Latest Tweets

Follow Us

Manchester & Salford

We Face Forward: Art From West Africa Today

Manchester Art Gallery

2 June – 16 September 2012

 

Forget everything you think you know about African art; embrace all that you don’t yet know about the art, culture and creativity of West African artists today. Major new sculptural installations, painting, drawing, photography, textiles, video, sound and fashion ask us to consider global questions of trade and commerce, cultural influence, environmental destruction and identity. Challenging and humorous, curious, noisy, elegiac and eclectic – this is the dynamism of West African cultures today. These form a huge, city-wide exhibition, spreading across Manchester Art Gallery, Whitworth Art Gallery and the Gallery of Costume (Platt Hall).

There are more We Face Forward exhibitions and events at The Manchester Museum and the National Football Museum and a packed programme of We Face Forward family activities at various venues.

And We Face Forward reaches far beyond Manchester’s gallery spaces. The music programme, curated by Band On The Wall and The Manchester Museum, includes world renowned acts such as Afro-Cubism, Femi Kuti, Angelique Kidjo, Diabel Cissohko and Kanda Bongo Man and reflects the incredible diversity and brilliance of musical styles from West Africa.

Confirmed artists:

Georges Adéagbo (Benin), El Anatsui (Ghana/Nigeria), Hélène Amazou (Togo / Belgium), Lucy Azubuike (Nigeria), Mohamed Camara (Mali / France), Cheick Diallo (Mali / France), Aida Duplessis (Mali), Aboubakar Fofana (Mali / France), Meschac Gaba (Benin/ Netherlands), Francois-Xavier Gbré ( Ivory Coast / France), Romuald Hazoumè (Benin), Abdoulaye Armin Kane (Senegal), Abdoulaye Konaté (Mali), Soungalo Malé (Mali), Hamidou Maiga (Burkina Faso), Nii Obodai (Ghana), Emeka Ogboh (Nigeria), Abraham Oghobase, Amarachi Okafor (Nigeria / UK), Charles Okereke (Nigeria), Nnenna Okore (Nigeria / USA), Duro Olowu (Nigeria / London), George Osodi (Nigeria / London), Nyaba Leon Ouedraogo (Burkina Faso), Ibrahima Niang AKA Piniang (Senegal), Nyani Quarmyne (Ghana), Abderramane Sakaly (Senegal / Mali), Amadou Sanogo (Mali), Malick Sidibé (Mali), Pascale Marthine Tayou (Cameroon / Belgium), Barthélémy Toguo (Cameroon / France), Victoria Udondian (Nigeria).

Confirmed musicians:

AfroCubism – featuring Eliades Ochoa of Buena Vista Social Club and Toumani Diabaté (Cuba / Mali), Diabel Cissokho (Senegal), Angelique Kidjo with Manchester World Voices Choir (Benin / UK) ; Dele Sosimi Afrobeat Orchestra (Nigeria / UK); Endless Journey – featuring members of Mamane Barka and Etran Finatawa (Niger); Kanda Bongo Man (Congo / UK); Jaliba Kuyateh & The Kumareh Band (Gambia); Seckou Keita Band (Senegal / UK).

 

Further information
  • Opening times Tuesday to Sunday 10 am to 5.00 pm
  • Location Manchester Art Gallery, Mosley Street, Manchester M2 3JL
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information 0161 235 8888

http://www.manchestergalleries.org/



Everything’s Inevitable: Works from the collection of Manchester Art Gallery selected by Des Hughes

Manchester Art Gallery

1 May 2012 - 5 May 2013

 

This new display of works, largely from the gallery’s own collection, brings together sculpture, painting, watercolour and drawing from the 16th century to the mid 20th century. Chosen by contemporary sculptor Des Hughes, the display comprises around 20 landscape, portraiture and still life pieces.

It’s a chance to see some of the gallery’s most popular works, such as paintings by William Blake, Alberto Giacometti and Paul Nash and sculpture by Jacob Epstein and Barbara Hepworth. Some of the lesser known works by artists such as Edward Middleditch and Elizabethan court painter, George Gower, have rarely been seen out of storage before.

It also features one of Hughes’ most recent works In a Brown Study 2011 which the gallery will acquire for the collection.

The exhibition presents a fantastic opportunity to see Stanley Spencer’s masterpiece The Garage, on loan from The Andrew Lloyd Webber Foundation. This evocative depiction of the motoring world is a fascinating study of both the social and technological aspects of the industry in the late 1920s. It has never been shown in the city before.

Hughes has also filled a cabinet with ancient and intriguing objects from the gallery’s collection, including some Roman nails, a spoon from the 5th century and a birch porridge stirrer (known as a thible) from the 19th century. He has mingled these with pieces from his ongoing series of small sculptures Thems.

On show until 2013, the exhibition is just one of many exciting changes currently taking place at the gallery. Over the next few months it will be revitalising many of its permanent displays and replacing some galleries with entirely new exhibitions.

 

Further information
  • Opening times Tuesday to Sunday 10 am to 5.00 pm
  • Location Manchester Art Gallery, Mosley Street, Manchester M2 3JL
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information 0161 235 8888

http://www.manchestergalleries.org/



Focal Points: Art and Photography

Manchester Art Gallery

17 May 2012 – 2 June 2013

 

Self Portrait with Fried Eggs, 1996, Sarah Lucas

Photography is at the heart of some of the most significant works of art of our times.

This new display of around 30 photographs explores just some of the different ways contemporary artists have used photography in their work. It reveals how they have used the camera to explore traditional artistic themes in new and exciting ways.

Taken from the 1980s onward, the photographs explore the body, reinvent still-life, examine our cultural identities and explore the places where we live, work and spend our leisure time. The artworks often find ways of making the familiar strange and the ugly beautiful.

The display features work by influential photographer Keith Arnatt, famous British artist Helen Chadwick, Turner Prize nominee Catherine Yass and Young British Artists such as Sarah Lucas and Jane and Louise Wilson.

It also includes a number of photographic works collected by the Gallery over the last 10 years, with support from the Contemporary Art Society’s Special Collection scheme. By artists including Craigie Horsfield, Cornelia Parker and Thomas Demand, these works explore the themes of photography and sculpture and the connections between the two. They are the inspiration for this photography display.

The photographs in this display come from the collections of Manchester City Galleries, The Arts Council Collection at The Southbank Centre, London and other lenders.

 

Further information
  • Opening times Tuesday to Sunday 10 am to 5.00 pm
  • Location Manchester Art Gallery, Mosley Street, Manchester M2 3JL
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information 0161 235 8888

http://www.manchestergalleries.org/



A Sleek Dry Yell, 2008 – Haroon Mirza

Manchester Art Gallery

21 April – 23 September 2012

 

Haroon Mirza, A Sleek Dry Yell, mixed media

Manchester Art Gallery has a new sculpture by Haroon Mirza and you can see it on display now in the ground floor exhibitions gallery.

One of the hottest UK artists of the moment, Haroon Mirza has won both the Silver Lion Award at the 54th Venice Biennale for best emerging international artist and the Northern Art Prize 2010. Haroon Mirza uses sounds and objects from everyday life to make his art. His sculpture A Sleek Dry Yell is made using bits of furniture, water, an old television monitor, a record player, wooden speakers and video footage of cult musician and actor Richard “Kid” Strange.

Sound is used in this work as a sculptural material. The distinct objects have been brought together in a lo-fi DIY manner to generate noise and create something new. It is the combined rhythm of these noises that forms a sort of distorted sound composition.

Come along and hear it for yourself.
What is the difference between noise and music? Find out from the Creative Consultants. This dynamic group of young people aged 16 to 20 have been meeting regularly at the gallery to research Mirza’s work.

Working with artists Tony Hall from the Owl Project and Katy McCall, they have explored the use of sound in contemporary art. They have found and recorded different noises taken from day to day life, both inside and outside the gallery and have adapted an old sampling keyboard into an interactive interpretative tool.

From 20 May you can use the keyboard full of these found sounds to make your own musical compositions.

The artwork has been purchased by the Contemporary Art Society through the Sculpture Fund, supported by Cathy Wills. It is the first of five works to be co-acquired for Manchester Art Gallery, Whitworth Art Gallery, Victoria Gallery and Museum (Liverpool), Walker Art Gallery (National Museums Liverpool) and Grundy Art Gallery (Blackpool).

Collecting art through partnership will help ensure that the public art collections in the North West are contemporary and relevant now and for future generations.

Following its display at Manchester Art Gallery, the sculpture will go on display at the other partnership galleries.

 

Further information
  • Opening times Tuesday to Sunday 10 am to 5.00 pm
  • Location Manchester Art Gallery, Mosley Street, Manchester M2 3JL
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information 0161 235 8888

http://www.manchestergalleries.org/

 



In Translation: Women, Migration and Britishness

Manchester Art Gallery

25th February 2012 – 23 February 2013

 

Empire Marketing Board Posters. This exhibition is part of a major project working with women who have migrated to the North-West of England from all over the world. The women, drawn from a range of diverse backgrounds, are working with artists’ collective UHC (Ultimate Holding Company) to co-curate a display featuring and inspired by Manchester City Galleries’ collection of Empire Marketing Board Posters.

These posters were produced by the Empire Marketing Board, a promotional body set up by the British government in 1926. They are large, colourful lithographic prints, which are now regarded as a rare example of peace time government propaganda. Each set of posters promotes a way of thinking about the Empire – for example, as an eager market for British exports, or as a bounteous source of produce for the British tea table. Any darker ideas of ruthless colonial domination were kept at bay by the sheer brilliance of the posters. The poster campaign ran nationwide on Britain’s streets from 1926 to 1933.

In 1933, Manchester Art Gallery acquired 222 individual posters for the Gallery’s Industrial Art Collection. The posters did not see the light of day again until the 1990s. Perhaps this was because people were uncomfortable with the version of Empire that they promoted.

As with any cultural material, however, their meaning has changed over time and the poster collection today is subject to quite different readings from those originally intended. Now the Sunshine and Europia womens groups at Wai Yin, the Cumbria Multicultural Women’s Network, and UHC, are working together with staff at Manchester Art Gallery to look at these posters in a critical and creative light. They will create a display of a selection of the posters together with the women’s own interpretative artwork.

A blog documenting the project can be found here: In Translation

A series of events linked to this exhibition will run throughout the year and a publication, Empire Marketing Board Posters, is available in the shop priced at £7.95.

Further information
  • Opening times Tuesday to Sunday 10 am to 5.00 pm
  • Location Manchester Art Gallery, Mosley Street, Manchester M2 3JL
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information 0161 235 8888

 http://www.manchestergalleries.org/



Interventions: The 62 Group, responses to the Gallery of Costume and its collections

Manchester Gallery Of Costume

13th January to 19th May 2012

 

Marilyn Rathbone, Pastimes

Interventions celebrates the 50th anniversary of The 62 Group of Textile Artists.

In 1962, a group of embroidery lecturers and recent graduates met to exchange ideas and exhibit together. They hoped to make a difference to attitudes about embroidery, which at that time was not viewed as a serious art form, but more as a female hobby. The 62 Group’s activities soon expanded beyond embroidery to include other disciplines, including art made with paper, metal and textiles.

The title Interventions has inspired the exhibiting artists to respond in an innovative and personal way to the costume collection at Platt Hall. This exhibition of new work displays the Group’s diversity of practice as well as the individual artists’ creative approaches.

The 62 Group has a total of 56 exhibiting members based mainly in the UK. University professors and lecturers, teachers and freelance professional textile artists make up the bulk of the membership, and many members have established international reputations.

The 62 Group is an artist-led organisation and it is a tribute to the members’ commitment and energy in helping to run the Group that, after 50 years, it is still recognised as a leader in contemporary textile art.

 

Further information
  • Opening times Wednesday to Saturday 1.30 pm to 4.30 pm
  • Location Manchester Gallery of Costume, Platt Hall, Rusholme, Manchester M14 5LL
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information 0161 245 7245

http://www.manchestergalleries.org/



COTTON: Global Threads

The Whitworth Art Gallery Manchester

11th February to 13th May 2012

 

Yinka Shonibare, MBE, Boy on Globe 4, 2011

Late winter and spring sees all the ground floor galleries at the Whitworth combining to tell a compelling story about the production, consumption and global trade in cotton. With exhibits ranging in date from the late Middle Ages to the present day, the exhibition takes in Lancashire and South Asia, the Americas and Africa and is the region’s flagship exhibition outcome of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad programme Stories of the World.

Cotton was the world’s first global commodity. At the heart of the exhibition are displays of fashion and textiles that examine India’s extensive global trade networks in cotton centuries before production shifted to Northern Europe, and the impact that cotton had on Western fashion, providing the catalyst for the Industrial Revolution. The displays also take a provocative look at cotton’s ‘dirty secrets’ – at its human and environmental impact – and at the pivotal political and economic role it has played in establishing national independence from colonial rule.

The fashion and textile displays engage in dialogue with the work of seven contemporary artists working in a range of disciplines whose work addresses one or more of the exhibition themes. They include Yinka Shonibare MBE, Lubaina Himid, Chicago-based Anne Wilson, Malian artists Abdoulaye Konaté and Aboubakar Fofana, and Grace Ndiritu, while Liz Rideal’s work illuminates the exterior of the building throughout the hours of darkness.

The exhibition also showcases the outcomes of a three-year programme of work with young people, taking the form of an interactive space for younger visitors.

A full events programme will accompany the COTTON: Global Threads exhibition.

 

Further information
  • Opening times:  Monday to Saturday 10 am to to 5 pm; Sunday 12 pm to 4 pm
  • Location: The Witworth Art Gallery, The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M15 6ER
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information: 0161 275 7450

http://www.whitworth.manchester.ac.uk/



Idris Khan, The Devil’s Wall

The Whitworth Art Gallery Manchester

24th February to 13th May 2012

 

Idris Khan, The Devil's Wall, 2011. Courtesy of Victoria Miro Gallery, London and Yvon Lambert Gallery, New York

This is the first UK showing of Idris Khan’s new installation The Devil’s Wall, which draws inspiration from rituals and practices of the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca that is one of the pillars of Islam and is undertaken by millions of Muslims each year.

Here Khan exhibits three new sculptures and a series of drawings based on an aspect of Hajj ritual. Incorporating sculpture, literary texts, drawings and photography, Khan uses repeated actions and texts in his work to explore his own Islamic heritage, making The Devil’s Wall a pilgrimage of self-discovery that can have powerful resonances for viewers experiencing the installation. Highlights from the Whitworth’s collection, selected with Idris Khan, are also on display.

This exhibition is made in partnership with the British Museum and is supported by Victoria Miro Gallery and Yvon Lambert Gallery.

A number of events have been planned in association with this exhibition. Further information is available here.

 

Further information
  • Opening times:  Monday to Saturday 10 am to to 5 pm; Sunday 12 pm to 4 pm
  • Location: The Witworth Art Gallery, The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M15 6ER
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information: 0161 275 7450

http://www.whitworth.manchester.ac.uk/

 



Subversion

Corner House Gallery Manchester

14th April to 5th June 2012

 

A unique group show of new and recent contemporary art that explores and rethinks modern Arab identity.

Subversion features work from 11 emerging and established artists who use autobiographical narratives combining fiction, popular culture and subversive parody to express the divisions they face as they perform multiple roles in a society which is frequently represented to the outside world in a contorted and mediated manner. Spanning an array of techniques including installation, video, photography and sculpture, the work illustrates fragments of the distorted imagination that often preoccupies the Arab world.

Emerging Gaza artists and filmmakers Tarzan and Arab will present their award-winning Gazawood project (2010). It’ll include a series of striking cinema poster pastiches of imaginary movies from different genres, and a short film Colourful Journey, which will be screened in a pop-up cinema in Gallery 3. Originating from a region that has not had a functioning cinema since the 1980s and heavily relies on satellite TV and illegal DVD copies, the works strongly reflect the twins’ interest in and passion for film.

In A Space Exodus (2009), Palestinian artist Larissa Sansour adapts a segment of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, providing it with a new, Middle Eastern context by positing the idea of the first Palestinian in space. Originally developed as part of the A Space Exodus installation, Subversion will also feature Sansour’s Palestinauts (2010) and three preliminary sketches for the Nation Estate project, a sci-fi photo series conceived in the wake of the Palestinian bid for nationhood at the UN.

Curated by Omar Kholeif

Artists: Akram Zaatari, Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige, Khaled Hafez, Larissa Sansour, Marwa Arsanios, Sharif Waked, Sherif El-Azma, Tarzan and Arab, Wafaa Bilal

 

Further information:
  • Opening times: Tuesday to Saturday 12 pm to to 8 pm; Sunday 12 pm to 6 pm
  • Location: Corner House, 70 Oxford Street, Manchester M1 5NH
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information: 0161 228 7621

http://www.cornerhouse.org/art

 



Forming A Line: Rachael Elwell & Tom Harnett O’Meara

Corner House Gallery Manchester

20th April to 29 May 2012

 

Forming A Line brings together two artists based in Manchester and Todmorden who are both using the immediacy of drawing to explore open-ended processes and narratives.

Rachael Elwell’s  work explores the connections between line, form and space through a set of drawing processes and systems. Elwell focuses on the dynamic between chance and control / structure in thecomposition of her images. Often presented in series, they are random, generative and transformative, with the final result an unknown entity until the process is complete. Elwell has recently graduated from an MA in Contemporary Fine Art at University of Salford. She has exhibited widely across the UK and undertaken a number of European residencies.

Tom Harnett O’Meara’s selection of recent and new black and white drawings are intertwined with a sense of narrative. As he creates them, stories issue forth about the characters and the places they inhabit, linking together in unusual ways across pictures. Sometimes during breaks between drawing he will writedown these strange tales. O’Meara’s inspiration comes from art nouveau, Japanese prints, Indian art, and the fine draughtsmen of Victorian illustration. His drawings have been exhibited at select venues in Manchester, and he has been published in several magazines.

 

Further information:
  • Opening times: Tuesday to Saturday 12 pm to to 8 pm; Sunday 12 pm to 6 pm
  • Location: Corner House, 70 Oxford Street, Manchester M1 5NH
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information: 0161 228 7621

http://www.cornerhouse.org/art

 



The House of Annie Lennox

The Lowry Galleries Salford

17th March – 17th June 2012

Currently on display at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, this immersive and intimate exhibition explores the image and vision of one of most successful female artists in UK music history. An innovator and icon, Annie Lennox’s success has spanned four decades and she is internationally renowned both for her music and her personal style. A selection of costumes will be shown alongside personal treasures, ephemera from political campaigns she has championed, and a specially commissioned video of Annie in conversation.

Further information:
  • Opening times Sunday to Friday 11 am to 5.00 pm; Saturday 10 am to 5 pm
  • Location The Lowry, Salford Quays, Salford M50 3AZ
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information 0843 208 6000

http://www.thelowry.com/



A Flash of Light: The Dance Photography of Chris Nash

The Lowry Galleries Salford

11th February – 13th May 2012

 

Showcasing Chris Nash’s fascination with movement, light, colour and composition, this dazzling exhibition features three decades of the dance photographer’s most significant work. With over 100 stunning images, it documents thirty years of contemporary British dance and reveals the vision behind Nash’s process, combined with a specially commissioned behind-the-scenes film of the photographer at work.

Further information:
  • Opening times Sunday to Friday 11 am to 5.00 pm; Saturday 10 am to 5 pm
  • Location The Lowry, Salford Quays, Salford M50 3AZ
  • This is a free exhibition
  • Further information 0843 208 6000

http://www.thelowry.com/



1984 Looks Like This

Salford Museum and Art Gallery

19th March to  1st July 2012

 

What does 1984 look like? Is Big Brother watching you on CCTV?

Documentary photographer David Dunnico asks you these questions in a two-part
exhibition.

For a number of years, he has documented the rise of CCTV surveillance in a
series of graphic black and white images. Alongside this, Dunnico has built up a
collection of editions and ephemera about George Orwell’s 1984 – the book’s
changing covers tell how every new generation of readers finds Orwell’s work
frightingly relevant to their own times.

The exhibition brings both of these together so you can decide is Big Brother watching
you?

 

Further information
  • Opening hours Monday – Friday 10.00am – 4.45pm. Saturdays and Sundays 1.00pm – 5.00pm
  • Location: Peel Park, The Crescent, Salford M5 4WU
  • The museum is located next to Salford University and is approximately a 20 minute walk from central Manchester, via Chapel Street to the crescent
  • Contact tel 0161 745 9490
  • Admission free

http://www.salford.gov.uk/salfordmuseum.htm

 



Kathleen Walne: the Salford collection

Salford Museum and Art Gallery

28th April to  15th July 2012

 

Boy on cushion, with kind permission of the Ward family

Following the death of the artist Kathleen Walne in June 2011, Salford Museum will be displaying their entire collection of her work, many of which haven not been seen for 26 years.

A much acclaimed watercolour artist hailed as being ahead of her time, Kathleen had the ability to create unusual designs enriched with wine-rich pigment.

 

 

 

 

Further information
  • Opening hours Monday – Friday 10.00am – 4.45pm. Saturdays and Sundays 1.00pm – 5.00pm
  • Location: Peel Park, The Crescent, Salford M5 4WU
  • The museum is located next to Salford University and is approximately a 20 minute walk from central Manchester, via Chapel Street to the crescent
  • Contact tel 0161 745 9490
  • Admission free

http://www.salford.gov.uk/salfordmuseum.htm

 



The Wondrous Collection of Encapsulated Time: an exhibition by Sue Platt

Salford Museum and Art Gallery

14th July to  4 November 2012

 

Poison Frog

Time rules the modern world and out lives. Practically every room in people’s houses contains at least one clock, as part of the cooker, DVD player or central heating system. Not to mention wrist watches, built into the car dashboard,
mobile phones and so on.

Sue Platt’s fascination lies not with these clocks, but ones that have become dysfunctional, clocks that were clockwork, that had to be wound up and involved effort to keep on time. Sue transforms these clock cases into small cabinets, tiny theatres to show scenarios, a moment caught in time. Instead of telling the time, these clocks now each have a different story to communicate. Each piece is a small comment on the world around us, be it humorous or tragic, analytical or
earnest.

Sue’s work is inspired by the Victorian’s fascination with collecting weird and wonderful artefacts to display in cabinets or curiosities.

For more information please visit Sue Platt’s website

 

Further information
  • Opening hours Monday – Friday 10.00am – 4.45pm. Saturdays and Sundays 1.00pm – 5.00pm
  • Location: Peel Park, The Crescent, Salford M5 4WU
  • The museum is located next to Salford University and is approximately a 20 minute walk from central Manchester, via Chapel Street to the crescent
  • Contact tel 0161 745 9490
  • Admission free

http://www.salford.gov.uk/salfordmuseum.htm