Culture Diary Special: Things To Do In January 2018
January’s boring, right? Wrong! Fear not, friends: there’s an abundance of exciting events to enjoy across the UK in the first month of 2018…
Monday, 1 January – Manchester Camerata: The New Year’s Day Viennese 3pm @ The Bridgewater Hall, Manchester — £43—21/£5 Students
Join conductor Christian Kluxen and soprano Sarah Redgwick for a fabulous Viennese Gala on the first day of 2018… Expect many seasonal favourites, including Austrian composer Johann Strauss II’s famous waltz, The Blue Danube.
Ingmar Bergman Retrospective @ BFI Southbank, London – Prices Vary
Acclaimed Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman (1918–2007) is celebrated from 1 January until mid-March this year, and features well-known works Persona (1966), Seventh Seal (1957) and Wild Strawberries (1957), plus lesser-known films like The Touch (1971) starring Elliot Gould, TV programmes like Fanny and Alexander (1983), and his version of Mozart’s opera The Magic Flute (1975).
Thursday 11 January – Exhibition Opening: The Pier Head – Tom Wood 6—9pm @ Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool — FREE
Waiting for the Mersey Ferry between 1978-2002, when he lived in New Brighton, photographer Tom Wood would capture fellow passengers (pictured, above) taking the everyday journey across the River Mersey to Liverpool. See nearly 100 of Wood’s snapshots next to the waterfront itself, and grab the accompanying new book, Termini, while you’re at it – bound, like Wood’s previous publications, to make The Greatest 150 Photo Books of All Time list.
Darkness Visible 7—9pm @ Whitechapel Gallery, London – £9.50/7.50 (Booking Required)
After spending a solitary and stimulating week working in his studio in a self-enforced blackout, artist Sam Winston has invited other artists to do the same. Expect an evening exploring the results: sensory collaborations with photographer Andy Sewell, composer Jamie Perera and filmmaker Anna Price, plus live readings from poets Emily Berry, Kayo Chingonyi and George Szirtes.
Friday 12/Saturday 13/Sunday 14/Saturday 20 January — Female Sexuality And The Male Gaze 11am—4.30pm @ The National Gallery, London — £26.71 (Booking Essential)
A popular day-long workshop by London Drawing Group delving into traditional concepts of nudity and the Male Gaze, expect debate around and sketching of some of the best paintings The National Gallery has to offer, with expert guide and resident LDG Art History Tutor Luisa Maria MacCormack.
Friday 12–21 January — London Short Film Festival @ Venues Across London — Prices Vary
Dubbed “The Best Short Film Festival in the World” (Guardian Guide), LSFF have been responsible for screening early (short) versions of some of the UK’s best homegrown talent – including The Greasy Strangler (2016) and Berberian Sound Studio (2012) – for 15 years. Get a sense of the festival’s impressive achievements in WE DARE TO FAIL: 15 Years of LSFF, and look to the future with their first ever competition strand selected by an international jury – at cinemas including the ICA, MOTH Club, Rix Mix and Curzon Soho.
Saturday 20 January — Women In Punk & No Wave Film And Music 12–5pm & 8–11pm @ BEEF: Brunswick Club, Bristol — £12 OTD/£7 Day/£7 Evening
A jam-packed day of films, talks and performances (and dancing!) looking at how Punk challenged 1970’s norms of femininity, expect to discuss voice as resistance, see new work by Irish feminist experimental and documentary filmmaker Vivienne Dick, hear DJs Delirious Rhythm and Queens of the Neighbourhood, and more.
Wednesday 24 January – Psycho (1960) – Hotel Hotel! 6.30—8.30pm @ Nottingham Contemporary — All Films £5/5 For £20
Part of a new season of classic films about or based in hotels and motels, tonight’s feature is set – of course – in a place that encapsulates everything that could go wrong: The Bates Motel. If you haven’t already seen this voyeuristic thriller, do: it’s still as hair-raising nearly 60 years on, thanks to Hitchcock’s experimental film techniques (don’t miss the double exposure of Anthony Perkins’ grinning, murderous face with a human skull) and Bernard Herrmann’s electric score.
Friday 26 January – Dear Esther Live 8pm @ Liverpool Philharmonic Hall — £18.50/14.50
Who is Esther and where is she? Why is this lonely, gruff man stuck on an abandoned Hebridean island, writing letters to her? What are the strange, alien markings that cover shipwrecks, abandoned cottages and cave walls? If you love gaming, strings, sopranos, storytelling, and just plain bonkers experiences, this is for you: a live, apocalyptic murder-mystery from BAFTA-nominated narrator Oliver Dimsdale and BAFTA-winning composer Jessica Curry.
Saturday 27 January – Manchester Collective: The Edge Of Fantasy 7.30pm @ Invisible Wind Factory, Liverpool — £18–5
A contemporary string quartet taking on the theme of fantasy, expect Manchester Collective to whisk you away to Eastern Europe tonight with a section of frenetic and hallucinatory tales; including Leoš Janáček’s Kreutzer Sonata – based on Tolstoy’s tragic, 1889 novella about a woman trapped in a loveless marriage, who is drawn to a handsome violinist – and Henryk Górecki’s folk-influenced, brooding Quasi una Fantasia.
Laura Robertson, Editor
