NEPN Symposium – 18 May 2012 – booking still open
MIchelle Sank, Untitled from 'The Submerged'
Speakers include: Pauline Hadaway; Bas Vroege; Michelle Sank; Anthony Luvera; Craig Ames; Ben Jones.
Dan Graham: ‘All artists are alike. They dream of doing something that’s more social, more collaborative and more real than art’. (http://artsconnected.org/collection/107477/dan-graham-beyond?print=true )
Is it possible for photographers to realise such dreams? What are the issues facing socially engaged practitioners today? Such questions seem particularly apt in our highly contested social sphere, marked in the UK by Conservative politics and seemingly intractable financial crisis coupled with savage cuts in public spending. Echoes of the 1980s are all too pervasive, with talk of (yet another) ‘lost generation’, rumour of renewed conflict in the South Atlantic, queues at petrol pumps and disarray among political parties of all persuasions. Much of this is played out across new social media contexts, where the networked photographic and video image has a seemingly new currency.
How might photographers today respond to these and other challenges? Our symposium seeks to explore some of the photographic and artistic strategies developed by current practitioners in varied contexts of social engagement, collaboration and participation. These strategies will be explored in a series of presentations and dialogues, involving artists, curators and audiences. Among other questions, we will consider the extent to which the ‘social turn’ is paralleled in other visual and artistic practices. What criteria should we employ to judge the effectiveness and success of socially engaged practices? How do we balance process, participation and shared ownership, alongside more conventional notions of authorship, photographic concept and creativity? In short, the aesthetic dimensions of socially engaged practice will be a focus of our discussion and presentations, whether confrontational and disturbing or daring to explore strategies of visual pleasure and play.
Socially engaged projects have traditionally had a weak profile within the commercial photographic and art worlds. We will also consider the extent to which this may be shifting, with the renewed emphasis on experimental socially- engaged projects in the public realm on the part of commissioners and festival curators.
Join us for a day of photographic debate, provocation and networking.
Registration is now open. Fees are just £15 or £7.50 for students and unwaged, this includes lunch and refreshments!
Venue: Mining Institute, Neville Hall, Westgate Road, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 1SE.
Following the Symposium we will be heading down to Side Gallery where Damien Wootten will be launching his new publication ‘Northern Refuge’ supported by North East Refugee Service and published by NEPN.
More information is available in the Events section.
The Felling, Dawn Felicia Knox
NEPN Symposium, 18 May 2012
Socially -Engaged Practices Today @ Mining Institute, Newcastle upon Tyne
Michelle Sank, Untitled from the series The Submerged, 2011
Speakers include: Pauline Hadaway; Bas Vroege; Michelle Sank; Anthony Luvera; Craig Ames; Ben Jones.
Dan Graham: ‘All artists are alike. They dream of doing something that’s more social, more collaborative and more real than art’. (http://artsconnected.org/collection/107477/dan-graham-beyond?print=true )
Is it possible for photographers to realise such dreams? What are the issues facing socially engaged practitioners today? Such questions seem particularly apt in our highly contested social sphere, marked in the UK by Conservative politics and seemingly intractable financial crisis coupled with savage cuts in public spending. Echoes of the 1980s are all too pervasive, with talk of (yet another) ‘lost generation’, rumour of renewed conflict in the South Atlantic, queues at petrol pumps and disarray among political parties of all persuasions. Much of this is played out across new social media contexts, where the networked photographic and video image has a seemingly new currency.
How might photographers today respond to these and other challenges? Our symposium seeks to explore some of the photographic and artistic strategies developed by current practitioners in varied contexts of social engagement, collaboration and participation. These strategies will be explored in a series of presentations and dialogues, involving artists, curators and audiences. Among other questions, we will consider the extent to which the ‘social turn’ is paralleled in other visual and artistic practices. What criteria should we employ to judge the effectiveness and success of socially engaged practices? How do we balance process, participation and shared ownership, alongside more conventional notions of authorship, photographic concept and creativity? In short, the aesthetic dimensions of socially engaged practice will be a focus of our discussion and presentations, whether confrontational and disturbing or daring to explore strategies of visual pleasure and play.
Socially engaged projects have traditionally had a weak profile within the commercial photographic and art worlds. We will also consider the extent to which this may be shifting, with the renewed emphasis on experimental socially- engaged projects in the public realm on the part of commissioners and festival curators.
Join us for a day of photographic debate, provocation and networking.
Registration is now open. Just £15 or £7.50 for students/unwaged including lunch and refreshments. More information is available in the Events section.
Portfolio Review Day, 19 May 2012. Information on reviewers and process is available here
Marjolaine Ryley at Street Level Photoworks
Marjolaine Ryley’s exhibition of new work ‘Growing up in the New Age’ opens at Street Level Photoworks on Saturday 21 April – 3 June 2012.
Ryley’s practice uses autobiography as a tool for investigating her subjects, moving between the personal album and the social document, between research and practice.
Growing up in the New Age explores ideas of memory, history, familial relationships and archival narratives. It is an ongoing journey through the fascinating subject of alternative education and philosophies of the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s including pacifism, anarchism, counter-culture, left wing politics, women’s rights and ‘new age’ ideas. Drawing on her own life growing up in the 1970s and 80s and her parents experiences, from their initial meeting in a commune in the south of France, she uncovers the early formulation of their ideologies, set against the backdrop of political and cultural happenings of the 1960s and early 1970s.
She also explores alternative education and the belief systems that led to the founding of Kirkdale Free School by a group of alternative thinking parents in the 1960s, which Ryley attended from 1976 – 1987. Included in the exhibition are a series of black and white prints by Dave Walkling, whose images of Kirkdale and the squatting scene add a salient primary source of evidence of the time alongside other items which knit the archival records with the lyrical imagery of Ryley’s.
An exhibition guide with contributions from Zoe Lippett, Val Williams and Malcolm Dickson is available.
Exhibition Related Events:
Friday 18th May, 2pm. Exhibition talk for photography students with Marjolaine Ryley. Free, all welcome.
Saturday 19th May, 12-1.30pm, Portfolio reviews led by Marjolaine Ryley. Free, booking essential.
Saturday 19th May, 3pm. Exhibition tour with Marjolaine Ryley. Free, All welcome.
More information at: http://www.streetlevelphotoworks.org/programme/exhibitionsandprojects/marjolaineryley/mryley.html
NEPN welcomes Photo Book Club to the region in May
The event takes place the evening before our annual symposium on socially-engaged practice. More info to follow here soon.
Call for Proposals – New commission with Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival
Penumbra, Gareth Hudson & Jack Burton, 2011
We have invited proposals from artists who are working across moving image and photography, or who have moved from one practice to the other, while the new commission will explore the overlapping terrains of moving and still images.
Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival returns for its eighth annual celebration of the art of film – once again illuminating the whole town through screenings, installations and projections, in locations across Berwick-upon-Tweed and along the Town Walls, and capturing the imaginations of thousands from the North East & Scottish Borders and across the UK.
The selected proposal will be awarded £2,500 to cover artist fees and all production costs. In addition, the AV equipment needed to exhibit the work will be provided, as will technical help with install, and accommodation for the artist during the Festival.
The commission is supported equally by Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival, with thanks to Arts Council England, and by the North East Photography Network through support from the University of Sunderland.
SUBMISSION NOW CLOSED.
The Festival is also still accepting moving image submissions until 29th June, with an ‘Early Bird’ deadline of 2nd April, http://www.berwickfilm-artsfest.com/submit-your-film
Damien Wootten ‘The Visitors’ at South Shields
Over the next few weeks and into the Spring a series of large-scale artists’ billboard images will be installed along the seafront wall of Ocean Beach Pleasure Park. These are part of a programme of contemporary artists’ commissions designed to celebrate the landscape and cultural heritage of the South Shields seafront. Starting their research work last year, a group of artists spent time in and around South Shields, exploring the local history and talking to people about their personal memories and experiences of the seafront.
The first works from the Seafront Interpretation Project to appear along the wall include:
The Visitors, a series of beach portraits by photographer Damien Wootten records some of the trips made to South Shields Seafront by north-east residents and international visitors during Summer 2011.
All works were commissioned by Grit & Pearl for South Tyneside Council as part of the South Shields Seafront Interpretation Project 2011-12. The project was supported by South Tyneside Council, Seachange and Arts Council England.
Grit & Pearl is Newcastle based public art agency with a reputation for delivering highly creative projects for a wide range of private sector and local authority clients. www.gritandpearl.co.uk
Damien Wooten is a photographer based in Gateshead who has a long-term interest in coastal landscapes and portraiture. His work has previously been exhibited at The Customs House, South Shields.www.damienwootten.co.uk
Juliet Chenery-Robson work at Eaga House, Newcastle
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‘A Diagnosis of Exclusion’ & ‘Unpredictable Patterns’, photographic projects by Juliet Chenery-Robson will be viewable at Eaga House, Archbold Terrace, Newcastle, NE2 1DB on 2 March, 9 March and 16 March from 1.00-2.30pm.
The exhibitions form part of the ‘Life with Art’ programme and are supported by ME North East & ME Research UK
Further Information is available by contacting ME North East, Tel: 0191 3892222
Dawn Felicia Knox: Nomen Nudum at the Great North Museum
Research Residency Opportunity
Image from Belfast Exposed Archive
The North East Photography Network (NEPN), in partnership with Belfast Exposed Gallery, is offering a research residency opportunity for a photographic artist from the North East of England. Interesting parallels between the industrial, economic and social histories of Newcastle and Belfast can be drawn and both cities and regions have a rich photographic history and a strong tradition of photographers developing relationships with the city and its inhabitants.
Proposals are sought from photographers who are interested to explore their own interpretation of ‘socially-engaged practice’ in the context of Belfast and the long history of photographers who have worked in the city and with its communities.
Founded in 1983 as a community photography initiative, Belfast Exposed Photography now functions as a gallery for contemporary photography with emphasis on commissioning and publication of new work. It holds a community photography archive and runs an extensive educational outreach network.
The production of socially and politically engaged work and dialogue is the driving force behind all aspects of the Belfast Exposed project. The North East Photography Network was set up in 2009 to develop and promote photography in the North East of England. The region has a reputation for producing high-quality photographers and has supported a diverse range of practices. NEPN’s aim is to build on this history, providing a context for the future development of the region’s photographic culture. NEPN engage with a broad range of contemporary photography, including documentary and photojournalism alongside lens-based visual arts practice. NEPN current research interest is the relationship between the photographer and the public, exploring notions of socially engaged practice and the intersections where photography and the public interact.
Photographers should consider what they could bring from their own practice to contribute to this dialogue.
A space to work from will be provided by Belfast Exposed. The selected artist will have access to chemical and digital darkroom facilities at the University of Sunderland. The selected artist will be asked to make an introductory talk/ presentation to be delivered at the gallery’s ‘Exchange Space’. The photographer will also be expected to present a work in progress in Belfast and in North East England.
Applicants should maximize the benefit of the opportunity presented and view it as an experimental platform from which to develop a new line of enquiry or body of work. Photographers should think about how to make the best us of the knowledge, history and resources available.
Applicants should be able to undertake the opportunity between April- September 2012 and initial research visits will need to be undertaken by June. A £3000 award is available to incorporate artist fees, materials and all expenses. We are not able to accept applications from those undertaking studies at undergraduate level.
A proposal of a maximum of two pages is required which should briefly outline your intended area of enquiry and how this opportunity would benefit your practice. You should also include a CV and up to 5 images representative of you work, which should be sent as jpegs and must be a max of 72dpi.
It is anticipated that a project would develop over a period of a few months to allow for natural development and reflection and we would not expect applicants to spend long block periods of time in Belfast. Initial research visits will need to be undertaken in May/June to maximise the resources and support available.
Deadline for submissions: 9 March 2012, 5pm.
Applications should be emailed to: amanda.ritson@sunderland.ac.uk
Download this information as a pdf
This opportunity is supported by the National Lottery through Grants for the arts, University of Sunderland and Belfast Exposed Gallery.
