Culture Diary w/c 11-06-2018
Our pick of this week’s arts, design, film and music events from around the North of England and the rest of the UK – and most of it’s free!
Monday – YOTA 7pm @ Arts Club, Liverpool – £11.50
Ever wondered what it would sound like if members of Gorillaz formed a side-project with sometime Klaxons? Wonder no more. Tonight YOTA – or Youth Of The Apocalypse if you’re not into the whole acronym thing – bring their brand of alt-punk and hip-hop this way.
Tuesday – Liquid Sky (1982) 8.30pm @ ICA, London — Ticket Prices Vary
Last year it was reported that this 1982 Sci-Fi would have its last hurrah before being retired, such was the degradation of the last surviving 35mm print. Since then, it has happily been newly restored from director Slava Tsukerman’s original negatives. Like all good sci-fi, Liquid Sky riffs on the era in which it emerges – in this case, new wave fashion and music, gender relations, and New York counter culture.
Exhibition Opening: Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 10am–6pm @ The Royal Academy of Arts, London – £16
Every year, the RA, that grande dame of the arts establishment, throws open its doors in celebration of “art made now”. This year’s summer show has been curated by that most visible of UK artists Grayson Perry, who has included some stellar names – Hockney, Kapoor, Tillmans, Emin – jostling alongside the less well known. Including a mind-boggling 1,300 works in various mediums, the RA’s website promises its “biggest, brightest and most colourful Summer Exhibition yet” to mark its 250th anniversary and a recent refurb.
Thursday – Exhibition Opening: Common Ground 10am–5pm @ Albert Dock Colonnades, Liverpool – FREE
In case you hadn’t heard, the 2018 World Cup kicks off this week (today in fact), so this exhibition is timely indeed. Curated by Foto Octo (“a creative collective of minds with the community at its core”), Common Ground (below) looks beyond the surface highs and lows of football. Including work by Tom Wood, Ken Grant and Tabitha Jussa – photographers of different generations – the show aims to “offer a unique insight into how the locale has evolved alongside the might of the now multimillion pound football industry”.
Talk: Magnum Photos Now: Fantasy, Play, And The Document 7pm @ Barbican, London – £10
Skirting around issues of appropriation, authenticity and truth, former photojournalist Cristina De Middel’s (below) work is always an interesting proposition. In Fantasy, Play, and the Document, artist, critic and art historian Lucy Soutter leads a talk exploring de Middel’s particular approach to storytelling via the medium of photography.
Friday – Exhibition Opening: Liverpool Biennial With BALTIC Presents: We Are Where We Are 12–5.30pm @ BALTIC 39, Gateshead – FREE
Showcasing 11 Biennial Associate artists from the North of England, We Are Where We Are marks the end of a three year project working on the proviso that artists can, and do, build sustainable careers outside of the capital. The artists, who have been working with international curators to that end, now present their work as part of the Great Exhibition of the North 2018, in what should prove a great opportunity to gauge the results.
Exhibition Opening: A Slice Through The World: Contemporary Artists’ Drawings 6.30pm @ Modern Art Oxford – FREE
This new show from Modern Art Oxford addresses the complex and fascinating issue of what it means to use the traditional tools of paper and pencil in a digital age. Bringing together 14 international artists committed to that very materiality, the exhibition posits, very sensibly, that drawing can make us slow down and, well, look harder. Get along to MAO tonight for the opening party, including a tour of the show with curator, Stephanie Straine.
Saturday – Talk: Sonia Boyce 3pm @ Manchester Art Gallery – FREE, Booking Required
Earlier this year, Sonia Boyce (below) and Manchester Art Gallery were the subject of controversy (on the grounds, variously, of censorship and political correctness gone mad). In the wake of the temporary removal from the gallery walls of John William Waterhouse’s Hylas and the Nymphs, Boyce explained her intention was to instigate a conversation about the Victorian Fantasy, and how and why museums make decisions. Get along to MAG this afternoon to hear, no doubt, more on this subject on the occasion of the artist’s first retrospective exhibition.
Woman With A Movie Camera Summit 2018 11.30am @ BFI Southbank, London – £20/£16/£10
This day of events, talks, and panel discussions convened by BFI asks the question: what does power mean for women? With sessions dedicated to topics ranging from Who Runs the Set, to Before and After Time’s Up, Woman with a Movie Camera explores what a year of fall-out in Hollywood means for levelling the notoriously lopsided playing field of the film industry. Fans will be excited to hear that following the summit is a special edition of Frances-White’s The Guilty Feminist podcast.
Sunday – Last Chance To See: Snapshot To Wechat: A Migration Of Identity @ Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool – FREE
Snapshot to WeChat: A Migration of Identity considers the relationship between the casual photograph and how we see – and present – ourselves. Including anthropologist Dr Xinyuan Wang’s investigations of China’s immense social media platform WeChat, Thomas Sauvin’s revelatory archive of negatives (pre-smart phone), Beijing Silver Mine, and Teresa Eng’s shopping mall project Self/Portrait, catch this exquisite and illuminating exhibition while you can.
Mike Pinnington
