, I’m sure there are projects in the north that I can get them involved in.
Have managed to store all my huge book tubes in The Royal Standard studio space for at least 4 months (and I’m on the waiting list for a studio – if any come up and if I can ever afford one) Its a great space though with some seriously good artists involved, fingers crossed.
The Biennial’s Wirral Project that I’m helping organise is coming along nicely, booked the amazing Birkenhead Park to have a finale community event after a week of smaller events in June. The 4 artists all seem to be on track, check out www.wirralpedia.com to see some of Jemma Egan’s work. Jemma is in local libraries over the next week gathering information.
Right…I’m off to look at more artists.
