THE opening of an exhibition at Gallery150 in Leamington is always a bit of an occasion.
It’s the only gallery where you get called sir or madam as you’re handed a glass of wine, and the canapés are always beautifully presented.
But tonight’s opening was the first where at opening time the exhibition was still being hung! LSA Chair Gerry Smith, fresh back from holiday, and an able assistant were busy fixing the last digital prints to the wall as the first drinks were poured, but they were soon all in place and in a straight line too.
Artists
Coventry University degree show features art and anguish
Coventry University’s annual degree show is a must-see event for anyone in the area who’s interested in what the next generation of up and coming artists are doing.
The opening night on Friday was as usual full of dressed-up students, their proud but often-confused parents and lots of visitors just keen to see what’s going on.
The opening night has never been the same since the students were stopped from serving up their own drinks to all passers-by, meaning you could traverse four floors with a plastic cup of wine never emptying.
However doing it sober probably means visitors notice more of the work. There was a trend this year, especially with the graphic design students, of having offerings of sweets along with their displays – though one display which featured more food carried a note along the lines of ‘please help yourself to sweets but don’t touch the cupcakes’!
Meter Room is exciting new Coventry venture for city artists
AN UNUSUAL and exciting exhibition space has opened in Coventry – but you have to be very observant to find it.
The Meter Room is at 58-64 Corporation Street in the city centre – just round the corner from the bottom of The Burges, with the entrance in a side alley between the pub and a charity shop. It says Meter Room above the door and also the name of the building’s previous occupier – the CVSC.
Go up a couple of flights and the doors open into a corridor which at the moment has various exhibition spaces off it, and also studios for lots of local artists.
Coventry artist George Shaw on Turner Prize shortlist
The shortlist for art’s most prestigious award, the Turner Prize, is due to be announced tonight – and Coventry-born artist George Shaw is among the contenders.
The list is due to be announced on Channel 4 news from 7pm tonight, but several leaks on Twitter and on various websites name Karla Black, Martin Boyce, Hilary Lloyd and George Shaw as the names up for the award this year.
Local talent on show in Coventry and Rugby photographic exhibitions
TWO short exhibitions on in Coventry and Warwickshire are showcasing photographic talents from the area.
Both look like they’re worth a visit but aren’t on for long enough for me to be able to write about them more fully in the Friday Coventry Telegraph art column.
At Rugby’s Floor One gallery in Rugby Art Gallery & Museum until May 5, Lee Prescott is showing his photographs in an exhibition called Infinite Ephemera. He lives in Hillmorton, Rugby, and this is his first solo exhibition of travel photography, and he says the works are “documenting those ordinary moments that once captured on film become extraordinary”.
Kenilworth on Brink of new art opportunities
ARTISTS are being invited to take part in an outdoor exhibition of work.
BRINK, a new ‘not for profit’ arts organisation based in Kenilworth, is calling for submissions for Art on the Edge which will take place at the Lions Grand Show in Kenilworth on June 11.
Artists will either exhibit works, or create them on the day, from installations to live painting, sculpture and contemporary-style Indian folk art. Most of the artists already involved will be present on the day to meet the public, who can watch them at work, and there will also be an artists’ picnic.
Any local artists interested in getting involved should send a biography, CV and five- 10 images to brinkevents@gmail.com before April 30.
BRINK was founded by artist/curator Tim Robottom and writer/curator Sarah Silver, who both grew up in Kenilworth, in October last year. It aims to raise awareness of contemporary art and make more accessible to the public, while promoting talented emerging artists through events and shows that take place in less traditional exhibition spaces.
From Saturday, May 7- Sunday, May 15 BRINK in collaboration with English Heritage is presenting Temporanea at Kenilworth Castle, an exhibition of contemporary art featuring a mix of sculpture, installation and paintings by regional, national and international artists.
In the Elizabethan Garden, Stephen Charlton, bronze winner of the 2008 Chelsea Flower Show sculpture award, will be showing a series of mischievous resin mice, frozen in a moment in time, and inspired by childhood and nature.
Martin Johnson, a Coventry artist, lecturer and senior concept visualiser for Blitz games, will be showing a series of paintings interwining graphic novel-style and traditional techniques. He will also create a work on site during the exhibition.
Concetta Modica from Milan will present a piece relating to her personal history and homeland. Luke Perry, co-present of the Channel 4 series Titanic:The Mission will show video work Poveri Fiori, with footage of shipyard workers including his own father.
BRINK co-founder Tim Robottom is presenting several installation pieces, and Surminder Virk, who lives in Leamington, will show Downward Spiral, a delicate installation piece of a mattress wrapped in thread.
The exhibition is open during normal castle opening hours and the usual castle entrance fee applies.
Artists’ talks are new feature at Gallery 150
Gallery 150 in the Regent Court Shopping Centre, Leamington, is launching Art talks, an opportunity for people to meet the artists exhibiting at the gallery and get an insight into their methods, conception and production of art.
Two talks next week tie in with current exhibitions. On Tuesday, April 19 at 7pm Andy Farr will give a talk on his exhibition of paintings, and on Thursday April 21 at 7pm the founder of the Coventry-based Titanic Heritage Trust, Howard Nelson, will be giving a talk about his work and the trust.
Coventry University students’ first exhibition at the Lock
A GROUP of students have taken over the Lock gallery in Coventry this week for their first professional exhibition.
The six, studying a mixture of fine art and illustration, are second years at Coventry University, and doing all the work to stage an exhibition is part of the professional practice module in their degree.
Frank Sidney Smith’s paintings at The New Art Gallery show beauty born from trauma
A LIFE full of trauma and tragedy has helped create some paintings which are enchanting and enthralling.
It seems as though Frank Sidney Smith decided to use his creative urges as a type of therapy, to try to come to terms with everything that had happened to him.
There are times when it’s impossible to look at some paintings without reference to the artist who created them and what he or she has endured, and this is one of those times.
The images are pretty and child-like in initial appearance but many tell stories of unbelievable sadness. It’s vital to read the paragraphs underneath each one in this exhibition at The New Art Gallery, Walsall, to have an understanding of what the innocent-looking pictures really show.
Tanya is hitting the big time
A woman who has found her big passion and escape in life through art is exhibiting at Bedworth Arts Centre until March 5.
Tanya Martin’s first solo exhibition is called Art Is My Life, and she showed it by taking so much work along there wasn’t space and some had to go home again!
And she’s proving controversial, as three pieces from her Body Form collection had to be taken down after people were “a bit upset” about them – although she had asked if it was ok to display them at first and had been told it was.
Private View II 