Workshop // Writing About Art

I was looking forward to this lecture as I felt it was the most relevant to me as an Art Historian. I really enjoyed this lecture and found it to be quite inspiring.

We learnt about many places where writings about art are published; for example many newspapers but these are often reviews of London-centric and high profile exhibitions  Additionally, Art Journals such as art Monthly, Frieze, AN and Creative Review are places where one would find more critical, in depth and longer reviews as these are aimed at a specified audience unlike newspapers.

But when thinking about exhibitions and art reviews, it questions the smaller exhibitions that aren't in London and aren't high profile. Cathy Lomax edits and published ARTY, an idiosyncratic publication in which 'fans of art' review smaller exhibitions and events thus goes against the increasingly elitist writings of art.

Also discussed was online ways of publishing our own writings about art. For example through blogs and AN's Interface. 

Interface allows anyone and everyone to post their reviews, writings, thoughts and opinions about recent exhibitons and allow anyone to read them. Interface also gives the opportunity to write a review of a certain exhibition for them and they will cover the costs via a bursary. These exhibitions can be anywhere from Europe to anywhere in the UK. This really grabbed my attention as I love writing about art (hence the CAH degree!) but it would be the most fantastic opportunity for a student or as a young adult wanting to kick start their career.

Later in the workshop we discussed different ways of writing about art. As JJ Charlesworth and James Elkins discuss in "What is Criticism: The State of Criticism", the art critics is becoming unimportant and claim that art dealers are the only ones who can judge the value of art. 

"The critic is becoming a dandified copywriter producing beautiful writing about beautiful objects and their beautiful makers:...such writing pandering to reflective cultural sensibilities of writer and reader, avoids conflict over what constitutes good, interesting or worthwhile art" Elkin, J (2005) What Happened to Art Criticism, University of Chicago Press. (From Rosie's Lecture 18-03-1013)

I agree with this statement as it seems, increasingly, more and more art critics do not have anything bad to say about whatever they are reviewing. I would like to hear some honest reviews, especially if they are written about the high-profile expensive exhibitions. This is why JJ Charlesworth's writing on Jake & Dinos Chapman really caught my eye. It was refreshing to see such a honest, as well as colloquial, reviews; Charlesworth is brutally honest in his opinions but this is what is needed in order for art critics to become critical once again, rather than just 'producing beautiful writing about beautiful objects and their beautiful makers'.

This was a most inspiring lecture/workshop.

The Print Fair #2 : What I Bought

At the Print Fair I managed to accumulate a fair amount of goodies for about under £10. (Another thing I liked about the fair - the prices were student friendly and not about making profits.)

I picked up these goodies, some of the artists however I didn't manage to get their name or details but I picked up a fair amount of business cards. These themselves were beautiful and allows me to follow up some of these artists. For more artists, this article by Manchester's Finest highlights some of them!

I then picked up a few zines to see how different they could be and find similarities between them.

I picked up "Twenty Two" by 2022NQ themselves. I'm not sure if this is a zine but it fulfill the criteria: it's free, low production costs, lack of capitalism etc. I really enjoy this read as it fills you in on going on in Manchester from art to music to literature to photography - just about everything! I love the graphic design of the magazine too - it's contemporary, creative and easy to read.The fact its free is an added bonus!

 

Corridor8 is a four part guide to a guide to contemporary visual art in the North of England. I purchased  Part 3 as it featured Manchester Art School. This publication (I say publication as opposed to Zine as they do no consider themselves as a Zine and the production does not seem low cost) but takes a more educational turn looking at Northern Art Schools and articles on Art Education.

 

Vapid Kitten is a women's zine, a feminist's zine. This particular issue focuses on beauty and what beauty means. It features creative writings, essays, for example questioning where the women artist is in history, and illustrations. I really enjoyed this one as I consider myself a feminist. Although not a strong feminist, I do believe in women's rights - especially after the Jane Doe case in America. This was such a lovely way to present arguments and was easy to read and follow as well as presenting valid debates.

Lecture: Natalie Bradbury of "The Shrieking Violet"

Natalie Bradbury is the created of The Shrieking Violet, an alternative guide to Manchester in the form of a zine.

It initially began as an online blog but in 2009, she made the move into something more tangible, in the form of a zine. She left it in public places such as cafes, shops and library as well as the Salford Zine Library. At this point, it was meant to be a guide to the city. It covered places and subjects that weren't mainstream or were not written about.

Inspiration.

She had quite a lot of inspiration from other zines. Her parents actually owned a number of Punk-zines that first interested her into zine culture.  From this collection, favourites were 'The Knoxville Grid', 'Belle Vue', 'Things Happen', 'Article', 'Canning' and 'The Modernist'. She favoured these zines for several reasons ranging from the size (she enjoyed the idea of a pocket sized zine to keep in your pocket), to subjects about regeneration, urban ism, city experiences and interaction to fictional prose. 

Contributors.

She asks people to contribute to the fanzine. For example, the contributors have ranged from writers/illustrators with passion or obsession, ranging from Fingland's buses to public transport in  to murals and mosaics to weather, all in Manchester. Similarly, the cover of each issue is designed by a different artist or illustrator each time. Bradbury sets no brief except the cover must feature the name of the zine. 

Collaborations.

 She has collaborated with Manchester's Modernist Heroines writing her feminist response to women. she has also collaborated in Sounds of the City which is a festival that celebrates new music and performance, uniting the cream of the national and international scene with some of the city’s finest independent promotors, collectives and club nights.

Production.

Bradbury then showed us good and bad designs and what we need to take into consideration when creating our zine. For example, is it legible on the background/font/colours chosen. It seems, she learned through mistakes with a few of her earlier zines quite difficult to read.

The Shrieking Violet is still roughly photocopied and hand-folded, which is very time consuming, but it can also be viewed online at Issuu for free or downloaded as a PDF. The current zine is 24 pages long but started off as only 16!

Distribution.

As well as distributing her zine to cafes, libraries and other public places she takes advantage of social media and online publishing sites. For example she uses Wemakezines, a community for zine culture and zines to be read online via Issu. She also has a blog to keep people up to date under the same name.

Lastly, this has allowed her to be feature in other publications and be interviewed. For example by David Haslan, Karen Glaze and 'The "F" Word - a feminist publication. This has helped in creating the annual Victoria Baths Fanzine Convention. She first started this in 2011 and has been so popular she continues now. This years is on the 5th May, 12pm - 4pm at Victoria Baths.

Progress Meeting : 16-04

Today we had our first proper progress meeting in which we relayed our condensed mind map with out 5 rules. (I'd insert an image of our mind map but we didn't get it back!) However, I was left wondering, at the end of the session, how beneficial this had been for us as a group.

Although it was good to hear other people's ideas and their approaches because that allowed us to see the different methods of creating zines and other areas we might have forgotten about otherwise.

However, the actual feedback we received from the tutors just seemed to be a misunderstanding of our intentions. As mentioned before, we found it difficult to understand zines as many of them we saw in the beginning were illustration and graphic based. We are very used to words, essays and debates we couldn't make sense of zines. We understand the content of zines can be whatever you choose and the same for the format yet we decided to follow a more visual approach in order to challenge ourselves beyond our comfort zone. When we originally discussed this the previous week, the tutors were excited that we were not going to restrict ourselves by our comfort zone.

 Therefore, we worked on a concept that would be visual yet work in our favour. So, we came up with an idea using images related to our exhibition proposals, from the previous unit,  and format it visually in our zine in a surrealist and Dadist manner.  Yet, when we explained this this week, we were told to stick to what we know and use words. We felt despite all the research we had done and the fact we had decided to come our of our comfort zones was all going to waste and was not appreciated. We left the session very confused - not a useful way to come out of a progress meeting.

The Print Fair #1: 2022NQ

On Saturday, I attended the Print Fair at 2022NQ in The Northern Quarter. I'd never been to an event like this before so I didn't really know what to expect

It was a lot more intimate, and a lot smaller, than I thought it was going to be. I really enjoyed the fact that this event brought together a community of people and local artists. People chatted away with strangers and bonded over Kopperberg and the prints they bought. I may have got sucked in and bought a few things but I really enjoy the "handmade" and independent work. This was one of the things I enjoyed the most - there was no commercial aspect, yet there was a sort- of capitalist aspect in making money, but this was mostly to fund making more prints and further their work rather than making a profit.

This made me reflect upon the Zine fair and I think it'd be nice to create a community similar to the Print Fair. It's nice to see people interested in a less mainstream thing come together and enjoy the handmade and the lack of commercialism. As 2022NQ is one of the contenders for the Zine Fair, it was a good chance to see the space. Although small, it helped create the intimate atmosphere and a buzz of creativity.

A useful list of illustrators, artists, zinesters etc is available here.

Exhibizine : Mind Map

This was our initial mind map to show our thinkings. It follows the idea of the 'five rules' we needed to know/cover.

These 'five rules' are idea, content, format, audience and roles.

Idea: Using our hypothetical exhibition proposals from the Framings Unit to create the content for the zine. The zine will show visually our exhibition proposals. The four topics from the exhibitons are death row and memory, graffiti and wallpaper, wardrobes, clothes and identity/memory and maritime ceramics.

Content: Surrealists and Dadist inspired images of our proposals. For example, one person will work on a page then each one of us will work over the top in relation to our exhibition. For example, one page, we could end up with a man on death row being hung wearing a Karl Largerfield suit and glasses in a ceramic vase in a graffiti print.

Format: Similar to an exhibitor guide. Perhaps the outside is very minimal and boring. Then the inside is colourful and vivid. Perhaps a concertina, or some way of making the paper fold out different than simple a book format. A very punk-zine-esque look using glue sticks and scissors.

Audience: Those who are interested in contemporary art, those who frequent art galleries, those interested in zines

Roles: We have discussed that everything will done together as a team. The zine would not work if it was soley one person designing it as it wouldn't be a collaboration of our exhibition proposals.

Neal Fox // Le Gun

Neal Fox is a London based artist/illustrator. He studied at Camberwell Art College and the Royal College of Art. Since graduating with an MA in 2005 his commercial illustration clients have included the Guardian, the Independent, the Times, Dazed and Confused, Faber & Faber, Absolut Vodka, Babyshambles and Red Hot Chilli Peppers.

Babyshambles comission

Absolut Commission

Faber & Faber Commission

Dazed and Confused Commission

The Independent Commission

The Guardian Commission

Le Gun is a self-titled annual independent publication created by Fox and other RCA graduates. The publication blends a punk, occult, pop and surrealist  aesthetic which makes Le Gun so distinctive.

Fox's more personal works are a cauldron of contemporary culture, with references from music and films. From a life long obsession with the tales of his inspiration, his dead grandfather, his large scale ink drawings have developed into increasingly layered celebrations of the debauched and iconoclastic characters.

 Fox creates a psychedelic nexus of events and trails of thoughts including Francis Bacon and William Burroughs taking tea in the ancient Egyptian after life, or Captain Beefheart selling a vacuum cleaner to Aldous Huxley at the Doors of Perception. Many of Fox's illustrations are spattered with blood, violence and surrealist fantasy (often in relation to drug use). However, I did notice the way in which Fox creates females within the illustrations. They were often debauched and represented as prostitutes or as sexual objects.

Much of his work openly represents his opinion on often provocative subjects such as sexuality, politics, gender and capitalism.