Tuesday 30 April 2013

Remembering Who We Are, at Ante



http://www.ante-art.co.uk/2012/04/25/remembering-who-we-are/

REMEMBERING WHO WE ARE

To help celebrate and reclaim May Day, Melanie Maddison and Lindsay Starbuck will display an exhibition of work by various artists commemorating labour and workers’ movements, actions, and struggles. Included will be a selection of work from Shape and Situate: Posters of Inspirational European Women, the Celebrate People’s History poster project, the Occuprint portfolio as well as two tapestries in homage to historical trade union banners ,and photographs.

The historical and commemorative art work will remind us how far we’ve come in the fight for employment rights and the work looking at contemporary issues can reassure us that despite the changes in the way workers are represented and able to organise, we are neither alone nor helpless to create change. We hope that both will inspire us in the struggles that we still face this May Day.


At Ante, this weekend, Kirkgate Centre, Shipley, West Yorkshire: http://www.ante-art.co.uk/

Empowerment in your pocket

Empowerment in your pocket
 
"We are seeking marginalizing, excluding and/or alienating questions and statements that you encounter and your strategies for dealing with them - in short, we need your answers to dumb questions and your reactions in these situations."
 
http://www.femoco2013.de/empowerment-in-your-pocket/empowerment-in-your-pocket-en/

What can history do?

What can history do? What does history mean to you? What does history mean to us? – Call for Contributions

"We want to use the pamphlet as a space to explore the practicalities of history making – for example running discussion and memory groups, oral history projects, grassroots archives (on and offline), exhibitions and other ways individuals and communities explore, recover and use history to understand their identities, where they live or the cultures they belong to."

http://feministarchivesouth.org.uk/what-can-history-do-what-does-history-mean-to-you-what-does-history-mean-to-us/?fb_source=pubv1



The Feminist Archive South have funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund to create a pamphlet that explores how feminist, women’s and other radical histories shape lives, understa...ndings of social change, collective dreams, hopes, disappointments and imaginations.

The pamphlet will be published for the end of the Ellen Malos’ Archives project in September 2013. It will be distributed to schools, further education colleges and libraries in Bristol, the South West and further afield on request (we have limited budget for distribution but can provide free copies should you want some).

We invite people to explore these questions in whatever way they wish, but please do think about the question of what history can do, what it means to individuals and what it can possibly mean to communities, collectives or whatever other way you want to envision/ interrogate/ reconfigure/ think about ‘us.’

Contributions should be written in a non-specialist language as it is envisaged that a wide range of ages and backgrounds will read the pamphlet.

We want to use the pamphlet as a space to explore the practicalities of history making – for example running discussion and memory groups, oral history projects, grassroots archives (on and offline), exhibitions and other ways individuals and communities explore, recover and use history to understand their identities, where they live or the cultures they belong to.

If you work for a feminist or women’s archives, please consider a contribution that tells us about your collection – we plan to have a directory at the back which lists archives and libraries where people can find out about history.

You may also want to consider if digital media has had an impact on the question of what history can do, and how it is shaping individuals and communities right now.

Other contributions can be in the form of

* Visual art e.g., Illustrations, photos, cartoons, posters
* Essays and critical writing
* Philosophical reflections
* Telling radical histories
* Profiles of archives, collections, museums, projects, websites/ web resources
* Practical ‘how to’ articles – e.g., how to use an archive, how to work with historical sources, digital archiving and information management
* Creative Writing, including poetry
* Interviews with interesting projects
* Interviews with people in your community

All written contributions must not exceed 1500 words

All images must be sent as JPEGs 300 DPI

Deadline for contributions
15 July 2013

Please send contributions to fa_south@yahoo.co.uk and contact us for further information
http://feministarchivesouth.org.uk/
Twitter: @femarchivesouth

Please distribute widely!

Sunday 28 April 2013

Bradford Baked Zines

Bradford Baked Zines
 
A week-long popup zine shop celebrating self-publishing and DIY culture in Bradford.
At: 13 Market Street, Bradford BD13 3HW
From 13th - 18th May
Opening hours: 11am - 7pm
Featuring zines and self-published books and music of all descriptions for sale, exhibition, library, workshops, talks, readings, photocopy club, live music and much more. Details announced very soon.

Zine party on Friday 17th May, 6pm till late.

Bradford Baked Zines is a collaboration between zine collective Loosely Bound and other groups and individuals involved in zines, self publishing and DIY culture in Bradford beyond

More information on
http://bradfordbakedzines.wordpress.com/

Empty shop space and support kindly supplied by Fabric Bradford.

Saturday 27 April 2013

Ante 4th and 5th May


Ante art event
Shipley does May Day
Sat 4 May (starts at 11am) - Sun 5 May (11-4)
Kirkgate Centre, 39A Kirkgate, Shipley, BD18 3EH.


Two days of May Day bookfair, art factory, gigs, and whatever you want to find. More info at: http://www.ante-art.co.uk/ (link to last year's events)


 "Ante is about the person we were until we became buried by work (or increasingly, ‘no work’), by shopping, debts, television...."
  
Exhibition & café all weekend

Saturday 11-4pm Book/zine/print fair
Saturday 7:30pm: Gig with NRacker, Yol, Brian Gilson, Petals and Lovely Honkey (£4)
Sunday 11-4pm: Art Factory

 
 
The weekend Includes:
 
  • Q&A with Gee Vaucher (Crass/Exitstencil Press) will be at 11:30am on Sun 5th May. Gee will be around on Saturday too
  • Screening a film by Chto Delat 
  • Ante-art exhibition, ante-stalls/bookfair, ante-gig, ante diy art factory/skill share
  • Ante will be running 'Twatter' - an opportunity to try out analogue technology including pens, paper and a genuine community notice-board!
  • I think Knit A Bear Face are knitting something looking at the bedroom tax
  • Myself and Lindsay will be displaying an exhibition of work by various artists commemorating labour and workers' movements, actions, and struggles. Included will be a selection of work from Shape and Situate: Posters of Inspirational European Women, the Celebrate People's History poster project, the Occuprint portfolio as well as two tapestries in homage to historical trade union banners, and photographs by Matthew Cunningham.
  • Plus bloody loads more that I don't even know about yet
 

Thursday 25 April 2013

collectivism

From my inbox via Andy Abbot/Black Dogs...
 
 
 
col•lec•tiv•ism
Noun
1. The practice or principle of giving a group priority over each individual in it.

Black Dogs art collective wish to use the RadicalAesthetics/RadicalArt event ‘Art, Politics and the Pamphleteer’ on June 14th http://www.phm.org.uk/whatson/art-politics-and-the-pamphleteer/ as an opportunity to facilitate a dialogue on the theme of ‘collectivism’.

Our proposed activity will take the form of a 20-minute slideshow containing up to 40 slides. Prior to the start of the slideshow a pamphlet will be distributed to each member of the audience. The pamphlet is designed to be read (silently) alongside the slideshow, with each page relating to a specific slide/image.

Black Dogs are inviting contributions to this exercise. Please send us a slide plus accompanying page (to be printed) that is either for or against collectivism (as defined above). Keep in mind the manner in which the audience will engage with your contribution and the amount of time they will spend with the slide and page (no more than 30 seconds).

Please send slides as (colour) jpegs in Powerpoint format (960 x 720 pixels) and pages as A5 black and white PDFs by 5pm Friday May 31st to blackdogsleeds@yahoo.com. Your contribution will then be considered for inclusion in the pamphlet and presentation and archived on our website.

Thanks and best wishes

Black Dogs
www.black-dogs.org


migration project

The wonderful Lindsay Starubuck has posted on her blog about the creative campaign about migration that she's started + a call out for fundraising and other artists to get involved:

http://andsomeplyers.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/migration-project.html


She writes: "Borders are manmade and arbitrary and we all cross them everyday; some are just more enforced than others. To demonstrate this, I created two stencils for people to make their own prints and then we calculated the distance they had traveled to get to London (as the swallow flies)."

Tuesday 23 April 2013

Some Girls

From my inbox:


Some Girls at International Project Space
Birmingham
24 April 2013


'Some Girls at International Project Space' convenes a forum that seeks to develop new dialogues around the Some Girls poster project (1982) within the context of Patrick Staff's exhibition ‘A Factory as it Might Be (Bournville)'.

The Some Girls poster project was initiated in the early 1980s at the conclusion of a 3-year action-research project working with young women in the West Midlands. Wishing to find a method for publically disseminating the outcomes of this research Carola Adams and Leah Thorn, with Graham Peet and Jonnie Turpie, facilitated the activity of the Madeley Young Women’s Writing and Design Group. The outcome of the collaboration was a set of 9 posters, developed around the experiences of the young women involved and underpinned by an inter-generational and collective ethos.

Carola Adams and Graham Peet will be present for the event, which will also include a screening of the film,
Giro - Is this the modern world? (1984, 45mins). The film, produced by the Birmingham Film and Video Workshop, has its roots in the modes of production explored during the Some Girls project and explores ideas around work, labour and the benefit system in the context of the mid-1980s. The film consists of interviews and the thoughts of the young participants as they search for answers to questions about the dole system, wage levels and what the future holds for them.


Workshop: Some Girls are such a dragInternational Project Space,
School of Art, Bournville
24 April, 3.00-5.00pm

As part of 'A Factory as it Might Be (Bournville)' artist Patrick Staff has convened a series of workshop meetings with students and graduates. The upcoming session will take place Wednesday 24th April from 3 - 5pm meeting in the gallery space at International Project Space. This workshop will be convened by Staff in collaboration with Inheritance Projects' Curator Laura Guy.

The session will use the Some Girls poster project as a framework and will explore the visuality of the posters, as well as ideas of the politics and use of radical archival materials. We will examine the posters as contemporary tools for discussion and collaboration as well as ideas surrounding cross-generational dialogues in contemporary feminist art practice.

Participants should have an interest in meeting and working collaboratively however no experience is necessary. In keeping with the ethos of mutual education there is no expectation of professionalism or prior experience, but rather the aim will be to try out methods and share ideas, skills, knowledge and enthusiasms.


http://internationalprojectspace.org/

Illustrated Letters

Hannah Rose, an intern at Glasgow Women's Library (and former vounteer at Canny Little Library - yay!) has been in touch filling me in on the 'Illustrated Letters' project going on at the Library, and recognising the links and ovelaps that project has with some of the aims of Shape & Situate zine. It sounds like a terrific project for anybody interested in remembering women's lives.

She writes:

[...] A project called Illuminated Letters. These are a series of creative letter writing workshops and esol workshops around glasgow, and beyond, and also an international call out for people, to write letters to women who are no longer with us whom we wish to write an illustrated letter to. It will hopefully culminate in an exhibition.
 

 
This is a message to women across the world. We are collecting letters of love and honour to a heroine who can be found in Glasgow Women’s Library, a woman who is no longer alive but whose story is celebrated somewhere in our shelves and boxes. You can find out what happens next at womenslibrary.org.uk
Come along to our inspiring workshops or simply write to your heroine today at Glasgow Women’s Library, 23 Landressy Street, Glasgow G40 1BP.

Life Is Short

Right now, after this week at work, and all that I've been pondering as a result, nothing is more in tune with me than this poster by Kevin Caplicki.
WHAT COULD YOU BE DOING?



((It also fits in with a lot of what myself and Lindsay Starbuck have been discussing re. our contribution to this year's Ante art festival to be held over May Day weekend in Shipley (more on this later, but for now here's the facebook event: http://www.facebook.com/events/168941936594177/permalink/175176799304024/#!/events/408377285927531/?fref=ts) OR: http://www.facebook.com/#!/events/443927942362210/?fref=ts - not quite sure why there's 2 different pages))





The 'Life Is Short' silkscreen poster was created for the 2013 Justseeds collaborative installation/exhibition, 'Uprisings: Images of Labor'

Kevin says: I chose to evaluate whether "work" is a valuable way to spend time, reinterpreting World War II slogans "Time is short" and "Make every minute count", for my contribution to out "labor" themed exhibition.


The print is available to buy on white or brown paper: http://www.justseeds.org/kevin_caplicki/18lifeisshort.html

This print was designed by Laurel Bell and Kevin Caplicki, entirely handmade with films cut from rubylith, stencils, and spraypaint, then printed cooperatively with Jesse Purcell, Laurel Bell, and others on recycled Mr. French paper.

 

Comics for Change


As a huge fan of the 'Oregon History Comics: Illustrated Stories from Oregon’s Little-Known Past' comics zines, I'm thrilled to hear that there's a new project afoot by the makers.

See: call for submission for Comics for Change! Illustrated Stories From Oregon’s Front Lines. A series of 10 comics that will tell the stories of Oregonian activists working for social change.

Sounds perfect!!
All the details and promo video here: http://knowyourcity.org/2013/04/22/know-your-city-announces-comics-for-change/

Thursday 4 April 2013

S&S at DIY Cultures

 
DIY Cultures fair
Saturday 7th April
at: Rich Mix, London
 
A day long festival of zines, artist books, comics and distros. There will be films, animation and video art as well as art exhibitions, workshops and music.

Events include a talk from the Black Feminists, talks on unemployment and creativity, artist-run spaces and prisoner zines as well as DIY workshops throughout the day.
 
“DIY culture is about creating alternatives to what is out there, whether it’s news, music or art, and doing it without the need of any experts or a lot of money” Sofia Niazi, DIY Cultures Co-curator

“In spite of blogs, facebook and twitter, zines seem to have had a nationwide comeback. This will showcase the best of alternative and independent activities from all across the UK in one big gathering.” Hamja Ahsan, DIY Cultures Co-Curator

Programme:

Upstairs:

Craft & drawing Workshops by ExtraBones & DIY Couture

Downstairs:

1pm: We All Can Do It! Black Women in DIY Culture - TALK
Join Black Feminists in a discussion about how black women have played a vital role in DIY cultures with Stephanie Phillips, Aurella Yussuf and Rianna Parker.
www.blackfeminists.org
#DIYBlackFems

2pm: FIlm - DIY OR DIE: How to Survive as an Independent Artist
feat. Zinesters, Lydia Lunch, Fugazi, Dinosaur Jr, Artists.

3pm: Unemployment & Creativity Panel Discussion
with Sarah Tea-Rex (Graduating in Unemployment Zine), Saban Kazim (Gissa a Job Zine), Robin Bale (Dole arts)
#DIYDole

4.30pm: Prisoner Zines, Writing & Creavity Panel
with Marek of Not Shut Up Magazine, Nicki Prisoner Fightback & Hamja of Free Talha Ahsan Campaign
#DIYPrison

6pm: DIY Artists Communities - Panel Discussion
with Pippa Koszerek (Post-Artists / Independent Art School / Arts Against Extraditions), Craftivist Collective Gareth (Foodface gallery) & other TBC
#DIYArt

Programme - www.diycultures.tumblr.com
Twitter - #DIY2013 @DIYCulturesFair
Facebook - www.facebook.com/pages/DIY-Cultures

/////

PLUS

Posters from issues 1-4 of Shape & Situate: Posters Of Inspirational European Women zine will be shown as a slide show at DIY Cultures.

(N.B - it's my first time at playing about with the 'make a movie' programme I have on my computer, so it's not the flashiest of slideshow films, but it allows me to show the posters and explain the zine even though I sadly can't be at the event myself)
 
 
 

Change the Culture, Change the World

Via Favianna Rodriguez (http://favianna.com/) -

Change the Culture, Change the World

http://creativetimereports.org/2013/04/01/change-the-culture-change-the-world/

"Art is uniquely positioned to move people—inspiring them, inciting new questions and provoking curiosity or outrage. Normally, and especially when we are in campaign mode, we tend to think about what artists can contribute to the action space. We think about how artists can strengthen the will and push people to act. But we should also ask ourselves: What are the valuable contributions artists can make in the idea space? Artists don’t think like policy folks. They don’t think like organizers. And this is a good thing."

"I talk about this and more in this piece on Creative Time. It's a great read about why have to strongly support artists in social change work. Featuring art by and mentions of Erik Ruin, Alex Rivera, Julio Salgado, Ernesto Yerena Montejano and more!"

http://creativetimereports.org/2013/04/01/change-the-culture-change-the-world/