Angela Tait speaks to two graduates in Salford who – sick of waiting for opportunities to come to them – are launching their own exhibition, prizes and membership for artists…

As educators, we spend much of our time preparing our students for the precarious nature of the real world. What potential paths are open to the next graduating class? How can they navigate the arts straight from university – affordable studios, exhibitions and residencies – when life gets in the way? With the current state of the depleted job market, national funding cuts and general doom and gloom, it sometimes feels like you’re fighting a losing battle.

So, when I see graduates kickstart and grow their own ambitious projects, it’s a real boon. Take Short Supply: a new support system for emerging artists in the North West, set-up by my former University of Salford students Mollie Balshaw and Rebekah Beasley, with the goal of “putting on some damn good exhibitions”. It’s brilliant.

Graduating just last year from BA (Hons) Fine Art, they have, in a relatively short space of time, established Short Supply as a graduate showcase, prize and professional development experience all rolled into one. The first open-call group exhibition, MADE IT 2019, will launch this week at Paradise Works in Salford; it has been judged by established curators Bren O’Callaghan, Curator at HOME Manchester, and artist Precious Innes, co-curator of show.me.up. One artist will receive the Curator’s Choice award of £100 while another will be offered an exhibition in the Cass Art gallery in Manchester city centre.

It’s everything Mollie and Rebekah desired themselves, post-graduation. “We wanted to pre-empt the situations we were going to be experiencing after leaving uni”, Mollie tells me, as we meet in the Salford Museum and Gallery café – a stone’s throw from the art school where we used to sit down for tutorials together. I’m curious about the motivation behind Short Supply; juggling this alongside their own practice, volunteering at galleries and working part-time jobs to pay the bills. “We knew we would lose our systems of support, and we wanted to put what we’d learned into practice”, continues Mollie. “There are other artist-led initiatives in Manchester and beyond, but we felt we could offer something different. Instead of working with those, we decided to tackle what we’d been worried about ourselves.”

It’s true – the North West is brimming with a broad range of museums, galleries and studios, MA and PhD courses, public programming, collectives and groups, charities and funded projects – Arts Council England has even got an office in Manchester. But finding your way from a standing start can be a challenge fraught with unpaid opportunities, unsuccessful applications and false starts. There are specific platforms which support recent graduates; Mollie herself is a recipient of the Graduate Scholarship Programme 2019, a joint endeavour from the University of Salford Art Collection and the School of Arts & Media, which pays for 12 month’s-worth of studio space at Islington Mill and regular mentoring from a Manchester-based industry professional. Readers will be aware of high profile, national exhibitions like Bloomberg New Contemporaries: a fabulous springboard for the chosen few which tours British galleries and is, likewise, selected by industry experts.

In that context, I ask Mollie and Rebekah why Short Supply is needed at all? We discuss the application fee for Bloomberg New Contemporaries, which this year charges £25 for proposals to be considered amongst “huge numbers” of others, for one of 45 prestigious places. MADE IT, on the other hand, was free to apply to. It is also – crucially – run by new graduates, for new graduates.

“We’re in the same boat”, says Mollie. “We share some of the same experiences and anxieties. We’re expanding Short Supply into a larger support network which will go some way to replacing the critical environment of the university.” The Short Supply website will act as a membership-driven community, an online portal listing any emerging artist who wishes to be represented. Their first group crit is being planned, inviting all the applicants of the open call, Short Supply supporters and, apparently, even me. They would like ‘coffee, cake and crit’ to become a monthly occurrence, in some ways creating a supportive place which might replace the university studio environment they have lost.

I’m pleased to hear it was an undergraduate exhibition that gave Mollie and Rebekah some of the impetus for MADE IT. Exhibiting in and co-curating their student show Reality: Tap to See More at Paradise Works – as part of a second-year module on professional practice – helped them to muster the confidence to start planning their own. They approached several Manchester galleries, before eventually getting the encouragement they needed from the Paradise Works co-founders, Hilary Jack and Lucy Harvey. Rebekah recalls the knock-backs they faced from venues because of their lack of reputation. “You can’t just say: ‘Here I am straight from university, trust me, I’m going to put on a show’.” And yet, that’s what they have done, in finding a venue that understood the need for an alternative graduate springboard drawing from the local talent pool.

And MADE IT is clearly and simply a good idea. Promoted through social media, purse-sized cards and posters in art shops and galleries, and on stickers on lampposts and bus stops, graduates from any North West university could apply to exhibit. “The flood of applications and interest truly took us by surprise”, says Rebekah. “Lots of people have reached out to us and said, ‘we like what you’re doing and we want to help or be involved’.”

Within a day of the campaign going live, Manchester-based independent publication Penny Thoughts had suggested a collaboration, along with Shy Bairns, a pop-up artist-run organisation also  started by graduates looking to find their own path. HOME, Cass Art and Paradise Works are behind them. They now have an inaugural exhibition of 14 graduates, from Manchester School of Art, the University of Salford, UCLan, the University of Chester, University Centre St Helens and Bolton University. The pair plan to make this an annual event and have already committed to MADE IT 2020, whilst also securing a gallery for a separate curated show next July. The connections being made by Short Supply have expanded their own professional network, a notoriously difficult process for new graduates whose sphere of influence is usually limited to their own university cohort.

From their experience so far, I ask Mollie and Rebekah if they have any tips for other, fresh-out-of-uni artists responding to open-calls. Rebekah advises making every application outstanding: “Imagine Charles Saatchi might read what you’ve written and don’t send off anything you’re not completely proud of. Never send anything but your best proposal whether this is to a graduate show run by your contemporaries or an application to the Tate.”

“Don’t write too much” Mollie adds; “be clear and concise and always use great images which show scale.”

The duo understand that they’ve emerged into a crowded and complicated world. Short Supply is one way in which they’re attempting to shape their own destiny, whilst holding out a hand to other artists in the same situation. They’ve preempted a challenging time in their early careers with professionalism, thought and commitment. “Our art-life never stops”, laughs Rebekah… And I’d like to think they learned a little bit of that from me.

Angela Tait

Short Supply’s inaugural exhibition MADE IT 2019 opens at Paradise Works, Salford, on Thursday 15 August 2019, 6-8pm – FREE

Exhibition continues Saturdays 17 and 24 August 2019, 12-5pm, or by appointment until 30 August

More info here

Images, from top: Oliver East for MADE IT 2019, Short Supply, courtesy the artist. Mollie and Rebekah, founders of Short Supply. Megan Needham for MADE IT 2019, Short Supply, courtesy the artist. Emily Wills for MADE IT 2019, Short Supply, courtesy the artist

Closing this Sunday, and in a final #BeACritic review of the exhibition, Maisie Ridgway finds a strong and rebellious selection of New Contemporaries reclaiming authority over the viewer…

Into the World Museum foyer, up two flights of stairs and through the bug display: this is where you’ll find 2014’s Bloomberg New Contemporaries exhibition, selected this year by revered judges and former BNC participants Marvin Gaye Chetwynd, Enrico David and Goshka Maguga.

The space does not beg you to enter, but challenges you to find it amongst the spiders, if you please. It may, therefore, initially seem an unusual choice of location, obscure even, but its sense of displacement in the World Museum pre-empts the theme of displacement that threads this year’s selections together. Other prevalent themes include gender, body image, inverted gaze and, more indirectly, money.

Upon entering the gallery, Alice Hartley’s almost 14-foot high screen print confronts the viewer with the words: “We’re All Very Disappointed” (2013). As a phrase most commonly associated with parental reprimand, Hartley provides the first and most prolific example of the inverted gaze. The piece establishes the artist’s authority over the viewer, repossessing her power through language and setting a precedence for the rest of the show.

MKLK’s performance piece, Man Eater (2013), demonstrates a curious manipulation of the female body through use of filmstrips of hard pornography, “specifically aimed at reflecting the male gaze within society”, in order to echo “the role of women as a visual spectacle for a masculine culture”. Man Eater is strong. Although the female remains the object of fixation, MKLK’s mesmerising performance commands our gaze so that she — and not us — possesses the power of sight.

This years BNC director Kirsty Ogg commented that: “creativity has become a marketable commodity in contemporary culture”. As an output that is experiencing a financial squeeze yet is increasingly viewed as marketable, artists inhabit an awkward space. A contradiction that is embodied in Matt Copson’s confused alter ego, Reynard The Fox (2013).

Reynard is a foul-mouthed fox, seeking vengeance for the mistreatment of his species in years gone by. Unfortunately, Reynard’s bloodlust is met with acceptance, as he is welcomed into the fold of contemporary art. Reynard, therefore, becomes impotent in his rage and so swings between sad resignations — “It’s just a gimmick, I can only apologise” — and inflammatory profanities directed towards babies, hipsters, homosexuals and anybody that comes to mind. Reynard is the tragicomedy of the exhibition. Read his thoughts via his blog post here.

These artists occupy a space disused by the World Museum because of budget cuts, which rather appropriately mirrors the financial constraints currently stifling the arts. Out of the 55 pieces selected, an uncommonly massive 24 are film based, one of the cheapest mediums available, whilst few more expensive materials are utilised.

The film pieces are displayed via televisions set on plinths that line the walls. The plinths, coupled with the Victorian style of the building, evoke a certain historical elegance that seems to jar with the contemporary nature of the work. I’d be inclined to suggest that this space, purposefully or not, comes to mimic the general sentiment of the selections. Namely, the young manoeuvring an environment tailored to the old.

In a time where the government no longer appeals to Generation Y for their votes — a generation that has been written off in terms of their ability to succeed, a generation that participated in one of the biggest student protests in history and were ignored — the dissatisfaction is clear. Through this 65th anniversary New Contemporaries exhibition, artists like Alice Hartley, Matt Copson and MKLK are reclaiming their autonomy, inviting you in as their guests under a scrutinous eye. They do not seek your criticism, but seek to criticise you.

Maisie Ridgway

This review was the result of a public #BeACritic afternoon for aspiring critics, hosted by The Double Negative, at the press view of Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2014 — more here

Read more on the #BeACritic campaign here

Bloomberg New Contemporaries continues at the World Museum, Liverpool until Sunday 26 October 2014. It then travels to the ICA, London from 26 November 2014 until 25 January 2015

Don’t be confused by the venue, says Abigail Stokes; the hidden Victorian gallery in Liverpool’s children’s museum is the perfect place for this year’s batch of New Contemporaries…

Friday. Not only my first press view, but my first experience of the Bloomberg New Contemporaries; an annual competition where selected (recent) fine art graduates get a chance to show their work.

Receiving details of the exhibition in a press pack, my first thought was that the World Museum is a rather odd venue for a contemporary art show. Meeting a group of critics on the way in, we question this choice whilst getting lost in the bug emporium — a space designed for children with its bright colours, projections and soft play area. Beginning to think we are in the wrong place entirely, we eventually pass through a door and stumble into the silence of a white gallery. The space is grand: revealing the intimidating long windows and high ceilings of neo-classical architecture.

With an exhibition of different emerging artists that has no planned theme, the space becomes an important factor: it is the one constant point for the New Contemporaries  to play with. Whilst other Liverpool Biennial spaces, like The Old Blind School and its musty, haunted corridors, give the work a sense of trepidation, this World Museum gallery gives a feeling of tradition and familiarity. This juxtaposition of traditional venue versus contemporary art poses an interesting question of how far current arts practice has become detached from historical methods.

So which dominates the show, the traditional or the contemporary?

For artist Henry Hussey, there is a risk of being over shadowed by Alice Hartley’s confrontational screenprint, We’re All Very Disappointed (2013); from floor to ceiling it demands your attention at the very start of the exhibition. However, Hussey’s The Guardian (2013) is looming at my shoulder, telling news stories with detailed tapestry work. “My grandmother is like a political pit bull”, it states, alongside Roman symbolism and photojournalism. I am hooked, not only by the text but also the combination of print on fabric. It is a clever use of traditional techniques, such as appliqué and embroidery, paired with contemporary digital printing.

Around the rest of the exhibition, an astonishing 24 video pieces account for almost half of the entries. So is this the medium of choice these days? Maybe, but as an art student I can vouch that video is a cheap way to produce and store work. So as studio spaces are increasingly tight and materials expensive, it seems to add up that there is such an influx of video. A traditional painting is best viewed in the flesh and doesn’t translate well to screen; however, in the age of social media, a video is easily shared in its correct format, thus another reason to encourage the use of this medium.

In this case, all but one of the videos come with a sculptural twist — each piece is viewed on a tv sitting on a plinth like a bust in a stately home, a traditional way to present the most contemporary medium in the show. However, this repeated 24 times causes me to lose focus; I start to treat all the videos the same, not wanting to stand and watch after the first three or four. This only draws more emphasis on the other works, curated and presented in a variety of ways, the — by default — ask for more consideration.

Hussey’s method of reversing traditional methodology by displaying it in a contemporary manner also works for Miroslav Pomichal’s Mismatched Couple (2013). Standing on the floor, oil-painted canvases lean on the wall like real people, a wooden rod sits between them and an arresting yellow background draws attention no frame could attract. Through this installation, the pieces take away the typical vantage point of the viewer, insisting they interact with the work in an unconventional way.

The venue that was originally a confusing choice becomes a point of comparison; we aren’t detached from the historical methods, in fact, the classic building simply helps remind us how far art has evolved. Elements of the traditional are shown in Hussey’s tapestry and Pomichal’s use of paint, alongside other works of sculpture, etchings and drawings. However, these pieces are transformed when they connect with contemporary digital prints and re-thought methods of hanging, showing that artists are readily considering a new combination of the traditional and contemporary.

Original and stimulating work dominates this year’s New Contemporaries, using tradition as a guideline. It is a show that anyone could appreciate and be excited about.

Abigail Stokes

This review was the result of a public #BeACritic afternoon for aspiring critics, hosted by The Double Negative, at the press view of Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2014 — more here

Read more on the #BeACritic campaign here

Bloomberg New Contemporaries continues at the World Museum, Liverpool until Sunday 26 October 2014. It then travels to the ICA, London from 26 November 2014 until 25 January 2015

Heather Garner observes a blending of new ideas and old techniques in the latest edition of New Contemporaries…

On the 65^th anniversary of Bloomberg New Contemporaries, the viewer is promised a snap-shot of the state of contemporary art, in the form of 55 undergraduates, postgraduates and recent graduates of art courses from around the UK. If this is indeed a glimpse into tomorrow’s contemporary artists and their practice, what can we gather about its wider cultural significance?

‘WE’RE ALL VERY DISAPPOINTED’ is a statement that literally greets the visitor on entering the exhibition space, in the form of Alice Hartley’s screen-printed wall display. A collective artist statement, perhaps? The thought of a generation, maybe? It may even be an anticipation of the criticisms that may eventually come to the art works or the exhibition itself. Whatever the intended or interpreted meaning, this statement seems to echo something of the general zeitgeist of youth culture today.

With recent austerity and government cuts to the arts across the country, it is easy to glean the disappointment of art students as a result of underfunding and financial pressure. There are no extravagant artworks that echo the wealth of a Damien Hirst or a Jeff Koons to be found in this exhibition. Most of the artworks on display perhaps reflect the austerity that is forced upon them through the use of materials such as builder’s sand, children’s playdoh, dust sheets, unfolded cardboard boxes, tights and traditional drawing techniques.

This is perhaps none more evident than in the significant amount of video art that has been selected for the 2014 exhibition, most of which are displayed on televisions on traditional white plinths. Such a medium requires little to no specialist equipment and can be filmed on a smartphone and uploaded on to any computer and is, perhaps, a medium born out of the Do It Yourself ethos when money is tight. It is an immediate and cost efficient form of expression.

Artist Matthew Humphreys’ video Goodbye (2014) seems to epitomise the stripped-back ethos that may be interpreted here. The poignancy of a farewell is captured to heart-breaking effect as he departs from his deaf and aging parents at the doorstep of their house over a period of three years. There are no staged camera set ups or pre-planned dialogue: it is simply communicating the universality and inevitability of saying goodbye.

Victoria Grenier, however, emphasises the lighter side of life through the importance of play: something that is all too easily forgotten. Whilst wearing handmade boots that resemble the gaping jaws of a menacing shark, Grenier improvises a self-conscious yet charming dance: the overall effect looks like a home video complete with 1980s style, special effect backdrops.

Viewing these pieces through the prism of austerity, it makes one wonder: is the artist’s medium and therefore aesthetic always altered in times of crisis? And what does this mean for the future of British art?

The less than optimistic title of art critic Donald Kuspit’s 2004 book The End of Art makes the case that art is no longer reliant on aesthetic significance. The ‘Post-art’ generation is characterised by the division of intellect and aesthetics. The notion that the banal can be elevated to the status of the mythical is claimed to have made art, as a visual and aesthetic medium, redundant.

Kuspit, instead, refers us to a new understanding of art and artists – ‘the New Old Masters’. When Kuspit uses this term he is not simply referring to the most recent artists who use the same techniques as the old masters, instead he is describing the future of art. In this sense, he suggests the future of art need not be limited to the conceptual but combines the intellect and innovation of the new with the humanism and spiritual qualities of the old.

To my mind, this is exactly what this exhibition represents: a move towards the blending of new ideas and old techniques, an understanding that is perhaps reflected in the decision to hold the new contemporaries in an old museum. A new generation of artists that has the political, social and innovative nous of Post-art, but the aesthetic and humanistic qualities of the old masters.

Henry Hussey’s politically-driven tapestry entitled The Guardian (2013) seems to be a perfect example of this union. Newspaper headlines and symbolic imagery of classical sculpture and disembodied hands reaching out to an unknown entity adorn this tapestry like the dada-esque collages of the 1920s.

Whilst Camille Summers-Valli’s Black Mesa (2014) touches upon the increasingly important issue of environmentalism and how the coal mining industry that threatens the Navajo peoples heritage and connection to the landscape. Set against the stunning back-drop of the desert, the film invokes the raw power of nature that may be drawn from the landscape paintings of the Romantic era.

If Bloomberg New Contemporaries has indeed provided the public with a snap-shot of contemporary art and culture, then from this year’s selection the art scene is as self-aware and politically astute as ever. But with arts courses and institutions feeling the effects of economic cuts, this exhibition seems to be an optimistic nod to the continued creativity of the arts scene today.

It is safe to say that art is in the capable hands of the New Old Masters.  Perhaps, we shouldn’t be so disappointed after all.

Heather Garner

This review was the result of a public #BeACritic afternoon for aspiring critics, hosted by The Double Negative, at the press view of Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2014 — more here

Read more on the #BeACritic campaign here

Bloomberg New Contemporaries continues at the World Museum, Liverpool until Sunday 26 October 2014. It then travels to the ICA, London from 26 November 2014 until 25 January 2015

Image: courtesy Camille Summers-Valli, Black Mesa, 2014. Still from video installation

What do you expect from the next generation of artists? Just don’t look for youthful optimism, says Josie Sommer, as she explores this latest batch of New Contemporaries…

This is it: Bloomberg New Contemporaries (BNC) 2014, a 55-artist-strong showcase of the cream of the emerging crop from UK art schools. Showcased at Liverpool’s World Museum, these artists have been selected by a panel of former New Contemporaries, Marvin Gaye Chetwynd, Enrico David and Goshka Macuga.

So, what are we expecting from the 2014 selection?
Video art? Check.
Politics? Check.
An impression of youth? Not quite.

Curated by BNC director Kirsty Ogg, the exhibition starts with an impressive bang: Alice Hartley’s staggering We’re All Very Disappointed (2013). This eponymous 7.8 meter-high banner is defiant yet sombre. Dark red and blue brushstrokes emanate energy, but closer inspection reveals the deceptive control of screen-printing. Registering this subdued facet of angst, sound from Marco Godoy’s video-work Claiming the Echo (2012) floods the space; its dimly-lit choir creating a prophetic, nigh-on apocalyptic atmosphere as a backdrop.

Facing all this is Just Let Go (2012) by Simon Senn, another piece of video art which follows a theme of collective unrest. Senn’s candidly filmed scenario is described as a ‘cathartic’ experience in response to the global financial crisis, as people ‘let go’ — a shirtless rent-a-crowd running around throwing paint, recorded in the style of news footage. Investigating the individual and group dynamics in contexts created by the artist, this work presents faux-violence against conditions that are side-products of the powers that be.

Suddenly, disappointment and collective experience are thrust forward as things to dread. Positive start then. At least it’s lightened by Henry Hussey’s delicately rendered and Marxism-saturated tapestry The Guardian (2013), hung behind Godoy’s choir.

After the initial entry space, the gallery becomes a hash of temporary white walls, with those that are permanent bearing TV screens (specifically for video art) on plinths. Staring down at one side of the gallery, this layout seems almost office-like, as a bank of identical televisions is set against floor-to-ceiling vertical blinds. It is here that the art takes a turn towards sex and relationships — but the majority of it is invested with a gravity or cynicism that one could say lacks ‘heart’.

Nipples formed by animated concentric circles, bouncing and flesh-coloured, are accompanied by a mash-up of orgasmic sounds and beats in Tajinder Dhami’s Electric Dream: Will Synthetic Intelligences Dream of Electric Sheep? (2014). Positioned next to Racheal Crowther’s How 2 Dress (2013), this area seems to take a comical stance on the sexual, as together both pieces create a kind of naughty-noughties vision of sexy: computerised, pink and fake.

Crowther’s photograph of a cropped reclining man, topless and tattooed with “DREAMS” across his stomach, is printed onto habotei silk, permanently fluttering by force of an electric fan. Hovering above this spectacle is a bunch of plastic grapes, dipped in a thick pink substance: too good to be true, faceless, bottomless, and falsely moving, this installation is a tempting lie.

Next up: Be Young, Be Wild, Be Desperate (2013, below) by printmaker Marie Jacotey-Voyatzis is a personal and comic storyboard-esque look at different female sexual encounters and fashions. Mixing image and text, and with a manufactured naïve innocence, this work casts an almost jaded eye upon youthful escapades. All too knowing and witty, Jacotey-Voyatzis’s bank of images plays at coming-of-age when this moment has evidently already passed; a maturity not unfamiliar to the whole exhibition.

Rounding the corner we have Katie Hayward’s Pillars (2013). These amorphous, towering legs jitter with constant fan-powered inflation, and appear like a pared-down version of Niki de Saint Phalle’s work; pale, temporal and colourless compared to the latter’s assertive vibrancy. Hayward’s work explicitly highlights the fragmented body that runs as a motif throughout many of the artworks on show here, as limbs are severed, faces are hidden and features are separated into individual entities across a variety of media.

Destined to be a hit is Reynard the Fox (2013), also known as Matt Copson. The crude, angular outline of a fox, painted in thick, black strokes on a white wall is lit up in alternating colours by a projector, while ‘Reynard’ bites his way through a hateful monologue on adjacent speakers. Discriminating against everyone (“I hate… medium-build white Caucasian males, babies…”), Reynard’s outburst turns to remorse, and it’s hard not to draw parallels between this angry fox and Herman Hesse’s ‘wolf of the steppes’ – a provocative mixture of magic realism, illusion, and the individual struggling in society.

At the last corner, the show becomes more muted, perhaps due to a compilation/impact-tracks-first style of curation, as well as a more earthy hue. Two paintings by Melissa Kime add narrative weight to politics through illustrative aesthetics. Technicolor Joseph and the Amazing City Bankers (2013) depicts grey bankers, one kneeling, one two-faced and holding a satchel apparently blood-stained. With bird-like planes (or are they drones?) jetting overhead, this intricate painting knows more than its style promotes.

There are punctuations throughout this year’s New Contemporaries exhibition that don’t necessarily correspond to the themes of the neighbouring artwork, and these pieces seem to be those which indulge in a welcome fascination with form. Sculptural works such as Ian Tricker’s texturally-polarised and futuristic, motion-suggesting Flux (2014, main image) and the delicate, site-specific Castle (2014) by Jonathan Meira, heighten awareness of the physical and the way bodies interact with an artwork and space, demonstrating a thoughtful consideration of the mixture of forms and mediums in the selection process this year.

Threading back through the space and thinking about the work collectively, there is a notable absence of what you might expect of ‘youthful’ artists: excitement, hope, or maybe a sense of looking to the future. The pieces on show are sophisticated and knowing; together they emanate a seriousness which verges on malaise, and helps these New Contemporaries sit comfortably in the conventional Victorian museum space of the World Museum, a position that seemed initially paradoxical.

Echoing with sophistication mature themes of disappointment, false sexuality, relationships and politics, this year’s selection of New Contemporaries have all too knowingly already come-of-age.

Josie Sommer

This review was the result of a public #BeACritic afternoon for aspiring critics, hosted by The Double Negative, at the press view of Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2014 — more here

Read more on the #BeACritic campaign here

Bloomberg New Contemporaries continues at the World Museum, Liverpool until Sunday 26 October 2014. It then travels to the ICA, London from 26 November 2014 until 25 January 2015