Top 3 Artworks in Sheffield chosen for Our Favourite Places

" ‘I am to paint several portraits in the country and three ugly women at Sheffield, dingy hole’. 

 John Singer Sargent describing his 'The Misses Vickers', 1884

"Ironically, it turned out to be one of his best and one of Sheffield’s most popular paintings: a modern depiction of three modern, pretty Sheffield women – a cinematic, tense, and ‘chiaroscuro’ (both light and melancholic) masterpiece..."

I was eager to write this feature piece but in practice it proved very tricky. My final shortlist of 'Top 3 Artworks' in Sheffield for Our Favourite Places included two works not currently on public display, and one public sculpture under threat of relocation and worse potentially, of being sold. So it seemed right to stick with this semi-awkward shortlist since it says much about Sheffield's artistic climate.

1. ‘The Misses Vickers’ (1884), John Singer Sargent

2.‘Double Somersault’ (1976), William Pye

3. ‘Election Protest, Bolotnaya Square, Moscow, 2011′, hand embroidery on wool (2012) from the Interpersonal Spatial Arrangements series, Roanna Wells

William Pye, 'Double Somersault', 1976. Photo by Shaun Bloodworth

Sheffield is brimming with artists - it's pretty difficult to be ignorant of the fact. There's an impressive quantity and quality of work being made in studios scattered right across the city, from converted office blocks to suburbs to artist led spaces. Yet there are scarce opportunities to exhibit or participate in projects in the city since its visual arts sector is severely underfunded.

In terms of the city's extraordinary art collection, sadly there is little capacity for display. The public can encounter the collection on semi-rotated display at the Graves gallery (on the very top floor of the central library, sporting limited opening hours) and the Ruskin gallery close by, both are modest in size in contrast to the works which are waiting in the wings (tucked away in storage beneath the Graves gallery). This is said to be a preservation issue, limiting exposure to light, etc.

Ruskin donated a great deal of artworks to Sheffield for the pleasure of the city's workers. Once, Sheffield's art collections displayed for public enjoyment set a fine example to cities like Manchester. Now, Manchester offers an extensive collection on display all year round, in conjunction with contemporary art exhibitions and new commissions.

It isn't an easy problem to solve but it was a pleasure to mark out three fine examples of artworks to be cherished but not hoarded, shared and above all, discussed. Whether visible or not, it's important we're aware of them and the artists that created them here, or dedicated them to us, for our benefit.

Read the piece in full here on Our Favourite Places

Cushion making

I chose these two fabrics in John Lewis - both are reproductions of classic 1950's prints. After a few initial snags, I taught myself to successfully use my new (old) machine and feel extremely pleased.

The checkerboard fabric is United Colours of Benetton - it has the best colours and seemingly doesn't repeat - an absolute bargain from a fabric shop in Hillsborough. 

 

The Magic Know-How, Laura Buckley

Beautiful new show at Site Gallery in Sheffield by London based artist Laura Buckley.

Image courtesy of Site Gallery

Image courtesy of Laura Buckley

Image courtesy of Laura Buckley

Image courtesy of Laura Buckley

Image courtesy of Site Gallery

Image courtesy of Site Gallery

Archive Sheffield

Archive Sheffield is a new printed matter, produced in and about Sheffield. It targets and illustrates the people of the city as documented by some of the city's best photographers, and heralds a specially chosen set of projects by presenting them in small, alluring bites.

The core idea of Archive Sheffield that 'Sheffield is not place it is people'. It's first edition includes work by Theo Simpson, Gemma Thorpe, Andy Brown and Clive Egginton. Each photographer is gifted in picking out inconspicuous and lesser celebrated or rarely identified everyday details - details often guilty of provoking grander sensations of contentment, displacement or inspiration in ourselves and in strangers around us.  Ordinarily, we might fail to observe them.

Du.st have designed the neat layout and shape of Archive Sheffield's print - large format newspaper style with an additional smaller sheet of information added to the outside, held in place by a clip, also giving you the option to separate the pages and see the pictures in full.

Gemma Thorpe's photography is particularly engaging derived from her ongoing larger project work with Chinese students in Sheffield, 'Youzi Project'. 'Youzi's (translates to 'wanderers'). Her photographs depict the individual and collective lives of young Chinese people studying in their thousands in the city, adapting rapidly to  a vastly disparate culture and in turn changing the city's cultural fabric.

A hopeful start for Archive Sheffield, working to capture and stimulate thought across a broader spectrum of people,  showing us the city we think we know through alternative lenses.

Tweet @archivethat

Copies available across the city, including Site Gallery

The finest example of a pair of Stork scissors

 

"Chased Stork Scissors" 

I looked into the term 'chased' but it's unclear if 'chased' is a scissor type or more to do with the stork. He looks quite static to me.

 As seen at Sheffield Cutlers Hall

News! Website launch and blog

"Hello new website"

 www.JaneFaram.com will house the majority of my writing (and a little artwork). It's my new,  neat online archive.

Faramaufait.blogspot.com (you are here), will be more explorative of broader ideas and specific experiences, from encounters with art to things I trip over on and offline - only (mostly) the good things. My blog Faramaufait will tell the less polished back story.

To be 'Au fait' means to be kept abreast of the latest developments, so as I keep abreast - please keep an eye.

Also you can find me on Our Favourite Places and Dig Yorkshire. 

Un-stilling life (if there is such a thing, this is it)

A still life painting by Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder (1573--1621) is brought as close to real life as you could possibly imagine. Artists Rob and Nick Carter with visual effects studio MPC have dedicated 2 years to creating a 3 hour animation of a Dutch golden age masterpiece. 

Once frozen in time, Bosschaert's oil painted flowers now open and close, the sky transitions from dawn to dusk and the bees, snails and butterflies buzz, flutter and creep. 

It's a really beautiful and extraordinary thing to see.

Transforming Still Life VFX breakdown

 

 

Thanks to Creative Review for sharing this remarkable thing in their June issue, p.34.

Polish Cold War Neon

I've been thinking a lot about Neon recently, since Richard William Wheater has returned to Site Gallery for Platform: In the Making. His latest work, 'Neon is Neon, Sex is Sex' is a beacon to passers by, celebrating neon as a medium, from all angles - the craftmanship, artistry, literary references and design. Wheater alludes to neon's alternative purposes, at a time where this glowing material and it's history is re-peaking our interest. Probably because that glorious beacon of neon is quite simply a light, vibrant and optimistic sight.

The "Neonisation period" - an excellent term coined by photographer Ilona Karwińska. Watch this fabulous short video interview with her - via the BBC.

Wheater's imperfect handproduced neon is quite different to these graphic socialist post-Cold War Polish Neon signs, which Karwińska says were in English words to add glamour, how after Stalin's death the call was for "Western magic in the Polish cities".

- Neon in bespoke handwritten fonts

- Neon designed for particular buildings 

Check out Richard William Wheater's year-long public art project with artist Victoria Lucas; '12 Months of Neon Love'  (I designed the book and now I love neon even more...)

A new magazine: Printed Pages

Just a quickie about this brilliant new magazine. It just came out of nowhere! I didn't know It's Nice That were having a major rethink about their magazine output, though I find their website a must-go-to, the magazine less so - just because the web works best for daily, quick profiles, and quick hits of inspiration, and the previous magazine was pricey and had others of similar price to compete with.

I'm so glad they did. This is the magazine I've been missing, though I didn't know I was missing it until Thursday.

Printed Pages

- The print quality is a pleasure. The cover image graphic is brilliant (on the website, the roving eye follows you about)

- It's short but sweet - 84 pages, all the content is high quality and engaging, and I've actually laughed reading it cover to cover this Sunday.

- Includes an interview with the super Chris Ware (with high quality reproductions of some of Building Stories & his cover artwork for the New Yorker)

- Feature on Omar Sosa (who founded Apartamento) inc. inspiring interior shots of his home in Barcelona, plus more great BCN features on the city's booming design culture, focussing on 3 standout studios.

So the features seem much stronger, they tell high quality stories about people and ideas, nothing in it feels remotely excessive or indulgant. There aren't any adverts! 

Also there's a lovely opening essay from the editor that stresses the importance of thoughtful goodbye's...

Less of the "kind regards" or worse, "KR's", Shaun Usher does absolute justice to the point that we really should care about how we communicate with each other - right down to how we sign off our zippiest emails - something that this new magazine and the team behind it have massive aptitude for. Communicating well, carefully and colourfully.

Yours, It's Nice That, with zestful gratitude,

Jane.

Interface bursary to review: Alternative Histories New York Art Spaces, 1960-2010

Alternative Histories 'part exhibition catalogue, part cultural history', is a book which picks up on the extraordinary archived history of New York's 'Alternative spaces' as was presented in the 2010 exhibition of the same name at Exit Art. 

It was great to be granted an a-n interface bursary to write a review of this publication which can be read online now (and below). This is a really valuable archive, nicely concentrated into book form - and will lead you down new roads of inspiration if you're remotely interested in DIY, alternative choices and striving against times of political, social and economic difficulty.

 

“Alternative Histories” was firstly a large scale exhibition to document New York Art spaces from 1960 to 2010 and subsequently this “part exhibition catalogue, part cultural history” was published bearing the same title, bursting with as much of that previous documentation as possible. The conception of “Alternative Histories” is credited to Exit Art co-founders Jeanette Ingberman and Papo Colo[i]. Exit Art has proven to be one of New York’s leading “alternative spaces”[ii], consistently responding to political, social and cultural issues whilst supporting artists who were unrecognised or exploring new territory. Befitting that Exit Art have conducted the mammoth task of telling the world this particular history.

The exhibition was presented as a great table littered with 140 cardboard boxes. Visitors could investigate as if digging into the past, each box dedicated to an alternative space[iii]. Not to be taken as a comprehensive survey but to “contribute to an ongoing process of mapping, recording and analysing the history”[iv]. In the book the individual profiles for each “alternative” include; timeline, founder/s and their story, geography, significant political and social implications, key exhibitions and projects. Alongside this, a single image illustrating the spirit of each; a photograph taken at Just Above Midtown (JAM) in 1981 of Butch Harris mid-performance “as a living “sculpture”” [v], powerful print graphics by Kenkeleba House[vi], THE THING’s basement operations room[vii], a sketched plan for the Franklin Street Arts Center[viii]. Some photographs of founders standing proudly by the main doors[ix] - paints a better picture of these alternative histories to put faces to the names of those who drove things forward.

Brian O’Doherty is credited with first coining the term “Alternative Spaces” [x]. The rationale for many artists turning to the disused, unkempt, readily available spaces in areas of SoHo and the Lower East Side, “Not the shiny New York we know now”[xi] . Artists injected their efforts into making the alternatives viable for living and working. “Let’s do it ourselves and maybe they’ll pay attention!”[xii] It also afforded a freedom of expression impossible in the established environments especially for young, unrecognised artists and those from less accepted backgrounds.

Melissa Rachleff’s informative essay[xiii] tackles the “alternative spaces” definition and surveys significant texts. In the 1960’s on the’ ‘home front’[xiv]; artists’ activist movements chiefly AWC (Art Workers Coalition) took MOMA to task over the underrepresentation of minority artists; AWC proceeded to address broader issues of “political and social concerns such as the Vietnam war, racism, sexism, and reproductive rights”. Extending far beyond evasion of museum policies, the Lower East side became an “activist central culture”[xv], incorporating health centres, workshops for Harlem Youths, practical alternatives to the orthodox museums for the Puerto Rican communities[xvi]. Alternative spaces served as multi-faceted support agencies[xvii].

Anecdotal tales make for great reading mostly within the 13 interviews[xviii] with founders, directors and key staff, led by curator Herb Tam[xix]. These divulge details of relationships, pressures and inspirations; “I threw a big food party in the loft and used the theme of edible flowers…Gordon [Matta Clark] came to the party…and said “You should start a restaurant” [xx]. Carol Goodden describes the start of FOOD, New York’s first art space / restaurant, illustrating the trajectories of everyday living and artistic idea.

Many “alternative spaces” have since closed - the inevitable irony of the downtrodden areas of New York suddenly becoming desirable since artists enlivened and cared them, city planners saw sudden potential for redevelopment. Others expired due to internal conflicts, financial strain, or as regulatory laws were more stringently imposed[xxi].

Temporary, radical spaces[xxii] could be more experimental and risky without the pressure of sustaining a location. We see a later shift in the 1980’s as some leaders found ways to work from within - or not in opposition to - established institutions. P.S.1 became affiliated with MOMA in 2000. Prolific curator Alanna Heiss states; “P.S.1 was the opposite of the alternative space…time to stop being a guerrilla warrior for art. A chance to really challenge museum activity in a space that wasn’t acting as a museum”.

It is commented that “commercial galleries figured out through the alternative space movement that installation was what they should be showing”[xxiii], Marina Abramovic’s exhibition at MOMA “could have been at artists space fifteen years ago”[xxiv]. The 1970’s saw more acquisition of NEA[xxv] funding which negated working with dealers and curators, and afforded more open ended artistic agenda.

 

Papo Colo writes about how we can move forward; “again we have to conceive new options”. It is not for us to look back with nostalgia for something lost or dwindling nor is this archival project to signal the end of “alternatives”, as they are now called for to be potentially “extra-institution”[xxvi]. Not necessarily protesting but demanding freedom of expression; Artists require test-beds, chance to explore new technologies and discover new “social, political, environmental and aesthetic priorities”[xxvii]. They can be supported by the larger institutions. Artists will always have the power to make change; “to confront the world. The news does not last and is not as significant or important as the arts”.[xxviii]. “Alternative histories” can be the foundation for alternative futures.

[i] P.14  The idea was conceived ten years previously to the opening of Exit Art’s doors for the “Alternative Histories” exhibition in 2010.

[ii] P.11 On Creating Alternatives and “Alternative Histories”, Mary Anne Staniszewski.

[iii] P.14 “We thought that the exhibition would include approximately thirty or forty spaces. We were surprised at the depth and wealth of information”, Jeanette Ingberman

[iv] P.11, Mary Anne Staniszewski.

[v] P.156, Photograph of Senga Nengudi and Cheryl Banks performance at Just Above Midtown (JAM)

[vi] P.163, Graphic from the invitation to the exhibition “Vice and Virtue” at Kenkeleba House

[vii] P.250, photograph of the basement at THE THING at 44 White Street in 1992

[viii] P.177, Drawn plan for the Franklin Street Arts Center building, 1977.

[ix] P.108, The Studio Museum in Harlem on opening day

[x] Essays by O’Doherty first published in Art Forum in the 1970’s

[xi] P.63, Interview with Alanna Heiss, founder of P.S.1

[xii] P.48, Interview with Steve Cannon, founder of A Gathering of the Tribes

[xiii] P.23, Michelle Rachleff

[xiv] P.99, Introduction to the 1960’s

[xv] P. 106, Lower East Side Printshop

[xvi] P.116, El Museo Del Barrio

[xvii] P.112, American Indian Community House

[xviii] 60 interviews were conducted in total for the original exhibition. These are being made available online: http://as-ap.org/oral-histories

[xix] P.45 Herb Tam is the Curator and Director of Exhibitions at the Museum of Chinese in America, New York. He previously served as Associate Curator at Exit Art

[xx] P.58, Interview with Carol Goodden, founder of FOOD

[xxi] P.146, Collective for Living Cinema

[xxii] p.19, Interview with Alanna Heiss

[xxiii] P.89, Interview with Martha Wilson, founder of Franklin Furnace

[xxiv] P. 14, Jeanette Ingberman

[xxv]  (NEA) National Endowment for the Arts

[xxvi] P.41, Lauren Rosati

[xxvii] P. 20, Jacki Apple

[xxviii] P.69 Interview with Bob Lee, founder of Asian American Arts Centre