We were devastated to learn of the recent passing of our friend and contributor, Pete Goodbody: photographer and cultural philanthropist.

Pete, or P3dro, was a talented photographer and writer with a keen interest in artists, festivals, live music, food and travelling. He championed many people, projects and places across Liverpool, The Double Negative included. Pete attended our first contributor meetings, suggesting people and projects close to his heart that deserved more coverage, to be shouted about and celebrated. He would later become a donor, ever eager to help sustain indie publishing.

Many artists reading this will remember his enthusiasm and encouragement – attending their first gig or exhibition with his camera, sharing images afterwards (often for free), buying artwork, tickets or merch: ongoing acts of kindness that help nurture culture, as well as feeding Pete’s love of the scene. He was often accompanied by his beloved dog Kylie: “Her racing name was ‘Spinning Around’. She does. Often. But only anti-clockwise.”

Pete readily and regularly contributed thoughtful words and images to The Double Negative and other publications that discussed art and culture: covering the Sicilian Mafia in Italy and hyperrealistic sculpture in Denmark; giant pinhole cameras and Tracey Emin’s Bed; festivals Homotopia, River of Light, LOOK, Africa Oyé. He even showed up with his camera at Antony Gormley’s London studio.

Pete had two, equally talented sides: his creative practice, and his work as a barrister, specialising in commercial and chancery law. He was respected in both fields, in part, we imagine, due to his love of people and interest in their lives, a sharp eye for detail, and unwavering energy and enthusiasm.

We last saw Pete on a walking tour of Liverpool sculpture we organised a few months ago. Of course, as the above image attests, he showed up to support. We laughed, talked about art, its purpose, history, made new friends, had a few drinks, and reminisced about parts of the city he’d enjoyed walking and photographing.

Pete, you were a generous friend, a lovely person, and you’ll leave a space here in the city. You’ll be sorely missed.

Here are some of our favourite Pete Goodbody articles.

Above: Liverpool’s River Of Light – In Pictures

“This mini festival of eleven light installations dotted around Pier Head, Mann Island, Liverpool One and Castle Street is both a delight and a gentle re-introduction to the point at which we all remember our last gig, or the last real get-together with mates.”

Letizia Battaglia: Breaking the Code of Silence

“Battaglia, ultimately, suffered for her work. She lived in the old centre of Palermo, a grim place to be and was often burgled as a result. Death threats due to the nature of her work were a feature of her life, yet she carried on. She wasn’t the only one. There are plenty of photographs in this exhibition of magistrates and prosecutors slain by Mafia bullets who fought the same war. But it is due to her work, and the crucial role played by her pictures, that has helped to give Sicilians a voice in opposing the Mafia system.”

In Pictures: Africa Oyé

“Shooting Africa Oyé is always good fun, both the bands and the crowd (I had a pass for the pit, but it isn’t always needed — it’s easy enough to get close to the front anyway). It’s a highlight of the year for me; Liverpool does this kind of event so well and seems to have an understanding, even in this challenging economic climate, that it is important still to get people out in the park to have a good time.”

Field Trip: Gosh! Is It Alive? ARKEN Museum Of Modern Art, Denmark

“Nakedness is a recurring theme. In itself, this seems an unlikely problem for an exhibition, but these were replicas of people laying bare not only their bodies, but also their souls. We were staring into their lives, and they let us in. It didn’t matter that they were inanimate; to the viewer, they were pretty much real, and it would only take one of them to breathe or to wink back at us and we would have been completely freaked out.”

Venice Biennale and Tea at the British Pavilion

“3,000 cups of free tea were being served in the British Pavilion every day. Art? Who cares when there’s tea involved.

Actually, I do care. These things are important. A nice cup of tea might seem like a kind of quirky token in the British Pavilion, but when the same thing is done in the Iraqi pavilion, then it becomes all the more important. Here we saw works by a selection of artists based in Iraq but who were all working on the same theme of representing daily life in a war ravaged country.”

Laura Robertson and Mike Pinnington

All images courtesy Pete Goodbody except Palermo, 1992. Rosaria Schifani, the widow of police agent Vito killed together with judge Giovanni Falcone, Francesca Morvillo and his colleagues Di Cillo and Antonio Montinaro © Letizia Battaglia

See all of Pete Goodbody’s images and words, contributed to this publication, here, and his website and Twitter

“River of Light is a tonic.” Pete Goodbody on the festival we need after a challenging twelve months…

One year after lockdown was imposed, Liverpool slowly emerges, with tiny steps to take a peek around the corner of what we remember it used to be like.

It would have been normal, having strolled around the 2km trail of light installations to have finished off the evening with a pizza at Casa Italia or a beer in, well, anywhere. But that’s to think we can jump back into the way it was, without looking. And, clearly, that’s not happening.

But this mini festival of eleven light installations dotted around Pier Head, Mann Island, Liverpool One and Castle Street is both a delight and a gentle re-introduction to the point at which we all remember our last gig, or the last real get-together with mates.

River of Light is a tonic and one that we need after a challenging twelve months.

There’s the signature feature of the Rainbow Bridge – given pride of place outside the Museum of Liverpool and the Albert Dock. This is the one that made the TV and the Echo and everybody’s Facebook feeds. And rightly so. Programmed to display messages of hope and inspiration along with abstract patterns, colours and, of course a rainbow, it was an obvious star of the show.

But we also found more to keep us entertained. The Lantern Company’s All In The Balance was a mystical mobile of butterflies, grasses and stylised sunflowers that reflects the way in which we have taken our daily exercise and connected with our natural surroundings over the last year. Maybe not intellectually challenging in its interpretation, but it was keeping the crowds pleased.

Viktor Vicsek’s Talking Heads over the way in Liverpool One reminded us of a time when we could, indeed natter to each other at will, save these two were kept safely apart. Even robots need to keep their distance.

There is the lovely Slinky thing (End Over End), also in Liverpool One, some illuminated washing hanging up to dry on Castle Street, and a Moon in bondage (Ursula Lassos The Moon) in the churchyard at Our Lady and St Nicholas.

The illuminated walkway at Pier Head, called Futures, from Lucid Creates, seemed to deliver the message the hardest and, perhaps without its participants noticing. Illuminated pillars on either side of the path narrow as you get further in. The colours of the pillars change all the time. We change, our surroundings change. We just don’t always see it happening.

Although, perhaps, as with the Rainbow Bridge, maybe we can just about manage an argument that we do see change. After the twelve months we’ve had, it’s crucial.

Words and Pictures by Pete Goodbody

River of Light Continues until 5 April

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 loads of it’s free!

Monday – Scalarama/Venues Nationwide – Prices Vary

The annual, nationwide celebration of cinema continues. Running until the end of this month in venues large, small and often non-traditional, it is inspired by the energy and DIY spirit of the legendary Scala Cinema. Founded in 2011, the festival runs on the dictum of “by everyone, for everyone, everywhere,” foregrounding the passion of exhibitors and audiences above all else. Entering its second week, among tonight’s offerings are The Night of the Hunter, prizewinning Liverpool indie, Some Girls Wander and Blade Runner: The Final Cut. Read Adam Scovell on The Night of the Hunter

Tuesday – Margaret Atwood: Live @ 7.30pm in Cinemas Nationwide

For many it will still sound too good to be true, but today sees the publication of Margaret Atwood’s sequel to her foreboding and prescient ground-breaking 1985 novel, The Handmaid’s Tale. Brought to popular attention recently with the TV adaptation, on returning to the story 34 years on, Atwood has said: “Everything you’ve ever asked me about Gilead and its inner workings is the inspiration for this book. Well, almost everything! The other inspiration is the world we’ve been living in.” The author will be joined and interviewed by Samira Ahmed to discuss the new book, her career and – no doubt – our dizzying, depressing present day reality.

Wednesday – Exhibition Opening: William Blake @ Tate Britain, London – £18

Quite rightly described as a visionary today, “in his own time,” says Liz Mitchell, “he was an oddity, an outcast whose weird nightmare visions put him beyond the pale of the Academy. And when you actually look — really look — at his work,” Mitchell continues, “it is mighty strange.” Mitchell was responding to Blake’s 2016 Tate Liverpool presentation (in a display alongside Tracey Emin). Now the painter, printmaker and poet is the subject of a solo show at Tate Britain, in an exhibition that will include more than 300 works, which seeks to reposition Blake as “a visual artist for the 21st century”.

Thursday – Season Opening: Anime’s Human Machines @ the Barbican, London

Anime’s Human Machines kicks off at the Barbican today, somewhat counterintuitively perhaps for a season dedicated to animation, with live action body horror Tetsuo, The Iron Man. But, released in 1989 (a year after Akira), it is justifiably considered to be in the vanguard of Japanese cyberpunk. Discussing Tetsuo’s influence pre-screening is season curator Helen McCarthy, joined by a panel of experts including Jasper Sharp, Nicole Coolidge Rousmaniere and Rayna Denison.

Friday – For Sama + Q&A 6.30pm @ Picturehouse Central, London – £16.90

Programmed by BFI backed influencer project, Reclaim The Frame (RTF), whose aim is to grow audiences for films told from a female perspective, For Sama has been described as “A love letter from a young mother to her daughter”. But this tells only part of the story. The mother in question is Waad al-Kateab, who filmed her life in rebel-held Aleppo through five years of the Syrian uprising, and For Sama – a document of the challenges faced by women and children – is the result. For more on Reclaim The Frame, read our interview with Mia Bays

Saturday – A Day in Liverpool Film Screening 2pm @ the Bluecoat, Liverpool – £7

Emerging in the 1920s, the city symphony genre – which foregrounded urban spaces, capturing modernity’s hustle and bustle in heaving metropolises such as Berlin – evoked a sense of place and progress in ways few people could. At the end of that decade, Liverpool’s docks, the now defunct overhead railway and tram systems, and construction of the Anglican Cathedral were captured for posterity by writer, director and animator Anson Dyer. See the film this weekend on its 90th anniversary, with a live score performed by composer and songwriter Aidan Smith.

Sunday – Exhibition Closing: Scott Charlesworth @ OUTPUT Gallery, Liverpool – FREE

Guest curated by Open Eye Gallery’s Thomas Dukes, today is your last chance to see The Dirt I’m Made Of, an exhibition of photographs by Scott Charlesworth. The title refers to all the things – small and large – that define us, and our perceptions of where we’re from. For Charlesworth, says Dukes: “It’s staring through the windscreen and viewfinder and wondering about what it means to come from somewhere. The 8 cooling towers of Fiddler’s Ferry Power Station [which] act as beacons during country long journeys, revealing themselves and polluting the sky with smoke, marking the home stretch.”

Mike Pinnington

Images from top: On set still from The Night of the Hunter; Install image from Tracey Emin and William Blake: In Focus at Tate Liverpool (18 September 2016-3 September 2017), courtesy Pete Goodbody; Scott Charlesworth @ OUTPUT Gallery

Why is it that hyperrealistic depictions of the human form are so unsettling? Pete Goodbody travels to Denmark to experience unnervingly realistic sculpture at ARKEN… 

Designed to resemble a beached ship, the ARKEN Museum of Modern Art presents as a striking figure on the coastline of Koge Bay: a 25-minute metro ride from the centre of Copenhagen, in Denmark.

But not all is quite what you’d expect from an average art gallery. ARKEN’s permanent collection is deliberately curated without theme, style, or apparent direction; designed to make the viewer ask questions about art, and evaluate perceptions as to what counts as art. It’s an uplifting, even joyful experience, with some genuinely funny moments.

Given the recent antics at polling stations in the UK, a highlight was Elmgreen and Dragset’s depiction of a broken Administration office staircase, entitled Social Mobility (2005—present). Clever, witty and imaginative, this piece seemed to sum up the overall curation without actually explaining it.

There’s a room devoted to Damien Hirst, and another given over to Ai Weiwei’s 12 depictions of the signs of the Chinese Zodiac – his touring Zodiac Heads – currently on extended loan until 2019. The fact that ARKEN manages to attract such big names is an indication of just how good this gallery is.

And then there’s Gosh! Is It Alive?: ARKEN’s temporary exhibition (see it until 6 August) of 39 human body sculptures, nearly all of which were unnervingly realistic. It isn’t easy to rationalise why a life-like depiction of the human form is so very much more unsettling than the real thing, but believe me, it is.

Here was a kind of horror show of humankind. Ron Mueck’s A Girl (2006) is perhaps the perfect example. A massive baby, still with the umbilical cord attached, flecked with blood and realistic whispers of hair on her head. We’ve all seen new born babies before, so that’s not new, but to see one scaled up to perhaps 10-times real life size is a startling experience. One couldn’t help going back for another look. It’s the stuff of Chucky-type nightmares.

A topless torso of a man explodes through the floor: Zharko Basheski’s Ordinary Man (2009-2010). Unshaven and looking towards the ceiling, he might be climbing out of a swimming pool, such is the pose. On the other hand, he may be trying to climb out of an abyss with a brief glance towards the heavens, hoping to catch the eye of his maker.

Corner after corner, there is an assault on the senses and, mostly, a recoil at what comes next. I watched a couple looking at Duane Hanson’s Salesman (1992), a mannequin dressed in a business suit. When they moved away, I was fully expecting it to follow them. 

Nakedness is a recurring theme. In itself, this seems an unlikely problem for an exhibition, but these were replicas of people laying bare not only their bodies, but also their souls. We were staring into their lives, and they let us in. It didn’t matter that they were inanimate; to the viewer, they were pretty much real, and it would only take one of them to breathe or to wink back at us and we would have been completely freaked out.

New Yorker, self-proclaimed “It-Girl with a penis” Juliana Huxtable, was, perhaps a welcome relief. Immortalised into sculpture by Frank Benson using 3D scanning tech – Juliana (2014-2015) – this was a transformation of a real transgender woman into a representation of a crazy, sexy, cyborg. A reminder that neither gender, identity nor sexuality are binary, and a rather magnificent, powerful statement of courage and liberation.

Nearby, Mel Ramos’ Chiquita Banana (2007) was a kind of tropical paradise: a topless woman, a cool car and fairly typical sexual symbolism. Even so, the soft porn, air-brushed, realism of the piece un-nerves, and makes you wonder whether this is really okay to be standing in front of, as a spectator with a camera.

That is presumably the point of Gosh! Is It Alive?. It challenges. None of the subject matter should be a problem. Naked babies, naked people, clothed people, trans people. Why does any of this cause an issue?

There are moral concerns about cloning humans, there are worries about robots taking over where humans once were, and then there is a general uncertainty about what this world will look like in the future – even in one year’s time. Now that artists can make facsimiles of us look so real, just imagine what will happen when the scientists and engineers get on the case.

Pete Goodbody

See Gosh! Is It Alive? at ARKEN Museum of Modern Art, Denmark, until 6 August 2017 — adults DKK 115, students DKK 95

Opening hours Tuesday–Sunday 10am–5pm, Wednesday 10am–9pm, Monday closed

#arkengosh

Images, from top: Installation shot of Mel Ramos’ Chiquita Banana (2007), Zharko Basheski’s Ordinary Man (2009-2010), and Frank Benson’s Juliana (2014-2015). All artworks part of Gosh! Is It Alive?. Images by photographer Pete Goodbody, 2017, and courtesy the artists

Photography made from a pinhole camera the size of a hotel room will be the star attraction at LOOK/17 festival. Pete Goodbody meets the artist, Luke Ching, to hear more about his peculiar and intense set-up — which includes living in the same room, in the dark, until the exposure time is complete…

You might be surprised to learn that digital photography will not be occupying the prime spot at LOOK, Liverpool’s International Photography Festival 2017. Instead, expect a more traditional, unpredictable format: pinhole photography. Created by Hong Kong-based artist Luke Ching during a week-long residency at the Titanic Hotel on Liverpool’s North Docks, during a chilly January 2017, Ching built a camera obscura the size of an entire room — although he prefers the term “pinhole room”. He’s an ideal choice for the festival’s theme, Cities of Exchange, as he uses an unexpected medium to consider how the language of photography is used to experience and shape the city.

This year’s LOOK festival will welcome Chinese photographers to the UK – via a close working relationship with Open Eye Gallery and former CFCCA curator Ying Kwok — and will explore images taken in Hong Kong and Liverpool; cities with a long history of commercial and creative interchange.

When I meet with Ching, he describes how his pinhole camera images are projected onto a vast collage of A3-sized photo sensitive papers, pinned all over one wall in his hotel room, and thus exposed to the image created by the tiny pinhole lens. The exposures are long: in the case of one image, 24 hours long. Unbelievably, throughout the exposure, Ching lives in the room, never turning on the lights. It’s difficult to imagine such a commitment, which seems comparable with meditation.

This temporary and intense residence is important to Ching. Many will know the Titanic Hotel building and its neighbouring Tobacco Warehouse as significant, historic structures; built in the 19^th century and a meaningful part of Liverpool’s past as a port city, as well as its present iteration as one of tourism and culture. By contrast, Ching’s stay is transient; he acts as a tourist, renting a hotel room for a short period of time. The huge camera that he constructs in this room is a temporary object; installed for about three days, then dismantled; the room returning easily to its intended use. It’s as though he was never there.

We discuss this temporary transformation of an unassuming room into a giant camera as a relatively short period of time in comparison with the life of the building. There is another contrast of time; compared with a “normal” camera’s exposure, usually measured in fractions of a second, the long exposures of the pinhole camera give Ching the chance to have a more considered relationship with the building. He calls this “playing with time”.

Ching’s other artworks also reflect a certain playfulness. Screensaver (2013-14) is a series of CRT monitors, each displaying a corporate logo. Over a period of about six months, Ching made sure that the image was burned onto the monitor’s screen, creating a permanent image on the display. This type of screen-burn doesn’t affect modern LCD or plasma monitors, but it was a problem in the early days of personal computing, and it was the reason for the creation of screensavers: a constantly shifting image displayed so as to prevent the creation of a permanent, ghostly image. Ching’s piece endeavoured to do the opposite.

He likes waiting, Ching explains. Another piece, entitled The Happy Princess, had Ching filming a pair of statues in Manchester in 2012. He waited to start filming until a pigeon landed on the statue’s head, and then filmed until the pigeon left.  It took him 12 days to get about six minutes worth of footage.

The pinhole camera images are part of a project Ching has been working on for more than 16 years and, he says, is likely to carry on for many more. Some of these images were shown at his exhibition For Now We See Through A Window, Dimly, at Gallery EXIT in Hong Kong at the end of 2016. Ching tends to focus on architecture as a metaphor for our times. Most of his photography is of structurally or historically noteworthy buildings. But some, such as a photograph taken at the Hong Kong squatter town of Pok Fu Lam, show the temporary life of structures. This reflects something of modern day Hong Kong, where Ching thinks real estate is treated more and more like a consumer good – a commodity to be bought and sold for money rather than a place in which to live on any long-term basis. Again, we see Ching returning to a theme of time.

He says he is seen as a conceptual artist at home in Hong Kong, and although he does work with other media, perhaps the pinhole shots are the clearest way to see and understand Ching’s fascination with the concept of time and his demonstration of the contrasts. He is very much an artist first and a photographer second: “I just know how to do pinhole”, he insists. As a vehicle for expressing his ideas, this tool seems to be a perfect fit.

The other thought-provoking effect of the long exposures Ching employs is to remove any people or movement from the image. This, then, focuses the work on the architecture, which Ching says should be intended to last, but is so often not the case these days. That is why he found working in the Titanic Hotel so stimulating, as its long history as a commercial warehouse created a contrast with his temporary residence. Yet, he hopes the images created there will speak to Liverpool’s more permanent residents, not just the tourists, as he was for a time.

Pete Goodbody

See Luke Ching at Open Eye Gallery as part of LOOK/2017 from 7 April to 14 May 2017 — FREE

Image, top: Luke Ching’s pinhole camera photography, courtesy the artist. Middle image: Ching in Liverpool during his residency, and bottom, a close up of his work — both image credits courtesy Pete Goodbody

In a new exhibition at Tate Liverpool, Liz Mitchell navigates a sobering variety of portraiture, from two very different mavericks…

Blood red walls and a stew of dirty sheets. Fag butts and corn plasters; vodka bottles, used tissues, a razor and a pregnancy test. An unmade bed is a shameful thing. My grandmother was definitive in this respect; clean knickers and made bed are the baseline of self-respect. When Tracey Emin’s My Bed first went on display in 1999, it caused outrage, both moral and critical. Disgusting self-indulgent wallowing? Cheap self-promoting shock tactics? A case of emperor’s new (bed) clothes? O Rose, thou art sick.

Seen in the flesh (so to speak) at Tate Liverpool in 2016, however, it’s less shocking than one might expect. The stains are old now and it doesn’t smell. It should be a foetid fug of bodily secretions, palatable only to the person whose private nest it has become. But then, it’s twenty years since a sweaty, leaky, boozed up body sought refuge here from a world of anguish. It isn’t an unmade bed anymore. It’s an artwork. It must be a curious thing to stage; how does one artfully place an overflowing ashtray, just so? Preserve a squeezed out tube of KY jelly and a pair of discarded tights with all the care and expertise deployed for Old Masters? This bed has become an idea, a memory, a remnant of some past private hell transformed into multi-million pound art commodity.

In this sense, it is discomfiting in the extreme. In the pristine galleries of Britain’s premier art institution on a sunny autumn morning, surrounded by well-dressed people in their gallery-going shoes (myself included), I am conscious of having walked down here, through the city, past people sleeping in doorways. Respectability is a thin veneer. And this heap of detritus is a sorry sight. Uncompromising, naked, blunt – this is how messed up life can be, it seems to say — see anything you recognise?

Because, really, haven’t we all got unmade beds tucked away somewhere? Times when everything’s got out of control, gone horribly wrong, when all we could do was hide beneath the covers? For all our composure, presentation and grooming, we are, at times, little more than fragile ego and animal instinct. Bed is where we are at our most base, our most vulnerable. Where we go to ground. Site of conception, birth and death, bedding soaks us up in all our messy liquefaction — unwashed, it goes on doing it till the sheets are stiff and brown.

Perhaps it’s a fundamental necessity that teenagers’ bedrooms go through a cesspit phase. When Thomas the Tank Engine and Barbie lose their magic. When bodies start behaving in powerfully overwhelming and unpredictable ways. When life becomes so much more complicated than it once seemed and longed-for autonomy brings both ecstasy and terror. Incriminating bedsheets and a midden of rubbish strewn across the floor are perhaps an inevitable consequence. Private sanctuary-cum-dirty protest-cum-cry for help. Fuck off out of my room.

So much comes bubbling up to the surface on encountering this artwork. Against expectation, I loved Tracey Emin’s My Bed. I found it sobering, provocative, compassionate. A space in which to contemplate one’s own dirty bedlinen. And that of one’s fellow human beings. How appropriate, then, to pair it with the strange and visceral humanity of William Blake. The loud-mouthed YBA and the 18^th century visionary. Blake is now well-established in literary and artistic canons; his poetry is studied by sixth formers, his genius an accepted truism.

But in his own time he was an oddity, an outcast whose weird nightmare visions put him beyond the pale of the Academy. And when you actually look — really look — at his work, it is mighty strange. If the body has gone from the bed in this room, it is there in all its tortured and fallible beauty around the walls. Hairy bodies, winged bodies, bodies consumed by flames – prostrate, on all fours, open-mouthed and naked. Humanity in extremis.

From a distance, these works look beautiful; exquisitely etched, delicately coloured in watercolour and tempera. But bad things are happening. I think. It can be hard to tell. Biblical Old Testament themes, sin, torment, the pleasures and pains of flesh, are re-told through a complex private mythology. Two small prints captured my attention in particular, in part because, like much of Blake’s work, being small only magnifies their potency. Plates from The First Book of Urizen of 1796. Densely coloured in black and red, each contains a single figure, oddly luminescent against an inky ground, bound by the tightness of the frame around them. A robed and bearded man carries a heavy red and black globe, radiating spikes.

“Fearless tho in pain / I travel on”, reads the caption, and indeed grimly he proceeds, striding forward, pushing through the frame towards the second plate; a naked figure bent double, hands pressed tightly to the sides of the head, draped over the same veiny mass of red. It is impossible to differentiate between the figure’s lank falling hair and the bloody matter beneath, reaching upwards in sinewy threads. It is a tiny vision of agony, described in delicate copper-plate script below — “Vegetating in fibres of Blood”.

To the visitor who is not versed in Blakean symbolism, the specifics of this narrative are unclear, though the red globe might be a foetus, the beginnings of life. But the sense of bodily torment is unmistakeable. In life we are in death. Blake’s fascination with the body is not just as symbol, but as blood and bone and muscle and flesh. It is divine and pathetic, beautiful and repellent. Above all, it is vulnerable. And it is this, portrayed with such ferocious compassion that makes Emin and Blake such a fruitful pairing. Blake was a wordsmith as much as an image-maker. Emin too uses text in much of her work. But no words are required here to explain the unmade bed. In fact, maybe it is the failure of words, the failure to be heard, recognised, understood, that is so powerful about it. A member of Tate Liverpool’s Community Collective, in the audio commentary that accompanies the exhibition, articulates this beautifully:

“This is what it can be like, what it was like. This is how I deal with it, because it’s the only thing I can do”.

Earlier in the morning, on my way to the Tate, I gave a man a cigarette – he was sitting on the pavement, by a cashpoint, paper cup at his feet and head in his hands. What could I do in all my middle-class guilt but offer him a fag, a moment of mutual recognition in a shared dirty habit – and then walk on. A few hours later I passed by his spot again – he was gone. In some ways, we aren’t so very different, he and I.

Liz Mitchell

See Tracey Emin and William Blake: In Focus at Tate Liverpool from 18 September 2016-3 September 2017 — FREE

Install images courtesy Pete Goodbody, with thanks

Liverpool Central Library’s current exhibition, Intermissions, reveals a fascinating insight into the portfolio of one of the city’s most prolific landscape photographers: namely, his portraiture business that paid the bills. What is revealed, finds Pete Goodbody, is a rich historical record…

Edward Chambré-Hardman (1898-1988) was a Liverpool-based photographer, active between 1923 and 1966, and best known for his portrayals of landscapes and cityscapes. But it was his commercial portraiture that paid the bills; currently the subject of an intriguing new exhibition, Intermissions, shown in the sumptuous surroundings of Liverpool Central Library’s Hornby Room.

Photographer and academic Keith Roberts (Head of BA (hons) Photography at St Helens College; PhD candiate with Manchester Metropolitan University) has been given unprecedented access to the Hardman archives and records, initially with a view to re-photograph some of the locations where Hardman had created his most iconic work. This involvement with the archive led Roberts to a more curatorial role, and then to a realisation that the records required digitising into a searchable database. This caused Roberts’ focus to shift from Hardman’s landscape work to the more commercial, portraiture-focussed side of the business.

Thus began the massive task of translating Hardman’s handwritten record books into the substantially less glamorous yet more organised form of an Excel spreadsheet, which now has something in the region of 40,000 separate entries – probably about one third of Hardman’s studio output. Each record has the name of the sitter, a profession (where listed) and, crucially, a reference number identifying the glass negatives of the photographs taken at the sitting. These negatives were all stored by Hardman in metal biscuit tins in less than ideal conditions and, presumably, simply because the tins just happened to be the right size.  The tins are now in the possession of Liverpool Central Library, stored in a freezer with the aim of slowing the deterioration of their contents, some of which have not survived the passage of time.

Once the spreadsheet had been created it could be searched for patterns and, in particular, as far as this exhibition is concerned, for sitters who had been photographed by Hardman more than once. The reference numbers meant the negatives could be identified and retrieved from the archive to be printed, assuming they were in a good enough condition. The images selected by Roberts for Intermissions are all presented as a pair – the same person recorded by Hardman at two different times. It is this gap between sittings that Roberts describes as the “intermission”, hence the title of the exhibition. Presenting the portraits as pairs emphasises the passage of time in the life of the sitter; many of whom witnessed enormous changes in British life, including two World Wars.

The differences between the two portraits of the same person are, in most cases, quite striking — note the difference between man and boy — but there is more to this exhibition than a straightforward comparison of the way a person ages over time.  The very act of putting the images on public display is a shift from Hardman’s original intentions. Hardman did enter his landscape work into exhibitions and salons, but never the commercial portraits. Of course, they were meant to be seen, but the intended audience was the sitter and his or her circle of friends and family.

Now, with a public audience, the pictures take on a new dimension. Apart from the personal copies paid for by the client, they existed only in the archive as a glass plate negative stored in a biscuit tin. This shift in function is deliberate because, although it may not have much impact on the majority of Intermissions visitors, Roberts’ expressed hope that some viewers may recognise, or even be related to, one or more of the sitters. That is precisely what happened on the opening night, when visitor recognised a pair of portraits as being a former next door neighbour.

Another aspect to this shift of function, and one that cannot be avoided, is the recognition by Roberts of his own influence on the curation process. Hardman was very particular about how his images should look when printed – even in the days pre-Photoshop, he would give specific instructions to the printers about his vision for the final print. The details of contrast, light and texture were always controlled by Hardman by written instructions on his proofs.  Now, without that direction, Roberts had to make his own decisions about how the finished print would look.

In addition, he had to choose which of the five or six different plates taken by Hardman at the original sitting would be used for this new exhibition, 28 years after his death. This intrusion into the Hardman workflow is recognised by Roberts, and he acknowledges the questions that may arise about provenance, ownership and the like. Can Intermissions be presented as an exhibition of Hardman’s work at all?

Roberts refers to the pairs of images as creating a triangle, in which the spectator is one point, and each image of the pair are the others. This technique emphasises the time lapse between the two images and highlights the unknown story of the sitter’s life during that period. One can have a guess at what may have happened, especially with the images of service personnel, but others are more benign. Some stories could probably be researched – military records may provide an insight in some cases. Others would be more difficult to discover, unless the subject happens to be known to the viewer.

Intermissions is much more than an exhibition of photography, albeit by one of Liverpool’s best known practitioners. It is a slice of social history taken from a resource that was never intended to be looked at by an arts audience or the wider general public, and that is probably why it works so well and on so many levels. This is a never-before seen recognition of Hardman’s commercial work, as well as an exercise in demonstrating his social documentary, even if that was not the original purpose of creation.

Keith Roberts’ database will endure and will, at some point, be made available for others to use. The timelapse between pairs of portraits shown here are not the only patterns to be found; many people were photographed more than twice and the inclusion of the sitters’professions makes for even more research possibilities. As a historical record, the database cannot be viewed as a comprehensive one, simply because Hardman’s clients were restricted to those who could afford his rates, but none of this minimises the effect of this fascinating exhibition.

Roberts’ work has raised the profile of the portraiture side of Hardman’s practice, and made it available to a much wider audience than originally envisaged. He has created a valuable new tool and shown a new facet of Hardman’s rich legacy.

Pete Goodbody

See Intermissions: Images from the Edward Chambré-Hardman Commercial Portraiture Collection at the Hornby Room, Liverpool Central Library, until 29 January 2016 — free entry

See more via Twitter @HardmanPortrait

Step back in time to the 1950s — visit Hardman’s home and photographic studio on Rodney Street, Liverpool, via the National Trust

We have asked our critics to name their cultural winners of 2015: who will make the cut?

What to say about a year where The Double Negative discussed shame with Jon Ronson? Watched Shia LaBeouf man an existential call centre? Debated the General Election’s effect on contemporary art? Saw The Whitworth gallery return to glory? Said goodbye to Wes Craven and Brian Sewell? Visited Brussels, Ghana, Gujarat, and Reykjavík? Printed an indispensable city guide?

Possibly one of The Double Negative’s most important experiences this year was being able to commission new arts writing. Through our Be A Critic programme — inviting broadcaster, writer and Royal Academy director Tim Marlow to Liverpool to deliver a public lecture and masterclass to 15 aspiring art critics — plus the fantastic Contemporary Visual Arts Network North West (CVAN NW) bursary, we’ve been mentoring, commissioning and publishing new arts writing. Not only creating a snapshot of ambitious, diverse contemporary British arts culture, these two programmes have demonstrated the power and urgency of supporting new writing from North-West England’s talent pool. We certainly hope to keep doing more of the same next year, in addition to providing more editorial support, mentoring and access to practical advice from those — like Marlow and last year’s Be A Critic guest, ArtReview’s Oliver Basciano — who have managed to champion critical thinking throughout their careers.

I’d like to take this opportunity to sincerely thank everyone who has contributed to The Double Negative this year, as always; feeding into a continuing, vital source of arts criticism and cultural commentary that looks outwards and onwards, whilst acting — and publishing — locally.

SO NOW, THE AWARDS…

MOST IMAGINATIVE IN-SITU ART WORK 

In The Eyes Of The Animal: Marshmallow Laser Feast for AND Festival (pictured above)

Nominated by Laura Robertson

London-based studio Marshmallow Laser Feast arrived in Grizedale Forest (Cumbria) with a bang in September. Commissioned to make the focus artwork for art and tech fest Abandon Normal Devices (AND), they created In The Eyes Of The Animal: utilising drones, lasers and 3D animation to create a heightened, virtual reality experience of the forest from the perspective of its creatures. Essentially recording a bubble or full-sphere view of the landscape, by flying drones out over and through the trees, wearers of special VR headsets were able to get ‘inside’ that sphere whilst sitting on tree stumps on the forest floor. The result? A painterly, out-of-body experience; and a peek into the startling future of personal-use VR.

BEST INDIE PUBLISHER

Comma Press

Nominated by Mike Pinnington

It was with a degree of irony that I’ve chosen publisher Comma Press – described on their website as being “dedicated to promoting new writing, with an emphasis on the short story” – as my pick of the year for 2015. I’ve always been ambivalent about short form fiction; often when I read a good short, I don’t want to let go of the ideas and characters after so brief a time, but sometimes it is more to do with a nagging feeling that what has been committed to the page is little more than a sketch, an idea that went for a walk but ran out of steam.

This year, however, with the science fiction collection Beta-Life (2015), I was introduced to Comma Press. Pairing experts with writers – a practice that goes some way to addressing each of my concerns about the form – readers get both great fiction and the science behind it into the bargain.

There was a fitting sense of coincidence, too, in my choice. Last week (22nd December) we celebrated National Short Story Day, and you can visit this page for more info and recommendations.

BEST LIVE PERFORMANCE

Max Richter performs The Blue Notebooks (2004) at ATP 2.0: Nightmare Before Christmas (Prestatyn)

Nominated by Laura Robertson

I was first introduced to contemporary composer Max Richter at university; one of my tutors made a copy of The Blue Notebooks for me on CD. They thought I’d be into it. I’d never given classical music much time… but I’d never heard anything like this. An abstract and poetic interpretation of Franz Kafta’s Blue Octavo diary extracts, using typewriters alongside birdsong, violin, piano and organ, with an unexpected vocal performance by British actress Tilda Swinton, it completely floored me. This record was one of the most exquisite things I’d ever heard. A rare chance to see it performed live and in full came this year with the UK return of ATP Festival: Richter seemed to stop time in the freezing cold, bedraggled surrounds of the Welsh holiday camp venue. A heavenly, poignant contemplation of the human spirit.

BEST ACTOR

Kirsten Dunst, Fargo (Channel 4)

Nominated by Jack Roe

Kirsten Dunst. Her portrayal of Peggy Blumquist in the second series of Fargo has been little short of bewitching. Her frazzled, twitching, beautician’s update on Lady MacBeth is a triumph of characterisation on the part of the writers, but there is something in her wide-eyed repetition of self-help mantras and increasingly erratic behaviour throughout the series that is absolutely compelling. And all that from someone who, let’s face it, wouldn’t make the top of many lists beforehand. There is always something thrilling about seeing a formerly mercurial actor quietly and assuredly take things up a gear.

BEST NEW INDIE FILM VENUE

A Small Cinema (Liverpool)

Nominated by Mike Pinnington

Now a regular feature in our Culture Diary, how did we ever manage without A Small Cinema? A self-professed “project exploring what cinema used to be, and what form it might take in the future, through research, events, experiments, film-making and community dialogues”, ASC is a model its founder, digital artist Sam Meech, has explored previously, and with success – in North Manchester’s Moston, as well as a currently under construction “sibling project” as he calls it in a former church in St. Helens. The project is fully supported by BFI Film Hub North West Central, which means that the three venues can bring specialised and independent British Film to their local audiences. March 2016 will see ASC Liverpool celebrate its first 12 months; it has quickly become not just a welcome addition but a fixture in the cinematic make up of the city.

BEST “BLEW THE ROOF OFF” SEQUEL

Joint winners: Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller) and Star Wars: The Force Awakens (J. J. Abrams)

Nominated by C. James Fagan

My cultural highlight of 2015? If I’m honest I have to give the award to two blockbusters: Mad Max: Fury Road and Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Simply because these two cultural events have been the ones which had me thinking and talking about them long after seeing them.

For me, both films served as reminders of what’s great about blockbuster cinema: the thrill of spectacle mixed with a heroic story. How that, in turn, acts as a spur to the imagination. Ultimately, however, I’ve selected Mad Max and Star Wars simply because they were so much fun!

Nominated by Jack Roe

There may (certainly) have been films that are more interesting, have more artistic integrity and have provoked more critical thought and discussion, but I will unashamedly swing for Star Wars: The Force Awakens. The task of giving an absolutely monumental, not to mention rabid, fanbase the film that they wanted seemed like an unforgiving and perhaps impossible task. This film is better than most of us had any right to expect.

BEST INDIE SCI-FI FILM

Advantageous (Jennifer Phang)

Nominated by Stuart Ian Burns

Bought for distribution at Sundance by Netflix, ironically causing unfortunate obscurity, Jennifer Phang’s indie wonder Advantageous glimpses a dystopian future in which an older woman is given the choice of losing a job which guarantees her child’s future, or sacrificing her own identity.  Tense, impressionistic, refreshing and warm filmmaking. Classic.

BEST MINI MUSIC FESTIVAL

Liverpool International Festival Of Psychedelia 

Nominated (and photo) by Pete Goodbody 

As impossible to define as to predict, Psych Fest was a revelation and only in a good way. Set in the Baltic Triangle and using stages in both Camp and Furnace and District, it was clear on arrival this was going to be something special. There was that kind of atmosphere pinging around that you can almost feel and touch. Apart from having a passing familiarity with the camp theatre of Evil Blizzard and their thunderous four bass, one drummer line up, none of the other names on the bill meant anything to me. No matter, I didn’t see a bad band all weekend. The fuzz of Holy, the Latin rhythms of Fumaca Preta and the stripped down funk of Throw Down Bones were just three of the bands who have since taken up a more or less permanent residence on my iPod.

But it was more than just the music. There were enough bars to cope with the crowds, good street food, Psych Cinema, a pop-up record shop and a Hookah tent. This festival was very much more than the sum of its parts, impeccably organised and a showpiece for the versatility of its venues. I was buzzing for days afterwards.

OBITUARY

Sir Terry Pratchett

Nominated by Jack Roe

The passing of Sir Terry Pratchett was, for many reasons, one of the more culturally significant moments of the year. The man’s unfaltering consistency, the fertility of his imagination and his wonderfully skewed, moralistic take on satire ensured that his works move beyond the sci-fi/fantasy genres and into something much more in touch with contemporary British society. The tragedy of the manner of his death ensured that the outpouring of emotion was huge from within and outside literary society, and yet the darkly comic bent was perfectly fitting with a man whose flights of fantasy could never quite avoid betraying a beautifully pitched cynicism. In the words of his brilliantly, and altogether human, take on the grim reaper: ‘AT LAST, SIR TERRY, WE MUST WALK TOGETHER.’

Laura Robertson

Although they may not be as instantly accessible as his Iron Men, an afternoon spent with Gormley’s Elemental drawings is time well spent, says Kellie Grogan…

Antony Gormley uses art as a way to engage in a collective consciousness and explore the corporeal aspect of being human; inhabiting a body, living consciously within it and experiencing the world through it. His 2005 installation Another Place exemplifies such aims: one hundred cast-iron sculptures — moulded from Gormley’s own body — face out to sea across the length and breadth of Crosby beach, Merseyside, and have helped make Gormley one of Britian’s most recognisable artists working today.

His figuartive work has fostered such an affinity and kinship within the community that a public campaign managed to stop their planned move to New York in 2006, securing the Iron Men permanent residency at Crosby. This year marks their tenth anniversary. In celebration, Gormley has brought an exhibition to The Atkinson in Southport, 15 miles north of Crosby beach. However, this is an art show in which you will find neither iron nor sculpture; Elemental decisively offers an insight into his prolific output of drawings — testament to Gormley’s own words, that “a day passed without drawing is a day lost.”

In Elemental, Gormley has brought together two sets of drawings: Body & Light and North Light, installed simply across four gallery walls. Body & Light consists of 37 frames that feature the artist’s exploration of depth within the body, as well as depicting the body immersed. Drawn at Coniston Water in the Lake District, they were completed between 1990 and 1996. The 14 drawings which make up North Light were created in 2014 during a period of time spent in Norfolk.

Both sets of drawings are on handmade paper, using pitch-black ink and casein to create oozy, seeping marks. Using an economy of ink, Gormley makes muted grey tones and allows the whiteness of the paper to be a significant part of the completed drawings. This makes the drawings verge on abstraction; which, interestingly, may be a little less instantly gratifying to those visitors drawn here because of Gormley’s public sculptures. Hung formally on white walls, and never exceeding paper 16 x 24 inches, this is another side of Gormley’s practice that simultaneously feel linked to and removed from the sculptures of Another Place.

Part of why Another Place worked so well is that it has an immediacy to it, giving a broad range of people the opportunity to engage with and see oneself in relation to the sculptures — or ‘surrogate bodies’ as Gormley calls them — in outside places. At Crosby beach, one is often buffeted by high winds, standing in tidal pools and tasting salt on the air; all of which add to the experience. At Elemental, people have to walk into a traditional gallery space; cutting themselves off from the natural world and their surroundings, the opposite of Gormley’s most popular works. Where the picturesque, stormy clouds of Crosby beach frames the Iron Men, the white walls of the Atkinson can’t compete.

But taking these drawings on their own merits, there is actually much to be gained from Elemental. The vastness of Coniston Water is a significant influence for the Body & Light drawings, with water proving an effective study for Gormley’s ideas. Up, for instance, shows a body submerged in water, moving and reaching across the page toward the light at the top left hand corner. It brings to mind the feeling of exhilaration of such a moment, when one punctures the water’s surface to catch a breath; re-living it through looking at the drawing connects the viewer back to such lived moment.

The technique used to create the drawings also feels particularly fitting; the flow of black ink over white paper is visually and physically not too far removed from the constantly flowing water which inspired them. Throughout these 37 frames, bodies and spaces emerge, captured in ephemeral moments; unmistakably human forms appear in enclosed areas within the darkened page, with rays of light popping through. Gormley once described the sculptures of Another Place as being surrogate bodies for us all to jump into and experience the world anew; viewed in such a context these drawings have the potential to work on the viewer in a similar way.

It feels like Gormley is trying to tap into those lived moments in which the environment engulfs the body; in which we slightly lose ourselves outside of the otherwise more quantifiable dimensions of our bodies. It is great to see the genesis of his more public works manifested through drawing.

North Light, unlike Body & Light, and the vast majority of Gormley’s work, puts the corporeal aside. Using black ink and casein in much the same way, grey tones show emerging forms of light and dark, horizons come into focus as does the world outside of our bodies. Astral matter floats in and out, again achieved with a sensitive use of the ink. Gormley gives form to what might be seen in more abstract wanderings, what we perceive as our reality and the drifting of our mind in dreamlike states.

To some extent, the simplicity of this set allows more room for our own projections of what we are looking at. The circular forms of ink in differing grey intensities allude to the universe at large, the happenings of our solar system. They spur on thoughts about the grandness of the universe, an effective record of those moments where we scale ourselves against our surroundings. They have an almost meditative quality. Tehyre remote: all architecture is removed, technology removed. Perhaps this set could be thought of as a visual manifestation of what the Iron Men are searching for out at sea.

At first sight Elemental may seem far removed from Gormley’s more recognisable work. However, these drawings can be viewed as a fitting accompaniment to the likes of Another Place. With a body of water influencing the first set, and the wider world we inhabit influencing the latter, the visitor is called upon to immerse themselves in familiar human experiences, within us or around us. This is definitely a common thread running tightly through all of Gormley’s work. He wants us to recognise and contemplate what it is to be human, and to feel as other human beings do. To Gormley, the value of art lies in fulfilling this ambition. In sticking to such a principle, Gormley stays true to his own musings and steers his own direction.

Although they may not be as instantly accessible, time spent with Gormely’s Elemental drawings is extremely worthwhile; a contemplative experience that lingers beyond The Atkinson’s gallery walls.

Kellie Grogan

This article has been commissioned for the collaborative #BeACritic project — an annual programme of mentoring and commissioned critical articles for North-West-based writers, initiated and supported by The Double Negative, Liverpool John Moores University and Arts Council England. See more here

See Elemental by Antony Gormley at the Atkinson, Southport, until Sunday 15 November 2015 – free entry. Opening times: Monday-Saturday 10am-4pm; Sunday 11am-4pm

Images from top: ROAD II (2014), carbon and casein on paper, courtesy the artist; installation shot at the Atkinson, Southport; HORIZON II (2014), carbon and casein on paper, courtesy the artist

Read Antony Gormley In Conversation: Iron Men At 10

See Pete Goodbody’s picture gallery of Gormley’s studio in London

What’s hot this week? Our pick of the listings from around Liverpool and the rest of the UK…

Tuesday – Scalarama Liverpool Launch And Film Jam 6.30-11pm @ A Small Cinema, Liverpool – FREE

One for the cineastes! Scalarama Festival is a month of films that aim to bring together cinema lovers from across the UK. Tonight in Liverpool, the events programmers have lovingly chosen a selection of films to give us a sneaky taster for the month ahead. Expect screenings all over the city — from FACT to Well Space, Golden Sq Coffee and Metal at Edge Hill Station — plus an excellent showcase of original, vintage film posters at Small Cinema’s café. See here for a full programme of events near you.

Wednesday – Hardeep Pandhal In Conversation 6.30-7.30pm @ Drawing Room, London — £5

Autobiography, parodic language and non-linear storytelling – just some of the multi-layered themes tackled in the videos and ‘comic foregrounds’ of Glasgow-based artist, Hardeep Pandhal. Tonight join Pandhal and Drawing Room co-director, Kate Macfarlane for an evening of discussion about his ever-growing body of work, followed by a special guided tour of his studio.

Friday – Exhibition Opening: Clam Jam 6-9pm @ The Royal Standard, Liverpool – FREE

Presenting work from an all-female selection of emerging artists — Claudia Dance-Wells, Chloe McClellan, Beth Shapeero, Molly Smyth, Sadie Williams, TASC: Aamber Ablett and Stacey Bradfield – this playful exhibition rejects traditional gender constructs and instead uses materials, mass and construction as a way to create a fresh approach to ‘female’ work. Expect sculpture, installation and performances that will provide spark for further discussion.

Get The Blessing 7.30pm @ The Kazimier, Liverpool – £11.50

Over the last 15 years, this Bristol-based four-piece have built up a reputation as one of ‘the most original and exciting bands on the British scene’ (Jazzwise). Bonded of their mutual love of jazz musician Ornette Coleman, Jim Barr and Clive Deamer (of Portishead fame), along with Pete Judge and Jack McMurchie, have carved out a career filled with infectious saxophone-laced rhythms that are impossible to resist.

Saturday – Above The Beaten Track Festival 12pm @ The Bluecoat, Liverpool – FREE

See the best of Merseyside’s song-writing talent — for this festival’s eighth year running. Expect live performances from dream-pop psychedelic combo Sunstack Jones, garage rock band Broken Men, acoustic duo Rob Jones and Rob White, singer-songwriter Mark Poutney, plus a plethora of DJ sets. The Bluecoat will also be hosting a series of arts events, including a Mellowtone retrospective of music posters, a record fair, Draw the Line (in which you can design your own album art), Capstan Bazaar’s arts and crafts fair and Merseyrail Sound Station.

PICK OF THE WEEK: Anthony Gormley: Elemental 10-4pm @ The Atkinson, Southport – FREE

Unbelievably, 10 years have passed since Gormley’s Another Place installation was set into the sandy shore of Crosby beach. In celebration of this momentous occasion, The Atkinson hosts a new exhibition of new (and old) works on paper by the artist that depict his fascination with depth, movement and the elements of nature.

Enchanted Cosmos 6.30-10pm @ The Royal Academy, London — £22

To coincide with Joseph Cornell’s acclaimed exhibition Wanderlust at the Royal Academy, we are invited to experience the awe and wonder of the cosmos through an evening of participatory events, including an immersive installation in which we can gaze at the stars beneath the artificial night sky, dance in a disco box from Vintage Mobile Disco, watch the beginning of the universe in an enchanting theatrical puppetry production, and watch screenings of classic sci-fi TV hits.

Sunday – Last day: Soundscapes 10-6pm @ The National Gallery, London — £9

A new way to experience old classics: the artworks of some of the most prolific, iconic and admired artists from the 14^th century up to the 20th century are reimagined in sonic form in this utterly immersive and site-specific experience. Expect a new spin on Holbein’s Ambassadors, Cézanne’s Bathers and Van Rysselberghe’s Coastal Scene by composer Nico Muhly, Turner Prize-winning sound artist Susan Philipsz OBE, DJ Jamie xx, film composer Gabriel Yared, wildlife sound recorder Chris Watson and sound artists Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller, to imbue these two-dimensional paintings with a three-dimensional life.

Heather Garner

Keen to hear about the best art, design, film and music events happening in Liverpool July-Sept 2015?

Wait no more! Download the PDF version of our indispensable new pocket-guide, Culture Diary, now.