Culture Diary w/c 07-09-2015
What’s hot this week? Our pick of the listings from around Liverpool and the rest of the UK…
Monday – Exhibition Opening: Luke McCreadie: Be In The Air, But Not Be Air, Be In The No Air 10-5pm @ Jerwood Project Space, London – FREE
What would become of us if we lost our language? Here, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne-based artist Luke McCreadie contemplates this unbearable loss of verbal language in three new works — wall-mounted ceramic shelf sculptures, a hanging mobile and a newly created film – and in doing so, brings together conceptual display methods to transforms the immaterial spoken word into a tangible form.
Tuesday – Narvik 7.45pm @ Playhouse Studio, Liverpool — £10-£12
Inspired by the stories of Navel Veterans, Norway and the city of Liverpool are drawn together through the telling of a tumultuous love affair in playwright Lizzie Nunnery’s new work. Featuring new songs written by Nunnery herself, the effects of war are brought to bear on the relationship of a Liverpudlian man and a Norwegian woman in a tale of betrayal, guilt, love and heroism.
Wednesday – Exhibition Opening: Platform 10-6pm @ Turner Contemporary, Margate — FREE
Initiated by CVAN (Contemporary Visual Art Network South East), Platform is showcasing the work of eight graduates (from the University for the Creative Arts, University of Kent and Canterbury Christ Church University), in the hope of providing a much needed leg-up for emerging artistic talent. Featuring work from Laura Hepworth, Layla Moore, David Vargas, Ben Crawford, Evdokia Georgiou, Nadia Perrotta, Ida Cholewinska and Lois Proctor, expect explorations of identity, memory, texture, and human relationships.
Thursday – Symbiosis: Art & Science 1-2pm @ The Bluecoat, Liverpool — FREE
To complement the Bluecoat’s current exhibition, Resource, based on the gallery’s founding premise – for ‘the diffusion of useful knowledge’ – it seems highly appropriate that art and science should be the topic of investigation in this fascinating ‘in conversation’ event. Tonight, exhibiting artist Laurence Payot and scientist Ewan Minter discuss Payot’s research into symbiosis and interactive sculptures, to highlight the similarities and disparities that occur in such seemingly disparate (yet somehow intersecting) practices.
Exhibition Opening: Sensory Systems 5.30-8pm @ The Grundy Gallery, Blackpool — FREE
Coinciding with the beloved Blackpool Illuminations, the Grundy present an ambitious show of light; transforming the gallery into ’chambers’ of sculpture, projection and immersive architecture. Featuring pioneering and experimental work from artists Angela Bulloch, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Ann Veronica Janssens, Anthony McCall and Conrad Shawcross, you can also expect a co-current show of 1930s hand-drawn designs for the famous neon Illuminations. Open late on Fridays and Saturdays (until 7pm) for the duration of the exhibition.
Friday – Film Station Scalarama Season: Daisies (1966) 6.30-8.30pm @ Metal, Liverpool — £3
Czech Director Věra Chytilová takes surrealist cinema to the extreme in this satirical tale of anarchy through the lives of two women. Here, we follow our protagonists (both named Marie) as they rebel against the dull bourgeois society they have come to expect and, instead, subvert their experiences in a bid for absolute freedom.
PICK OF THE WEEK: I Speak Machine 7.30pm @ The Kazimier, Liverpool — £7 ADV
Comprised of electronic composer/vocalist Tara Busch and science fiction/horror filmmaker Maf Lewis, I Speak Machine bring their current European Tour to Liverpool tonight with a healthy dose of audio works and film to create an electrifying night. Featuring some of their original films, such as sci-fi short The Silence, the unsettling ghost story I See Me, and period horror 1985, Busch accompanies the visuals with live vocals and analogue synths to create vast sonic soundscapes .
Saturday – Introduction to Bookmaking 1-4pm @ Ninety Squared, Liverpool — £30
Looking to learn a new creative skill? Today join visual artist and creative practitioner Lisa Risbec to master the art of bookmaking in this practical and useful workshop. Focusing on zine-style folding techniques, pamphlet stitching, Japanese stab stitch and the concertina method, you will produce your own books that will provide the basic skills and structure needed to continue your new-found creative skills at home.
Exhibition Opening: Jack Lavender 10-6pm @ BALTIC, Newcastle – FREE (main picture)
Comic books, magazines, plastic dog toys, leaf-shaped ashtrays, crisp packets and fake fruit – a seemingly peculiar selection of items used in artist Jack Lavender’s latest installation of new and recent artworks. His first UK solo show, Lavender utilises the vast gallery space to suspend sculptures, printed banners and found objects from the ceiling and, in doing so, elevates the mass-produced and every day to the status of art.
Sunday – Last Day: Duane Hanson 10am-6pm @ The Serpentine Gallery, London – FREE (pictured above)
During a career spanning 40 years, artist Duane Hanson has never shied away from the difficult topics in life – homelessness, police brutality, abortion – in his unbelievably lifelike sculptures. In his first survey show in London in 18 years, we observe some of Hanson’s most eminent works depicting working-class Americans and overlooked members of society, to transform the banalities of life into epic scenes of iconoclastic significance.
Cheap Thrills/Scalarama Presents Hairspray (1988) 6-7.30pm @ A Small Cinema, Liverpool — £4/3
Now a super-successful hit musical, the original John Waters film is a sassy, camp and surprisingly effective lesson in integration and acceptance. Starring a young Ricki Lake (as in the Ricki Lake Show) as the dance-loving teen Tracy Turnblad, alongside a screwball cast that includes Blondie’s Debbie Harry and the infamous drag queen Divine in her last ever role. Expect a Foot Stompin’ soundtrack of early 1960s pop hits — including Curtis Mayfield and Chubby Checker — that’ll spring you out of your cinema seat.
Heather Garner
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