A blog on the design of the Gallery Practice Poster.
5/01/10- Our first meeting of the new term took place in Studio 121. Amongst other topic of the agenda for discussion was the mention of the design for the gallery poster now that the date for the exhibition is confirmed on the 8th March for 10 days. Fellow students were encouraged to submit designs for comment. Information to be included in the poster is; A title for the student group , dates, venue, logo for Wirral Met, sponsors.
12/01/10 One design by Andrew Wu is offered for consideration. The title is suggested by Danielle is “Jigsaw” , representing the 13 students of the Level 2 coming from different socio- ethnic background of the region. Enclosed poster. Comments were discussed.
More designs were encouraged and displayed on the studio wall for opinions and discussions. Decision to be made next week.
19/01/10 One other design was submitted by Sharon Ross who had consulted Les Rowe for refinement . This design was finally accepted by the group . Andrew Wu will have the poster priced by different printers and will report back to the group. A5 posters for individual mailing and A3 for corporate displays.
Hello I’m Tommy Mc,now in my second year ( Fine art degree ) at wirral Met. I am currently working on a large stick and ink drawing. My first idea was to portray homeless people, but i have changed the format a little, I am drawing a whole collection of discarded items, a massive rubbish tip, and I am incorporating people living and sleeping rough.I am using black Indian ink and numerous twigs and Branch’s, it is more of a mark making exercise than a conventional drawing. It is very frustrating at the moment, a lot of the twigs are snapping plus I can’t always get the marks I want.
Venue Search Continued
The Novas Contemporary Urban Centre.
Both Tommy and I called at The Novas in person a few times because it was always difficult getting hold of the Arts Team on the phone. They were busy arranging exhibitions, I expect! I had emailed Carla Weaver a few times explaining our needs and she said we were welcome to go there and look round any time.
One of Carla’s staff members showed Tommy the larger exhibition space upstairs, and later took both of us (plus Des) round the smaller gallery downstairs. I took some photographs of this space, complete with current exhibition, to show the other students back at college. We discovered that this smaller gallery was the room which last year’s Gallery Practice Group had hired, and decided that this space would meet our requirements especially as we are a much smaller group this year. The rest of the students agreed and approved of our decision.
A few days later Carla and Tommy made the deal and a fee was agreed on. Fortunately this fee was to cover the hire of the room for ten days instead of seven which we had previously arranged. Tommy, Emma and I returned again just before Christmas to sign the contract. Stevie, a member of staff kindly took us round one of their exhibitions by an American/turned local artist. Extraordinary Drawings by Laurie Lipton was a large collection of amazing pencil and graphite art works, based on real life crimes and events, as well as taken from the artist’s gruesome imagination.
Tommy took the cheque to Carla over Christmas. Part of the money raised came from our Gallery Practice fundraising cake sale and Tombola – just before we broke up for the holidays. Michelle organized a table for us outside the lifts at Twelve Quays which we manned all day. And one of the third years kindly provided a huge box of fairy cakes which proved to be very popular. I made some flapjacks and everybody in our group donated unwanted gifts and festive goods for the table.
We are holding another Tombola event on the 11th February and will be donating unwanted Christmas gifts for this sale and raffle. I think this time we are going to improve on our system and have the winning tickets ending in a five or a nought (which is what the punters were all expecting last time!). We are aiming for a bit of a Valentine’s Day theme and are hoping for donations of romantic candles, chocolates and sexy underwear!
Hey this is Tommy McCafferty from Wirral Met. We are currently in the second year of our fine art degree. We are part of the Gallery Practice Venue Group which means we have to look for a venue to exhibit all the student’s work. (Em and Mark are also part of the group). We have to visit as many venues as possible and Liverpool seemed the natural choice. Lia and I met most days and visited various galleries. We walked (yes walked!) all around the city centre, arranging meetings with people at galleries such as The Blackie.
Hi I’m Lia (Celia Gentles) another member of the Venue Practice Group. As Tommy said we have been looking around Liverpool for the right venue for our second year gallery practice. There are thirteen students in all who must showcase their work during the second week in March.
It was very interesting and useful visiting the various galleries because some of us may have to liaise with professional people in the future – it’s good to get a bit of experience and to know what’s out there for artists. After some consideration we decided Liverpool was the right location for our exhibition – busy, central, and vibrant with art and culture.
The Arts Academy
The first gallery we enquired at was The Arts Academy in Seel Street but they were fully booked for February/March 2010. Mark, Em, Tommy, Des and I had a good look at the works on display. Also a local children’s author and illustrator had a book on show and was there in person to talk about her work.
The Blackie
The staff at The Blackie were very helpful and quoted us some reasonable prices. As well as explaining there were different prices for different sized rooms they were willing to give discount to student groups in return for some voluntary work done in their Archive Department.
However, we decided that it wasn’t quite right for our purposes – the rooms were either too small or too big. Also we needed to find somewhere with good parking facilities, and The Blackie did not have enough space.
I’d heard on Radio Merseyside that there was a new art gallery/shop opening in Clayton Square so Tommy and I went over there to have a nosey. It was much too small for our group and the owner dealt mainly in commercial style art such as portraits of The Beatles and other famous people. It might be worth bearing in mind if any of us wanted to show/sell pieces like that in the future.
The Gallery
We also looked round The Gallery, a new exhibition space in Liverpool 1, near to Cains Brewery. This had only been open a week or so and was displaying a collection of photographs based on the human body by an artist called Stephanie de Lenge. We just missed the artist in residence but were shown around by one of the organizers. It was a good size but a bit too much off the beaten track. We decided that the nearby Novas Contemporary Urban Centre was a much more accessible and “happening” place. There was parking space plus a bar and restaurant and there would be other members of the public going in and out of there for theatre and art events.
