ART GALLERY AND MUSEUM STUDIES LEEDS

Febuary Events at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery

2012-01-27T12:33:00.006Z

Bookings are now open for our February events! We've got lots of fun activities lined up this month, including a Kashmiri dance workshop (11 Feb), inspired by the Michael Sadler Shawl Collection and a special recital (4 Feb) to celebrate former VC Sir Michael Sadler's initiation of the concert series.

Also, coming up a talk to celebrate the 200th Anniversary of Charles Dickens's birth (7 Feb), not to be confused with Pip Dickens, who's work is currently on show in the Gallery, and a talk from former Deputy Head of Special Collections, Dr Oliver Pickering (18 Feb).

Find out more now: http://www.leeds.ac.uk/gallery/events.htm

Image: 19th Century Kashmiri shawl (detail), University of Leeds International Textile Archive, ULITA

Art versus Industry Conference: Booking Open!

2012-01-12T18:48:00.000Z

Head over to the Art versus Industry blog for more information...

January events at the SAB Gallery!

2012-01-03T11:43:00.003Z

January events at the Gallery are now online and bookings are open. Start 2012 with a visit to the Gallery! We'll be kicking off with a couple of events relating to the Gallery's new display, 'Sadler in the Archives', including a talk by Liza Giffen on the 7th January, about archival material relating to Eric Gill's 'Moneychangers', a war memorial that was commissioned by Sir Michael Sadler. For further details see below:

'The Carving will Tell its own Tale': Archiving Eric Gill's Moneychangers. Talk by Liza Giffen
Saturday, 7 January 2012, 2-3.30pm

In connection with the Gallery’s ‘Sadler in the Archives’ display, Liza Giffen’s talk will discuss different aspects of the Michael Sadler Archive, held by the University, with a particular focus on the documentation relating to his dealings with the sculptor Eric Gill. Sadler commissioned Gill to produce a war memorial for the University, for which Gill devised a scene depicting Christ driving the Moneychangers from the Temple.

Carved as a stone relief, the memorial was widely greeted with derision when it was unveiled in June 1923. An artist’s sketch and a photograph of the work in progress were recently discovered in the Archive and are included in the display. These items shed light on the process by which the relief was made, while giving context to a unique artwork, which has become part of the University’s history and is still housed within its walls. As Sadler once wrote: 'the carving will tell its own tale'.

After the talk there will be a trip over to the Michael Sadler Building, two minutes walk from the Gallery, where Gill’s ‘Moneychangers’ now resides.

Liza Giffen is Collections and Cataloguing Manager in Special Collections, University of Leeds Library, and the former Archivist of the University Archive.

Free event, all welcome. No booking necessary.

Archives for the Future: Talk and Tour by Chris Sheppard and Beccy Shipman
Saturday, 14 January 2012, 11am-12.30pm

Have you wondered what will happen to the Library's Special Collections when most new books and manuscripts are electronic and many old ones have been digitised?

In connection with the Gallery’s display, ‘Sadler in the Archives’, join Chris Sheppard, Head of Special Collections, and Beccy Shipman, Digital Content Coordinator, for a talk on the future of the collections, accompanied by a tour of the Library's new digitisation studio. There will be a chance to see the large format scanner in action and find out about the digitisation process, using special scans taken from the Michael Sadler Archive. Other great items from the collections will also be on show.

Free event, but places are limited so please book your place in advance by e-mailing gallery@leeds.ac.uk, phone (0113) 343 2778, or online at http://futurecollections-eorg.eventbrite.com/

Find us at: The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery
Parkinson Building
Woodhouse Lane
University of Leeds
Leeds
LS2 9JT

Telephone: 0113 343 2778
Fax: 0113 343 5561 (Please mark for the attention of the Art Gallery)
Email: gallery@leeds.ac.uk
Gallery blog: http://elgg.leeds.ac.uk/burton/weblog/
Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Stanley-and-Audrey-Burton-Gallery/170745069618675
Twitter: http://twitter.com/sabgallery

Audio Podcast: Dr Mark Westgarth!

2011-12-21T16:04:00.003Z

The Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery has initiated a new audio podcasting project, inviting academics from the University of Leeds to talk about an artwork in the Gallery.

A voice familiar to you all is that of Dr Mark Westgarth, who very kindly agreed to take part. Mark spoke on the 'The Striped Jug' (1914) by Ben Nicholson. Listen by going to the 'news' section of the Gallery home page here:

http://www.leeds.ac.uk/gallery/

Biographical Dictionary of 19th Century Antique & Curiosity Dealers

2011-12-19T18:00:00.001Z

Some of you may know that my Biographical Dictionary of 19th Century Antique & Curiosity Dealers, published in 2009, has now been reprinted, with a fabulous new cover!...it was previously only available to members of the Regional Furniture Society, but is now available to everyone!...You can even order a copy direct from me...email:
m.w.westgarth@leeds.ac.uk

Only £20.00 (plus £2.00 postage, in UK)...get a quote for International posting......if you're interested, of course! Ideal Christmas Present!

The Biographical Dictionary of 19^th Century Antique & Curiosity Dealers is the first attempt to provide comprehensive biographical information about the community of interconnected antique and curiosity dealers active in the nineteenth century. An introduction containing forty one images, mainly in colour, and over twenty pages of text, outlines the origins and development of collecting and the trade in furniture over the period and provides a valuable background to the dictionary entries of over 600 dealers, which range in length from a few lines to over 2000 words. The majority of these dealers were based in London, but others operating throughout the United Kingdom, across Europe, the United States and former British Colonies are also represented. The Biographical Dictionary is a valuable resource for those interested in the history of the ‘antique trade’ and the history of collecting and is the first major research study of the highly significant subject matter.

Mark

MGHG Conference July 2012

2011-12-18T17:44:00.000Z

Cultures of Curating: Curatorial Practices and the Production of Meaning c. 1650-2000

The 2012 conference of the Museums and Galleries History Group, to be held at the University of Lincoln 12-13 July 2012

Call for papers

While museum history now acknowledges the constructed nature of the museum narrative, and maintains that museum work such as cataloguing, conserving and displaying is not neutral, but actually produces meaning, relatively little work has examined the ways in which curatorial practices have developed, and the specific consequences for museums. Display has attracted most of the work that has been done, but ‘behind the scenes’ activities have not been investigated in such depth. We seek submissions which investigate any aspect of the developing work of the curator, from creating an acquisitions policy, to labelling and documentation, to publicity work, as we wish to explore curating as both craft and profession. We also invite contributors to consider how curatorial practices constituted the museum object, and attempted to produce or suppress certain meanings for museum objects; and how such practices formed particular relationships between curators and other museum figures such as donors and visitors. We are interested in submissions which consider a wide variety of periods and places, and all types of curating, from fine art to science.

Confirmed keynote speaker: Dr Sam Alberti, Director, Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons.

We invite papers on themes such as:
How curators were trained, and how they understood their role
Cataloguing and museum documentation
Acquisition – the role of the curator
Conservation and storage
Display and interpretation
How and why curatorial practices changed
The role of place and space in shaping curatorial practices
Curatorial practices, disciplines and discourses of knowledge
Curatorial practices and relationships with the wider public

We also invite session proposals. Session proposals should include a brief outline of the session (250 words) as well as three abstracts (300 words max. each) for the proposed session. For session proposals, please indicate who will chair the session.

Please send abstracts of no more than 300 words to chair@mghg.org or Kate Hill (khill@lincoln.ac.uk)
Closing date for proposals: 1 February 2012

Alice in Wonderland at Tate Liverpool.

2011-12-06T14:05:00.005Z

A black line. I nearly didn’t notice it. My sense of location in the exhibition shifted dramatically when I understood. This line demonstrates the height to which Alice grew. Consequently, in that moment, I shrank. Already I understood from the other works in this first room that I was somehow ‘in’ the text. However it was through Mel Bockner’s Measurement: Eye level Perimeter (ask Alice) that my sense of my own place and size as viewer shifted again. A very clever curation of works introduced me to the exhibition ‘Alice in Wonderland through the Visual Arts’.

More aware of the nature of my body within the space of the gallery, I climbed the stairs, looking forward to the next part of this exhibition which examines the influence of Alice in Wonderland on the visual arts. Extracts of text on the walls of the stairs took the form of concrete poetry written in perspective. Milder perceptual shifts, but again a clever conceit; a nod to the textual play in the book itself and a continuation of the slight disorientation of space and surface.

Reaching the fourth floor and the exhibition’s main focus, the effects of this hodological disorientation are allowed to disappear, this part of the exhibition reverts to a ‘glass case and pictures on the wall’ survey of material relating to Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) and the Liddell sisters. The dark red wall colour and drapes though, hint at a theatrical and Victorian interior space, entirely appropriate for the displays of early copies of Alice, the original manuscript, photographs of the Liddell sisters and a wealth of Alice ephemera. As you progress through the labyrinthine space, the walls pale, and works become more recent; arranged in themes such as ‘Alice from the 1960’s’, ‘Alice Revisited’ and ‘Storytelling and Time’.

The analogy of being lost in time and space could continue, given that the exhibition is such a comprehensive survey of Alice related material, it requires a level of attention where ones experience of time slows. This though, was perhaps more a result of spending so long with such a variety of material rather than being the result of a curatorial device. However the catalogue ends by suggesting (referencing the authorhsip texts of Barthes and Foucault) that the power of the book lies in the fact that:

a reference to Alice can always be legitimately claimed whenever we, as the viewer, be it museum visitor, art critic, or exhibition curator, discern one and declare it to be so.

Containing works stretching from the original manuscript to recent works by Dan Graham, Gary Hill and Annelise Strba, the exhibition succeeded in not only developing, for me, a much deeper understanding of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland as ‘gesamtkunstwerk’ but also the extent to which this story has become embedded in our consciousness. It introduced me to new ways of looking at works I was already familiar with, and showed me a range of work I had not encountered before. Alice in Wonderland runs at the Tate in Liverpool until 25 January 2012; I can thoroughly recommend it.

Call for Papers - World Economic History Congress

2011-11-27T18:23:00.002Z

CALL FOR PAPERS

XVI^th World Economic History Congress

9^th-13^th July 2012

University of Stellenbosch, Cape Town, South Africa

Encountering the ‘exotic’: the collecting, trade and exchange of exotic goods between Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas, from the 16^th century to 21^st century.

The encounter between travellers, merchants and explorers and the exchange of the ‘exotic’ acted as a diverse catalyst for cultural practices, innovation, technological change and economic generation. This session will explore the circulation, assimilation and appropriation of exotic and foreign goods as they are transported, translated, collected and exchanged between diverse cultures from the 16^th century to the present day.

Thinking about ‘exotic’ goods invites us to pay attention to the role and function of the ‘exotic’ in different scales – across national boundaries, countries and cities; and in different spaces – in the public and the private domain – as well as the relationships between the places of consumption and the places of origin. This session aims to explore the influence of the encounter with all kinds of ‘exotic’ goods, from ritual objects, to artworks, from objects for the domestic interior, to technological, scientific and military objects; both newly made objects as well the old and the rare. By taking a broad time frame we hope to better understand the mutations of the exchange, collection, trade, display and production and consumption of ‘exotic’ goods and how these encounters influenced broader transnational and transcultural economic change.

The session aims to explore these exchanges both in terms of the perspective of the Western encounter with the ‘Other’ (the West’s appropriation, adaption and translation of the ‘exotic’), and from the perspective of the ‘Other’s’ encounter with the West (how the encounter impacted upon and stimulated economic activities in Asia, Africa and the Americas). The nature and status of ‘exotic’ goods are multiple and complex, as is the nature and status of the ‘exotic’ as it changed through time and space. In our increasingly complex world of exchange, tourism, and migration, the encounter with ‘exotic’ goods may be decreasing, but as a catalyst for the imagination the ‘exotic’ still has a profound impact upon economic activity and practices.

We invite papers to explore these themes and relationships from a wide range of perspectives:

-On the marketplace actors – the travellers, explorers, merchants, scientists, artists, curiosity dealers, collectors, soldiers.

-On the biographies of the ‘exotic’ objects themselves – ritual objects, domestic and luxury goods such as porcelain and lacquer, new technologies such as clocks and maps.

-On the spaces of exchange – market-places, auctions, shops.

-On the spaces of exhibition and display – institutions such as museums, public exhibitions and galleries, to the display in the domestic interior.

Please send abstracts of no more than 400 words to the session organisers:

Dr Manuel Charpy (CNRS France/University of Lille IRHIS) manuel.charpy@wanadoo.fr and Dr Mark Westgarth (School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies, University of Leeds) m.w.westgarth@leeds.ac.uk

Closing Date for Abstracts: 15^th February 2012

Level One Trip to Temple Newsam

2011-11-27T10:33:00.001Z

Level One Country House & Museum Studies students again braved the cold to visit Temple Newsam last Thursday, thank you to all who attended. I look forward to reading the essays of those who choose to compare and contrast the presentation of this house with a National Trust or English Heritage property, it should result in some really interesting work.

Students ~~making their way to visit the cute farm animals~~ considering the repurposed estate buildings in context!

Performativity in the Gallery - Call for papers for the next AAH conference

2011-11-01T15:05:00.004Z

CALL FOR PAPERS: Performativity in the Gallery: Staging Interactive Encounters

Museum & Exhibitions Members’ Group Annual Session, the Association of Art Historians
38th Annual AAH Conference & Bookfair

Department of History of Art, The Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA
29 - 31 March 2012

This session explores participation, liveness, interactivity, process-based performative practices and performance for the camera in interdisciplinary practices, presented in visual arts gallery spaces. Live art and other multi-art form works that combine visual arts with performing arts such as dance and physical theatre have an intricate relationship with the canon of art history. Art history has been wary of live art’s tendency to encourage increased formal and conceptual risk-taking and its interdisciplinary nature. Time-based performances have also challenged the conventions of documentation and the viewer’s access to the art experience. A live art practitioner has yet to win the Turner Prize.

The session is particularly interested in new research analysing the intricate relationship between art history, live and performing arts and museum and gallery space; what it means to present, curate and create interdisciplinary performative work for gallery spaces. The Museums & Exhibitions Members’ Group invites papers from a wide range of practitioners, including art historians, curators and artists, to consider performativity in gallery spaces across all historic and contemporary periods.

The 2012 AAH Annual Conference will showcase the diversity and richness of art history in the UK and globally over an extensive chronological range. Like The Open University itself, AAH2012 is open to all people, places and ideas. This three-day event will present a broad scope of geographies and methodologies, ranging from object-based studies, socio-historical analyses, theoretical discourses, visual culture of the moving image, exhibition cultures and display. Sessions and papers will reflect the composition of the wide constituency that is art history today. Further conference info & fees: http://www.aah.org.uk/page/3327

If you would like to propose a paper, please email the session convenors directly. Please submit an abstract of your proposed paper in no more than 250 words, your name and institutional affiliation (if you have one). You will receive acknowledgement of receipt of your submission within two weeks. Please read the Conditions of Submission at: http://www.aah.org.uk/media/docs/Code%20of%20Practice%20-%20sessions_AAH2011.pdf

Session Convenors:
Dr Outi Remes, South Hill Park Arts Centre, outi.remes@southhillpark.org.uk
Dr Marika Leino, Christie’s Education mleino@christies.com

Deadline for submissions: 7 November 2011.

Merchants of Modernism talk by Mark

2011-11-01T13:44:00.004Z

Hope those of you involved in the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery displays have recovered from all the relentless hard work? Congratulations again on your achievement!

Coming soon, a free talk that might interest students of Museum Studies...by one of your favourite lecturers!

'Merchants of Modernism: Dealers, Exhibitions and the promotion of the avant-garde, 1900-1939' - Talk by Dr. Mark Westgarth
Saturday, 12 November 2011, 3pm

The rise in the interest in the avant-garde is a story that mirrors the evolving conditions of modernity in the early 20th century. New kinds of dealers and new commercial art galleries disseminated avant-garde artworks to a metropolitan public through innovative exhibition strategies, new marketing techniques and the professional practices of the modern art dealer. Focusing on some of the most significant art dealers in the period, including Paul Durand-Ruel and Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, and some high profile exhibitions at galleries such as Grafton Galleries, Reid & Lefevre, Leicester Galleries, this introductory talk maps the evolution of the modern art market at a critical moment in its development.

Free event, all welcome. No booking necessary.

Find us at:The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery
Parkinson Building
Woodhouse Lane
University of Leeds
Leeds
LS2 9JT

Telephone: 0113 343 2778
Fax: 0113 343 5561 (Please mark for the attention of the Art Gallery)
Email: gallery@leeds.ac.uk
Gallery blog: https://elgg.leeds.ac.uk/burton/weblog/
Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Stanley-and-Audrey-Burton-Gallery/170745069618675
Twitter: http://twitter.com/sabgallery

Display at the Henry Moore Institute Library

2011-10-28T15:58:00.004+01:00

I just wanted to publicise a small display I’ve curated at the Henry Moore Institute Library entitled 'A Revelation of Unexpected Associations: J.G. Ballard, Eduardo Paolozzi and Helen Chadwick in Ambit'. It’s about the art and literature journal Ambit and the contributions of the writer J.G. Ballard and the artists Helen Chadwick and Eduardo Paolozzi. Please see the link below for further info:

http://www.henry-moore.org//hmi/library/on-display1/a-revelation-of-unexpected-associations

It’s running until the 25th November 2011. Please visit if you get a chance!

Liz (ex MA student, Art Gallery and Museum Studies)

MA Art Gallery Students Exhibition Projects

2011-10-25T19:07:00.001+01:00

The current cohort of postgraduate museum studies students completed installation of their exhibition projects at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Art Gallery last week. They were very busy in the planning processes...and with almost 30 students, and just two groups, the management of responsibilities was quite a challenge...one that they all overcame brilliantly I may add!

Both Exhibitions Opened on 17th October, and you can see their excellent efforts until 10th December 2011....do pop along!

Exhibition Title Panel

Group A, decided to work with the Gallery ceramics collections, and produced a fabulous exhibition theme - 'Fancy a Brew'? 18th century drinking cultures'.....

MA Students preparing their exhibition

They worked hard of selecting the objects and working up a theme...as you can see....


Don't drop it!

The other Student Group also produced a fabulous exhibition - this time using paintings, prints, books and associated ephemera from the Bloomsbury Group...both from the Art Gallery holdings, and material from the University Brotherton Library Special Collections.... Their exhibition is entitled: 'Connecting Lives: Intimate Artworks of the Bloomsbury Group'......and they were equally animated in their preparations...

Preparing Exhibitions

Group Discussions

.........and the project meetings were very professional....as you can see!

Well Done to all the Students!...Fantastic Work!
.......Mark

Level One Visit to Harewood House

2011-10-14T14:46:00.001+01:00

Thank you to the level one Country House and Museum Studies students, who all made the trip to Harewood House on a misty Yorkshire morning this week. After taking in the exterior, state rooms, below stairs area and terrace gallery, there was even time to explore the grounds and say a brief hello to the resident penguins (while of course asking ourselves why they are there in the first place!) I hope it was an enjoyable and productive experience which provided plenty of food for thought.

Volunteer Opportunities at the Hepworth

2011-10-12T14:20:00.003+01:00

The Hepworth, Wakefield, are looking for a range of volunteers, both for half term and beyond. If interested you should visit www.hepworthwakefield.org/volunteering, for updates on opportunities and to download an application form. Thanks to those of you who attended the volunteering event there last night. They were really impressed by the Leeds Uni students.

Museology Seminar Series X

2011-10-08T18:18:00.003+01:00

‘MUSEOLOGY SEMINAR SERIES’

Series X

Centre for Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage

School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies

University of Leeds

A Rehabilitation Revolution

Rachel Forster

AHRC CDA PhD Research Student

School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies

University of Leeds

Thursday 20^th October 2011

11-14 Belnheim Terrace, Room G.11

3.00pm-4.00pm

ALL WELCOME

For further information on this Seminar Series please email

Dr Mark Westgarth m.w.westgarth@leeds.ac.uk

School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies, University of Leeds

Love arts Festival launches in Leeds

2011-09-27T11:20:00.006+01:00

Unfortunately I wasn't quick enough and didn't post this in time for the launch at Opera North's Howard Assembly Room last night. However all is not lost! Running from 27th September until Wednesday 16th November, this brand new, first-year festival sees arts organisations across Leeds, uniting with Leeds Partnerships NHS Foundation Trust and the Art and Mind Network in an exploration of arts, mental health and well-being. With both arts and mental health being such broad and complex areas of study, it will definitely be enlightening to see how they are tackled in relation to each other, with the added diversity of Leeds as the setting.

With the likes of Ruby Wax and Phil Hammond getting involved, I have my fingers crossed publicity isn't a problem. Due to the stigma surrounding mental health problems and unease when it comes to discussing such issues in depth, I feel this collaboration with the rich art and culture that Leeds has to offer, will shed some light and provoke some thought on a subject that needs opening up. Art, in all it's forms , is an expression, a release and this experience is heightened further still, when a form of escape is just what the doctor ordered.

You can find more information and a list of all events taking place here, http://loveartsleeds.co.uk/

Here's to hoping this festival becomes a more permanent fixture in the affluent collection of culture and arts events, the city of Leeds already has to offer.

Congratulations!...Student Volunteer Awards

2011-09-26T09:02:00.001+01:00

Congratulations to our MA Art Gallery & Museum Studies student, Elizabeth Stainforth - she has won the prestigious 'Volunteers for Museum Learning Award' for the Yorkshire Region, as part of the Marsh Volunteer Awards 2010, for her outstanding work at the University Stanley & Audrey Burton Art Gallery.....The Awards are run by the British Museum and the Marsh Christian Trust.....WELL DONE Liz!....
See you (and all the other 2010-11 cohort of students) at Graduation in December!

Mark

Doodlers Unite: Big Draw Challenge and Big Draw Day at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery

2011-09-24T14:14:00.001+01:00

Doodle now!

Preparing for our month-long sketchbook challenge for the Big Draw campaign, I accidentally came across this TED video about doodling and how it improves comprehension and unlocks creativity. Doodlers unite!

And once you've shed your inhibitions about doodling and become empowered by this short video, you'll be interested to run to our nearest Big Draw station at uni and sketch away. Here are the details:

The Big Draw: Sketchbook Challenge
The Campaign for Drawing has one aim: to get everyone drawing!

Held throughout October, The Big Draw is the Campaign's flagship programme and aims to bring communities together in creative ways. Join the largest drawing festival in the world! The Sketchbook Challenge, this year’s Big Draw activity of the university’s Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, has been inspired by the sketchbooks by the artist and art historian Stephen Chaplin (born 1934). To find out more about Chaplin and to see a selection of his fascinating sketchbooks please visit the Brotherton Library foyer from Monday 3rd October – Friday 21st October.

Between 1 and 21 October, ourlovely concertina sketchbooks will appear in various places around the whole university campus so you can sketch in all of them!

You can pick up a map of the locations at the Gallery. Please note that not all areas are open to the public.

Start drawing!
Take a few minutes to look around your surroundings, document the moment through a quick sketch in the sketchbook provided.

Stephen Chaplin often sketched the most mundane objects such as crumpled crisp packets and his mug of tea, often annotating his sketch with a couple of words, date and time, the weather, or his personal impressions, e.g. ‘Tea & ham sandwich in the first floor café – waiting for departure, platform 6, Salisbury’. You might have time to draw what’s going on the next table or out of the window. You could add a date, time, include your name or remain anonymous, annotate your sketch to set the scene for others. Be part of the exhibition.

Fill the sketchbooks with your observations, ideas and doodles, and your art will be displayed in the Brotherton Library Foyer and outside The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, Parkinson Court from Monday 24th October.

Doodle and chill with friends: Big Draw Day in the Gallery
In connection with the month-long drawing campaign, the Gallery will host a drawing and sketching afternoon on Saturday 8 October.

The Gallery will celebrate Big Draw Day by transforming the Gallery space into a cosy place where you can drop in to meet people, doodle and have a chat about art, universe and everything.

There will be beanbags, pencils, sketchbooks, music, and lots of inspiration.

The sketchbooks collected from campus and the Gallery will be exhibited from 24 October 2011.

The Campaign for Drawing will finish when the words 'I can't draw' are dropped from our vocabulary!

2011-09-23T11:44:00.003+01:00

Rise Art, the curated art marketplace, recently launched across the UK. The website, which commissions and promotes the work of talented emerging and established artists across the globe, now has thousands of artists portfolios listed across the site, and a growing board of curators who, along with our users help select the artists featured across the site.

The team at Rise Art has announced an open call for submissions. Artists are encouraged to submit their profile and upload works to the site.

Artists and enthusiasts can also take advantage of Rise Art's community tools to connect with one another and promote upcoming events and exhibitions. To get started visit www.riseart.com

Finally, the team is looking for current Leeds students with a keen interest in curatorial and gallery studies to participate in the public discourse on Rise Art and help shortlist artist portfolios across the website for consideration. If you would like to get involved, please email the Rise Art team at info (at) Rise Art (dot) com.

WELCOME to our Undergraduate Students!

2011-09-22T22:11:00.003+01:00

The new intake of Leeds University undergraduate students - not just the Art History & Museum Studies students, but students from the art history, cultural studies and fine art programmes as well, all gathered at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery at the University for a soiree this evening. There were speeches and some really nice wine, plus some fab goody bags full of interesting art gallery stuff for everyone (thanks to Layla Bloom at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery).....

BA Students at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery

The students are a great bunch, lively and inquisitive, and seem to be enjoying their first week at university.....teaching starts next week though....but I'm sure they will be conscientious!

Keep up to date with the progress of the Museum Studies students (both BA and MA) on the Blog!

Mark

Museology Seminar Series VIII

2011-09-21T15:31:00.009+01:00

‘MUSEOLOGY SEMINAR SERIES’

Series VIII

Centre for Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage

School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies

University of Leeds

                 'Museums are made for discourse':
    A comparative study of the Le Quai Branly
     and the Cite nationale de L'immigration

                                                           By Dr Diane Morgan
                                    Lecturer, Cultural Studies
                                         University of Leeds

                                 Monday 14th November 2011
                                            3.00pm-4.00pm
                                     Baines Wing, Room 1.15
                                         University of Leeds

                                                    FREE!
                                           ALL WELCOME

MA Art Gallery & Museum Studies Welcome Drinks Reception

2011-09-19T22:36:00.004+01:00

New Postgraduate students reception

The new cohort of MA Museum Studies students arrived at the university today...24 students, from countries as far away as USA, Korea, Taiwan, Canada, Greece...as well as from nearer to home of course, West Yorkshire!

Welcome to you all, we hope you enjoy your year of study!

Mark

Staff and Students at PG Reception

Back after the summer break

2011-09-18T16:28:00.000+01:00

Hi All,

well, it seems like ages since the Blog was populated...all been on holiday no doubt!...(I've been away too...Amsterdam...Abbotsford....got lots to post....later)....we've got a new intake of Undergrad and Postgrad students starting this coming week too...lots more voices for the Blog I hope!

I'll post news of the 'Induction Week' activities soon....

Mark

What was there?

2011-09-16T10:56:00.004+01:00

Here's an interesting project that extends the Museum of London Street Museum application to map historical photographs through crowd sourcing. I suppose ideally it would balance individual and institutional data, but open source projects can be limited by copyright restrictions and the occasional insular archive. Hopefully it will become a really useful resource.

http://whatwasthere.com/

There's also a free app for iDevices if you're that way inclined:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/whatwasthere/id421576457?mt=8&ls=1

Provisional Conference Programme

2011-07-20T12:02:00.002+01:00

Art versus Industry?

Leeds City Museum, 23and 24 March 2012

Friday 23 March 2012

9.45-10.15

Registration

10.15-10.30

Welcome and introductions

10.30-11.30

Lara Kriegel (Indiana University)

Filaments of History: Ladies, Lace, Labour and Nation at the Fin de Siecle

11.30-1.30 Panel one: De-centering the narrative

Lara Eggleton (University of Leeds)

Surface Deceits: Owen Jones and John Ruskin on the Ornament of the Alhambra

Sally Tuckett (University of Edinburgh)

Colouring the Nation: Scottish Turkey-Red Design and Manufacture

Natasha Eaton (University College London)

Subaltern Colour? Art, Industry and Colonialism in Britain and India

Renate Dohmen (University of Louisiana at Lafayette)

The Calcutta International Exhibition of 1883-4: A Differenced Vision of the Great Exhibition?

1.30-2.30: Lunch

2.30-4.30 Panel two: Labour, class and invention

Jasmine Allen (University of York)

The Status of Stained Glass at the International Exhibitions

Anne-Marie Millim (University of Luxembourg)

“A substitute for moonlight”: The Cultural Value of Mining in The Graphic (1870s)

Frances Robertson (Glasgow School of Art)

Crank-Pin Tracks and Corinthian Columns: Engineers and Draughtsmen as Visual Technicians

Ben Russell (Science Museum)

James Watt’s Workshop: A Nexus Between Art and Industry

4.30-4.45: Coffee

4.45-5.45

Tom Gretton (University College London)

Art as Hot News

Saturday 24 March 2012

9.30-10.30

Colin Trodd (University of Manchester)

Affinity and Alienation: Civility, Barbarism and Discourses of Design Culture, 1862-1894

10.30-12.30 Panel three: Making and mechanical perception

Ann Compton (University of Glasgow)

Building a Better Class of Craftsman? Re-examining Issues of Education, Craftsmanship and Professional Practice in Sculpture and Related Trades, c. 1880-1925

Gabriel Williams (University of York)

tbc

Nicole Bush (Northumbria University)

Mechanical Patterns: The Role of Brewster’s Kaleidoscope in the Age of Morris and the Machine

Patrizia Di Bello (Birkbeck)

‘Camera-Medusa’: Stereoscopic Photographs of Statuettes

12.30-1.30 Lunch

1.30-2.30 Panel four: The manufacture, circulation and exhibition of electrotypes

Alistair Grant (University of Sussex, Victoria and Albert Museum)

Galvanic Engraving in Relief: The Origins of the Art of Electro-Metallurgy

Angus Patterson (Victoria and Albert Museum)

For the Promotion of Art: The Formation and Influence of the Victoria and Albert Museum’s Electrotype Collection

2.30-3.30

Steve Edwards (Open University)

Picture Capitalism

3.30-4.00 Coffee

4.00-5.00 Roundtable discussion and closing remarks

£15 [£10 concessions] for both days. Information on registration will be posted on http://artvindustry.blogspot.com/ shortly, we hope to see you there!

Bramham, Baroque and Blow.

2011-07-07T08:35:00.016+01:00

The opportunity to visit a lesser known country mansion arose yesterday and I was spurred on by the vague recollection that the pile had a connection with Detmar Blow the architect. Detmar has always been a hero of mine due to his 'lame duck' nature and a history of being simply forgotten. His career paralleled Lutyens for a number of years, but once Bendor and the Westminster cabal closed ranks his reputation entered free fall.

However, back in time we go to 1906. Bramham Park had lain derelict for almost a century, but had been resurrected in part by Blow and his crew, who were able to produce a Baroque effect using Edwardian techniques. Although a passionate Arts and Crafts supporter, the enigma of Detmar was that he would happily move to other architectural styles especially if persuaded by an aristo! In fact, he built All Saints Church, Thorney Hill, from scratch and in a full-on Baroque style. [See smaller Photo].

I'll not attempt a verbal description of Bramham Park Mansion as I'm reading Edmund De Waal's linguistic picture of the Hotel Ephrussi at present, and will not get anywhere near that league. However, I hope my snapshots will convey some of the atmosphere of the place.

Detmar's internal work has a look of B&Q about it[!!!] for it's just too machine made and has lost the organic feel of surviving baroque details. Strangely, our guide failed to mention my hero, and so later I chatted with a gardener who reckoned that this was par for the course as the current owners are keen to promote the early 18th. Century origins rather than more recent additions. Blow also designed an elaborate Rose garden recently obliterated! There are, too, obelisks and a chapel.

I have added more photographs here but am unsure where they will appear.

Finally, the fireplace. I have included this item as it is the only time that the Arts and Crafts feel came to me although it is not obvious, and possibly meant to be nothing of the sort. How could Detmar do all this cribbing without some his passion rising to the surface. I like to think so.

Culture-led Urban Regeneration vs Heritage Degeneration

2011-06-24T13:21:00.000+01:00

You may have noticed the opening of the Hepworth, Wakefield, last month...yet another Culture-led Urban regeneration project. These projects seem to be consistently appearing lately....and whilst there is some debate about whether these projects do, in fact, regenerate an area in the ways that the planners and designers suggest (and hope) - in the sense that economic regeneration is not necessarily synchronic with social regeneration (at least not for 'everyone' I suppose...and that's the point!)...they do open up an evolving landscape of opportunities and possibilities.
However, at the same time as these spectular events are happening in one part of Wakefield, the possible closure of the heritage/education museum at Clarke Hall remains a possibility....I wondered what you thought about this 'in with the new'......'out with the old' dynamic?...seems curious?

Clark Hall, Wakefield

Mark

Hepworth, Wakefield
photo copyright Chipperfield Architects

Visions of the Future Roundtable Discussion

2011-06-01T09:47:00.002+01:00

Saturday, 4th June 2011, 2-4pm

In connection with the special display on science fiction art entitled ‘Visions of the Future: the Art of Science Fiction’, the Gallery hosts a Roundtable discussion, which brings together group of people working in different fields with a shared interest and enthusiasm for science fiction.

Participating panellists include Dr Richard Brown, Reader in Modern and Contemporary Literature from the English Department at Leeds and Dr Samuel Francis, whose first book, 'The Psychological Fictions of J.G. Ballard', will be published by in November by Continuum Books. They will be joined by Andy Hedgecock, co-editor of Interzone, Britain’s longest running science fiction magazine, and Chris Pak, PhD researcher at the University of Liverpool. The roundtable is moderated by Liz Stainforth.

Free event, all welcome.
Refreshments will be available after the event.

Spot the Differences!

2011-05-23T12:29:00.002+01:00

Bloomsbury time at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery this weekend:

Saturday, 28 May 2011, 2-4pm

The Gallery’s newest acquisition, the delicate still life by Duncan Grant is being restored to finally reunite with Vanessa Bell’s ‘Triple Alliance’ (1914) displayed in the Gallery.

The art of Bloomsbury would not be the same without romance... The Gallery's newest acquisition, 'A Still Life, Asheham House' by Duncan Grant is being restored to finally reunite with Vanessa Bell's almost identical still life displayed in the Gallery.

SEE IT
Spot the differences! The two artists (and lovers) created their respective collages in the same room and of the same objects. It is a rare privilege to be able to see them side by side during the conservation phase.

HEAR IT
Curator Layla Bloom's short introduction to the artists and the their works in the context of the Bloomsbury group and their experiments with new media.

DO IT
The talk will be followed by a creative art workshop facilitated by mixed media artist Amy Balderston.
Amy will provide collage materials and explain techniques of building layers and materials in mixed media art.
The workshop will suit all ages.

This is a free workshop, but places are limited so please book your place in advance by e-mailing Zsuzsa at libzmp@leeds.ac.uk or by phone (0113) 34 32777.
You can also book online at http://bloomsburycollage.eventbrite.com.

Call for Papers

2011-05-14T12:48:00.002+01:00

Art versus Industry?

Leeds City Museum, 23and 24 March 2012

This two-day international and transdisciplinary conference aims to re-evaluate the intersections between the visual arts and industry in Britain during the long nineteenth century.

The complexity and variety of nineteenth-century industrial culture and responses to it remain under appreciated. The idea that an ‘industrial culture’ might have existed in nineteenth-century Britain seemed paradoxical in the wake of Raymond Williams’ Culture and Society 1780-1950 (1958) and Martin Wiener’s English Culture and the Decline of the Industrial Spirit (1981). Both suggested a seemingly non-negotiable opposition between culture and industry. They privileged the writings of John Ruskin, and later William Morris, which resisted the incursion of mechanised production into the sphere of the fine and applied arts.

‘Art versus industry?’ invites papers that look beyond Ruskin and Morris to modify these characterisations. Recent studies of nineteenth-century literary culture have identified the development of a pro-industrial rhetoric in the early nineteenth century. How was this articulated in the visual arts? Debates over design reform in particular suggest the permeable boundaries between the artist, designer, artisan and operative, matched by a taxonomic conflation of art with design. Meanwhile, the prospect of widening the franchise of ‘taste’ often correlated with the embrace of new industrial technologies, as much as with the repudiation of them. ‘Art versus industry?’ seeks to uncover the complexities of the nineteenth-century ‘industrial culture’. Topics for discussion might include, but are not limited to:

Exhibitions and the display of science and art
Taste formation and circulation
The role of the periodical press and print culture
Industrial art collectors and collections
The education of the artist and artisan
Material processes and conditions of production; deskilling and reskilling
The principles and practice of design
Historiographic approaches to the debate
Mechanics’ Institutions and the ideology of self-improvement
Centralisation and regional specificity
The impact of trans-national communication and manufacture upon art or upon concepts of national style
New reproductive technologies and art

Confirmed speakers include Dr. Tom Gretton (University College London), Dr. Steve Edwards (Open University), Dr. Mervyn Romans (independent), Dr. Colin Trodd (University of Manchester) and Dr. Lara Kriegel (Indiana University).

Please email a title, 300 word abstract and CV to Rebecca Wade (r.j.wade@leeds.ac.uk) by 17 June 2011. For further information, visit the blog here.

Heritage-led urban regeneration

2011-05-07T14:47:00.000+01:00

Thanks Rebecca for the interesting post (below) on the proposals for the 'restoration' of the Kirkgate Cloth Hall and restoration and regeneration of the Kirkgate area in Leeds - I noticed that there have also been a few reports on the local TV news recently.
The Kirkgate Character Area Management Plan is indeed a fascinating document (see Rebecca's link below), one that maps out the objectives of the proposals, although I agree with Rebecca that despite the detail in the plan, the purposes of the restorations etc are not actually that clear. The project seems to be an attempt to restore/preserve some of the undoubtedly important historic fabric of Leeds, but there's an implicit notion that restoring the Cloth Hall and reinstating historic shop fronts in Kirkgate would be enough to breath life back to the area?
I was struck that in the plans there also did not seem to be any proposals for the role that good contemporary design plays in the regeneration plans - i.e. the role of the 'present' just as much as the role of the 'past' in regeneration. The most successful regeneration projects seem to be able to balance these issues - in Bruges, for example, the historic fabric is obviously highly significant, and is privileged, but it is also clear that even with such a rich historical fabric the contemporary plays a significant complementary role, and there is no fear of the 'modern'.

Bruges

Maybe within the the Kirkgate scheme there could also be a space for some challenging contemporary architecture too?...and maybe then the regeneration can, Janus-like, speak to those with interest in the past and the present?

Mark

Leeds 'Character Area' Kirkgate Regeneration

2011-04-22T16:45:00.012+01:00

There have recently been some interesting developments towards the regeneration of an area of Leeds city centre. The Lower Kirkgate Townscape Heritage Initiative Scheme has defined a 'character area' that includes Kirkstall Market, the Corn Exchange, the First and Third White Cloth Halls, the Assembly Rooms and St Peter's Parish Church. Some preliminary work has already begun with the demolition of the later infill and west wing of the First White Cloth Hall [see below]. There seems to be a plan to reconstruct the building with some materials conserved from the damaged areas, although it remains unclear to what purpose.

The Kirkgate Character Area Management Plan is a particularly interesting read [it really is - to me at least!], as a document that necessarily has to negotiate historical research, the disparate interests of cultural and commercial stakeholders and the bureaucratic apparatus of local government. The online public consultation is open until 20 May.

Encountering the Contemporary

2011-04-18T15:49:00.012+01:00

Ragley Hall

Nick's post..'Engaging, Creating; Artist and Maker Residencies in Public Spaces', (and Rebecca's comment) - (see below), raise some interesting points concerning the relationships between the past and the present - and the complexity of of this dynamic. I'm reminded of a couple of 'encounters' I had recently...one at Ragley Hall, in the Midlands, where the late 17th century house is surrounded by rolling parkland which is also

Contemporary Sculpture at Ragley Hall

dotted with contemporary artwork...
Although I'm not aware that any of the 'traditional' visitors made adverse comments?...and I know that English Heritage are also introducing contemporary art into their interpretation strategies....another example is perhaps more interesting, to me anyway, with my interest in the art market & museums (not as strange a conjunction as one would think of course!);

Sotheby's at Sudeley Castle

This is the move by Sotheby's to sell contemporary artworks against the landscape (literally and symbolically I think) of 'heritage'. Sotheby's 'Selling Exhibition' at Sudeley Castle (shown here) also clearly demonstrates that these fascinating developments are moving into other areas of consumption....Maybe the 'zietgiest' is the present-in-the-past-in-the-present...and maybe that's a kind of eternal zietgiest...if there can be such a thing!

Mark

Perspectives on the Art Market

2011-04-18T09:49:00.001+01:00

‘PERSPECTIVES ON THE ART MARKET’

Open Lecture Series No. IV

School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies

University of Leeds

"Old Masters and New Masters, and their Masters: Gustave Coûteaux and the Belgian Art Market, ca. 1840-1870"

Dr Jan Dirk Baetens

FWO Doctoral Fellow

Art History Department, KULeuven Arts Faculty, Belgium

UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS

Baines Wing Lecture Theatre (2.34)

On WEDNESDAY 4^th May 2011

5.00pm -6.00pm

ALL WELCOME

Engaging, Creating; Artist and Maker Residencies in Public Spaces

2011-04-11T16:26:00.004+01:00

I've just returned from attending this three day conference at the Victoria and Albert Museum which was exploring the role of artists residencies in the interpretation of museum sites and collections.

Overall, many projects were analysed; not least the artist in residence programme at the V&A (info here). Often, there was more of a focus on the relationship between artist and institution. Whilst the visitor was implicit in this discussion; fewer presentations dealt directly with the voice of the visitor and the impact of the residencies on their museum experience or understanding of the museum collections.

Tom Freshwater from the National Trust spoke about their new Contemporary Art Programme (info here). This was really interesting as he had used visitor comments to highlight how visitors had reacted to seeing 'art' when they weren't expecting it. Whilst many visitors appreciated the interventions, many threatened to cancel their membership citing that visiting a national trust property was all about getting away from the hubbub of modern life, rather than encountering the modern world in the form of 'contemporary art'. ( This is exactly what I'd done in my paper which looked at visitor comments about the contemporary art programme at the Bronte Parsonage Museum.)

There was a great presentation by artist Rebecca Jewell (website) who has been artist in residence at the British Museum. Her perspective as an artist was interesting as she has been working very much in an anthropological context; her work crossing boundaries between scientific illustration and fine art. It was particularly interesting to see an example of the British Museum displaying one of her drawings in place of an object which was too fragile to be displayed. Another project commented on the changing nature of scientific illustrations at the Natural History Museum, which are now seen as the 'art' collection, and little used or considered by the curators, their role having been supplanted by newer technologies.

Artist Stephen Farthing suggested that within the new REF framework for measuring impact; the most successful project he had been involved with was a residency at Birmingham City Football club, where he received an overwhelming response from football fans, interested in the subject rather than the content of his work.

A couple of other interesting residency programmes included:

Irish Museum of Modern Art (residency info here)

Luton Museum Truck Art project (exchange between Romany artist and Pakistani Truck artist; info here)

Visions of the Future: The Art of Science Fiction

2011-04-06T12:13:00.004+01:00

Please take the time to visit the new Education Room display, 'Visions of the Future: The Art of Science Fiction' at the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery, running from Monday 4 April - Saturday 11 June 2011.

This special display presents a selection from the University of Leeds' Special Collections, illustrating the history of science fiction artwork and its early development in utopian fictions to the images represented in contemporary film posters.

The display provides an insight into the development and artistic trends of the genre, and little-known facts, such as the important role Leeds played in the early history of science fiction in England.

"... in many ways science fiction was the true literature of the twentieth century, with a vast influence on film, television, advertising and consumer design. Science fiction is now the only place where the future survives..." J. G. Ballard, Miracles of Life, 2008.

Shakespeareana at Craven Museum

2011-03-29T18:10:00.000+01:00

Curator Talk and Portfolio Critique at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery

2011-03-22T12:05:00.004Z

Saturday, 9 April 2011, 2-4pm

Talk and Portfolio Critique by Curators James Moore and Dawn Woolley

James Moore and Dawn Woolley will be giving an introductory talk about the projects they have worked on, focusing on the current Virtually Real show, addressing practical issues like the process of writing proposals, arranging funding, and project management in artist-led activities.

James Moore and Dawn Woolley are practising artists who have worked together as curators since 2003, and recently guest curated 'Virtually Real' for The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery.

Their exhibition projects originate from concerns and ideas within their individual art practices, which they explore through small group exhibitions. Past projects have included Show Home, an exhibition exploring domesticity and the uncanny set in a vacant apartment, and Making Love To My Ego, a self-portrait exhibition.

The talk is free, no booking is necessary.
The talk will be followed by a limited number of one-to-one portfolio review sessions for students and emerging artists.

To reserve a portfolio review session please book your place by e-mailing Zsuzsa (libzmp@leeds.ac.uk) or by phone (0113) 34 32777.

You can also book online by clicking here.

Photo: Sea Wall, by James Moore, 2010, oil on canvas © The Artist

2011-03-02T11:53:00.001Z

"Contrariwise," continued Tweedledee, "if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic."
Lewis Carroll

The Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery turned into a magical Hall of Mirrors yesterday when the long-awaited 'Virtually Real' exhibition opened its doors to the public. Artists and curators Dawn Woolley and James Moore, as well as Grant Miller, one of the exhibiting artists straight from Kansas (no, Toto could not make it) were talking about their work to a captive audience among strange tales of the illusory and the deceptive, where human eyes flutter uneasy: is it real or am I being tricked here?

Some of the art on display is unrelenting like the Moebius strip, for example, Miller's precision of architectural elements making up the infinite impossibility of Escher, or James Moore's realistic paintings capturing the fictitious spaces of video games and CGI. Bruce Ingram's bonsai trees seem to blossom incongruence right in front of our eyes.

Some, on the other hand, wink and nudge: spectators are in on the joke when they spot the minute imperfections that give away the optical illusion: the edges of the cardboard cut outs in Dawn Woolley's work or the dollhouse details in Petros Chrisostomou's imagined spaces. Julia Willms plays on our modern discomfort about blurring the boundaries between inside and outside (flapping pigeons. Ew.), but remains seated in domestic familiarity.

But the playful and the confusing side by side, address serious questions of the traditional aesthetics of representing space in art, in a world of instant facsimile spaces created with the ease of digital photography and CGI. The curators created a coherent space with a consistent subject matter, where the seamless juxtaposition of artworks invites the audience to think and question received modes of interpreting landscapes and interiors.

The exhibition's comment board with its red and blue comment cards ('like' and 'dislike', respectively) adds an interactive angle to the show: the stark utility of the hooks to hang the cards on demands honesty and openness in the midst of uncertainty and illusion.

Following the tremendous success of Aubrey Beardsley's decorative world of the grotesque, the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery continues to enchant and whizz the audience to a land of the impossible. Come and step through the looking glass with us once again: this little gallery is truly big on the inside.
Have a look at the catalogue of 'Virtually Real':

Open publication - Free publishing - More virtually real

The End of Gallery Rage?

2011-02-01T19:16:00.006Z

Since the recent Gauguin show at Tate Modern attracted criticism for inducing 'gallery rage' as a result of overcrowding, it seems particularly interesting that Google has just released its Art Project, which has repurposed the cameras used for its street mapping activities to allow digital 'visits' to international museums and galleries. I wonder how an isolated, two dimensional ocular encounter might disrupt the socio-behavioral function of the museum and if it remains an embodied experience? I'm starting to miss the troublesome toddlers and walkie-talkie static already.

Museology Seminar Series

2011-02-01T08:07:00.001Z

Here's news of our latest 'Museology Seminar Series'....hope to see you there?....

Mark

‘MUSEOLOGY SEMINAR SERIES’

Centre for Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage

School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies

University of Leeds

To Display or Not to Display: Human Remains

Dr Myra Giesen

Lecturer, Heritage Studies

International Centre for Cultural and Heritage Studies at Newcastle University

Thursday 17th February 2011

2.00pm-3.00pm

Baines Wing, Seminar Room 4.12

ALL WELCOME

Rethinking the Museum

2011-01-22T11:42:00.006Z

We are all aware that there are seismic shifts taking place, politically, culturally and socially; non more apparent to us than in the world of museums and galleries. What will our 'industry' look like in 2030? What changes are likely to happen to us? What changes do we need to drive forward as current and emerging professionals?

Helpfully, the North West Museum Federation have asked these questions and more:

“Informed by futurology and some genuinely inspiring work overseas, this vision is intended to help us break out of pondering an immediate and uncertain future and undertake those most vital of tasks: long range thinking and a willingness to take a few risks.”
Piotr Bienkowski, Chair of the NWFE (NWMF website)

Read their vision here

Beryl Beryl

2011-01-18T11:52:00.005Z

The Yorkshire Craft Centre has two highly recommended exhibitions of work by the staff of the Bradford School of Arts & Media until 17 February: Workers' Playtime and Beryl Beryl [which is, I'm told, what Rebel Rebel starts to sound like sung under the influence]. The latter is a particularly excellent display of work by Ian Taylor and Brendan Croker, but then I must declare my interests - Ian taught me the the ways of the chisel as a Foundation student almost ten years ago and more incredibly, also taught my father in the dim and distant primordial past. Just about the best sculpture you'll find this side of Wakefield.

2010-12-01T14:51:00.005Z

This weekend Leeds-based mixed media artist Amy Balderston is taking over the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery for a very interesting experiment with the help of our visitors. To quote Amy's train of thought here, the starting point is the way Aubrey Beardsley deals with his backdrops and scenery: "I feel that within his complex worlds he makes the ordinary extraordinary. The landscapes often have something the viewer can connect to, rather than completely plucked out of his imagination. It is the characters and unusual additions to these backdrops that create such a captivating image." To explore this (very astute) observation further, visitors will be given simple templates of different backgrounds and sceneries, and Amy will help them fill these with their own thoughts and imagination with an expert hand.

The question 'What Would Aubrey Do?' arises, when it comes to Amy's art and the workshop's focus. Does it make sense to explore Aubrey Beardsley's fine black and white ink drawings by creating mixed media art at all? I think this is exactly what makes this workshop challenging and inspirational. Instead of recreating the style, the accomplished forms and lines in Aubrey's images, Amy's workshop is designed to look deeper and search for what lies in less conspicuous aspects of these pieces: the power of composition, perspective, characters, hidden, barely visible quirks of expression, the importance of the background, and other means to create the slightly ominous and almost tangible atmosphere, familiar to those who have come to see Aubrey Beardsley's art at our current exhibition.

The workshop is also carefully designed to accomodate various abilities and levels of artistic skill. Amy's templates will help to overcome the paralysing feeling of incompetence most of us experience when staring at a blank page, when we're told to create something there and then. While giving something for the mind to latch onto, the art templates are also designed to provide inspiration, a starting point for expression. The added bonus of working with mixed media is that while it is far from being basic and childish, it is a great way to alleviate the pain and frustration of the half of humanity that I belong to: I want to draw, but I just don't think I'm good enough. This normally makes me steer clear of arty workshops and run to the hills (Plus I always get to sit next to people who complain how they can't draw a straight line to save their lives and then proceed to draw the Guernica with Etch-a-Sketch, which really doesn't help). Not this Saturday though! You'll find me at the Gallery doing what I like best: cutting up pretty magazines and play with yarn.

I'm not sure Aubrey would be okay with that with his hangups about aesthetics and all, but I know that I'll come out knowing more about the artwork that I see at the Gallery almost every day. Now that is something he, the king of arcane weirdness and subtly hidden grotesque, would certainly approve of.

Join Amy and of course the illustrious company of dead book illustrators, Aubrey Beardsley, Arthur Rackham, Kay Nielsen and the rest of the gang at the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery, 2pm on Staurday, 4 December 2010.

Visit the website for more info on this and other events at the gallery.

6th December - Talk at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery

2010-11-17T10:49:00.004Z

The Quakers Tea Table Overturn'd: Moral Dangers of the 18th Century Tea Party
Talk by Oliver Pickering and Liz Stainforth. Free, no booking necessary

Monday, 6 December 2010, 5.15pm Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery,University of Leeds

Come and find out about the origins of the great British institution of tea drinking. Believe it or not, the tea party was a controversial and highly debated topic throughout the 18th century, regarded by some as a sign of weakening moral standards and by others as the height of refined social intercourse. The talk includes a discussion of the unpublished 1717 poem The Quakers Tea Table Overturn'd, from a manuscript held in Special Collections at Leeds University Library. It highlights a contemporary concern that young people in Quaker families may be tempted to partake of 'worldly pleasures' through indulging in the fashion for tea parties.

The development of tea drinking is traced through observations made by such eminent contemporaries as Jane Austen, William Cobbett and Samuel Johnson. The talk is held in association with the Gallery's temporary exhibition of late 18th century tea equipage, Vanity Ware: Affordable Luxury in the Late Georgian Period.

Upcoming HMI exhibition on Angkor Vat

2010-11-12T11:47:00.005Z

One of our Leeds colleagues, Dr Ashley Thompson, has guest curated an exhibition of temple inscription rubbings from Angkor Vat. More info is on
http://www.henry-moore.org/hmi/exhibitions/angkor-wat
The exhibition raises a whole host of interesting questions about the limits of display. What is one displaying, when the actual exhibits are French colonial scholars' rubbings of commemorative and votive inscriptions added to a Cambodian Hindu temple by later generations of Buddhists? And the objects (are they sculptures? are they Cambodian or French?) are being shown in a British institution of modernist sculpture? What politics and what aesthetics are involved? This would be well worth a seminar...
Watch out for an education event at the HMI in Jan/Feb.

Student exhibition 2010: Artistic Legacies: Sir Michael Sadler and Quentin Bell

2010-11-11T16:15:00.013Z

This year, the Art Gallery and Museums Studies MA students had to create two displays in the Gallery Education Room at Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery at the University. The students were divided in two groups, the Ceramics Group and Works on Paper Group. The Works on Paper Group was asked to select a number of works from the 'Bloomsbury Group' and 'Camden Town Group' to display in the upright cases and provide interpretative text for the visitor.

During the handling session we decided to put together an exhibition that told the story of the Bloomsbury and Camden Town Groups, their personal relationships within the group and Leeds through people like Sir Michael Sadler and Quentin Bell.

We selected several drawings and books to create an overarching narrative structure. We wanted to create a story that could be read visually, making it more accessible to the visitor who does not want to read through everything. However, our narrative was not as clear as we had hoped, and we attempted to do too much by deciding to have an exhibition leaflet, a laminate, an activity sheet and a poster. A simpler theme and better time management would have improved our exhibition.

This project gave us the opportunity to learn how to work in a team, be aware of the challenges that exist in setting up an exhibition, and to put in practice the work done in class.

'Artistic Legacies: Sir Michael Sadler and Quentin Bell' will be at the SABG until the 23rd of December 2010

Thanks to Abigail, Layla, the University of Leeds Library Special Collections, and the works on paper group.

Student Exhibition 2010: Vanity Ware

2010-11-01T12:39:00.010Z

Ten students. Two display cases. A tableful of ceramics. A baptism of fire!

Our exhibition project was an early opportunity for us to bring together all the interpretation theory we’d learnt thus far and apply it to a range of domestic ceramics from the University’s collections. Ideally our exhibition would dazzle our tutors and attract thousands of creamware-hungry visitors to the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery. It didn’t… but we did learn a lot about ourselves, the importance of a clear interpretation strategy and the practicalities of designing and assembling an exhibition.

‘Vanity Ware’ focuses on the relationship between the form and function of Leeds creamware 1760-1810. Creamware was produced as a cheap alternative to porcelain. It was used, however, to consume relatively expensive commodities like tea, coffee, chocolate and sugar. Creamware thus represented the social aspirations of the middle-classes and the increased ‘ritualisation’ of their dining and drinking habits.

From this core concept we deliberated and decided upon various methods of interpretation, marketing and display. In general the choice and design of our interpretive information received praise, as did our decision to leave a comments book to collect visitor feedback. Our exhibition could have been improved with a tighter and stronger theme rather than attempting to do and say too much. Curating by committee presented some challenges which often prevented decisive decision making. However it provided a realistic taste of the array of perspectives and interests a curator must consider when designing and assembling an exhibition. Moreover we learnt from each other’s valuable experience, becoming wiser and more considerate as a result.

Vanity Ware will be at the SABG until the end of the year.

Thanks to Abigail, Layla, Hilary and the ceramics group.

Museology Seminar Series

2010-10-29T12:08:00.001+01:00

Hello All,

Our next 'Museology Seminar Series' talk is on Monday 15th November 2010.

Leeds University Museology Seminar Series V

'The Reconstructed Old Town of Warsaw - a World Heritage Site'

Dr Urszula Szulakowska

School of Fine Art, History of Art & Cultural Studies

University of Leeds

Monday 15th November 2010

2.00pm - 3.00pm

University of Leeds, Baines Wing, Room 3.06

ALL WELCOME

Curating the Old and the New - (and the things that are left behind)

2010-10-23T10:06:00.002+01:00

Hello All,

all the MA students have been thinking about Foucault (again) the past few weeks - and whether such opaque ideas are useful at all, (at least for us in thinking about 'museum studies')...(the answer is of course it is!) In relation to this I thought I'd draw your attention to a recent exhibition I went to at the Royal Museum of the Fine Arts, Antwerp. Closing Time, curated by the Belgian artist Jan Vanriet - (it's unfortunately 'closed' now...I didn't hear if they called 'last orders'.....) -Closing Time is an interesting example of the complex ways in which museums and galleries are 're-thinking' the classifications, conjunctions and narratives of their collections; (perhaps in a 'Foucauldian' way...or perhaps we've always done such things...and..doesn't assigning this process a 'name' subvert the intentions of such a project?...what, indeed, is 'an author' in this context?)
Anyway, Vanriet is a well known Belgian artist (I confess I'd not heard of him...but I'm not usually in such 'loops'..I'll avoid the cliche of 'famous Belgians'...oh I didn't..sorry!). Vanriet had been given carte-blanche in choosing artworks from the permanent collections of the Royal Museum of the Fine Arts and re-assembled them in the temporary exhibition spaces, setting up conjunctions with his own works and disrupting the conventional taxonomies and classifications of the artworks in the gallery. As you can see (here), paintings by 'masters' such as Hans Memling (Man with a Roman Coin c.1478) are set in dialogue with the works of Vanriet (Eva, Black Bonnet, 2006). One can see 'echoes' in these conjunctions - across time, across cultures, across visual memory. I confess it was a beautiful exhibition - a taxonomy of poetics, instead of the 'hard science' of art history..(perhaps); and the exhibition was packed with visitors!
But.....there are, of course, 'consequences' for such interventions; I arrived at the gallery very early on a Sunday morning, and accidentally wandered into the (closed to the public) spaces of the permanent collections, from which Vanriet had rummaged and taken his choice. I was eventually, and very politely, ushered out of these spaces by the security guy, but had managed to wander through quite a few rooms before being 'caught'.

Unlike the Closing Time exhibition (which was downstairs), the spaces in the permanent galleries were rather sad. Paintings left, forlorn, and propped up against the walls, many swathed in bubble-wrap (this was not just as a consequence of Vanriet's interventions, but also in preparation for the closure of the gallery, which is to undergo a refurbishment for the next 2 years). But I was struck by the empty spaces on the walls alongside the artworks. 'Holes' in art history if you like - perhaps an inevitable consequence of the re-invigorating 'presence' in the Closing Time exhibition is this 'absence' - but then I suppose such effects are more than a 'necessary consequence' of the disruption of conventions, they are also a 'neccessity'!
Mark

Meet the artists - this Friday

2010-10-18T17:10:00.006+01:00

Image : Emma Stibbon, Devil’s Throat, Iguazu, 2009, chalk drawing on blackboard (c) The Artist

This Friday, 22nd October, from 1-4.30, the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery is hosting an Artist Roundtable for the current exhibition ‘All Over the Place.' If you've enjoyed the show, it's the ideal opportunity to come in for one final time (and I mean final - it ends on Saturday!) to meet the artists yourself, and to discuss the show's themes with them. Three of the artists speaking are from our own School of Design, so it would be a great opportunity to speak to them about their work in the context of the city and campus life.

The afternoon will be chaired by Prof. David Hill. There will be a free tea and coffee break midway through the afternoon, with an open public discussion following the artists' presentations.

The event is free, no need to book, but seats are limited, so arrive on time to avoid disappointment!

The event will be held in our Education Room, which saw two new displays open today, curated by the M.A. students on the 'Interpreting Cultures' module. During the break, we invite you to view their efforts and leave your comments in the guest book for them.

Hope to see you soon in the Gallery!
Layla

Workshop: Drawing Machines with Jim Bond at the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery

2010-10-13T15:14:00.003+01:00

Light Night at the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery turned out to be fantastic. Thank you for all who came and helped us make our map of Leeds bigger and better! Now, something completely different: Anyone up for kinetic stuff?

István Harasztÿ is the senior representative of kinetic art in Hungary (been around since the end of the 60s, that man). On his website, he talks lovingly about the beauty and meaning of making art literally move. He states that the primary feature of kinetic art is to leave behind superfluous elements, and somehow streamline the enjoyment and understanding of the statement conveyed by the pieces by making the interaction of sound, light, and motion as efficient as possible. This week’s Saturday event in the Gallery is bringing this idea of efficiency to the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery, with the added bonus that visitors can engage and even compete with artist Jim Bond’s machines, thus becoming part of the process (and have some fun at the same time).

Jim Bond’s work, especially the wonderfully creepy Blink makes him a significant member of the international tribe of kinetic artists. Blink is an ‘eye-machine’, very much in line with Jim’s fantastically Da Vinciesque celebration of the human form and function. No, not the Dan Brown humbug, not an ounce of that: we’re talking the real Vitruvian Man stuff here. You can see the somewhat unsettling contraption made out of a WWII glass eye and brass, as the main image on his homepage. Some Bond-trivia: Bond’s Blink has travelled to Budapest two years ago and was exhibited with the aforementioned István Harasztÿ’s Situation Indicator and Attila Csörgő’s magnetic Drawing Machine. According to Jim’s page, there are two pieces of this work one in a private collection in the US and one in Kilmorack Gallery, Inverness. One wonders whether they will (whether they should) ever meet in a contraption that moves them towards and away one another. Hah. Well, anyway, this Saturday he’s bringing his quirky art to the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery for the afternoon.

This upcoming workshop brings me back to my starting point, Harasztÿ’s thoughts on the big questions of kinetic art. Not only because of that Kinetica exhibition in Budapest back in 2008, but because he touches on something very important in his web introduction. István (also known as Édeske -'Sweetie' in Hungarian), says ‘when I was a child, I made all kinds of strange contraptions for myself because I could not never find a game that would have interested me more’. Deep down kinetic art, although indubitably one of the more complex and multilayered art forms (or is it a genre?), is about fun, exploration and ingenuity and Jim Bond’s workshop will surely deliver. So come along and be the human factor.

Saturday, 16 October, 2010, 2-4pm
Join artist Jim Bond in the Gallery to test your skills against his 'drawing machines.' Each machine has a different quirk to make the experience of drawing a special challenge! Free, family-friendly, drop-in activity.

'The Location of Value' - Antwerp Workshop

2010-10-09T12:28:00.001+01:00

Hello All,

I attended a fantastic 'Workshop' in Antwerp last week, (24th-25th September) entitled, 'The Location of Value' - (trust me, this was directly related to Museum and Art Galleries!...for what is a museum but a material manifestation of series of Values!) - There were just 14 of us, 'hot-housed' I suppose...and it was such a great experience...very effectively, efficiently, (and socially) organised by Bert De Munck and Ilja Van Damme of the University of Antwerp...

.....It was a great collegiate event. Bert & Ilja had drawn together a seemingly disparate group...Economic Historians, Social Historians, Art Historians to both challenge disciplinary boundaries and approaches and (I think) to share knowledge and open opportunities....I think everyone who attended valued the experience! As you can see here (picture, above) there were some animated discussions (but no fights!).
The Workshop was framed around overlapping Themes; 'Value of Art', 'Value of the Past', 'Pricing Mechanisms' and 'Negotiating Quality' - with stimulating papers by Ilja and Bert, Tomas Macsotay; Dries Lyna, Anne Wegener Sleeswijk, Phillippe Minard and Christof Jeggle (and me, of course). There were also papers submitted by Barbara Bettoni and Giorgio Riello (unable to attend). This was much more than a 'conference' and the dialogue between presentations and responses was illuminating, providing much food for thought. As catalysts for debate Bert & Ilja had invited some very eminent 'Discussants', including Filip Vermeylen, Beverly Lemire, Patrick Wallis, and Bruno Blonde...and there were some insightful (and amusing) concluding remarks delivered by Victor Ginsburg!...editor of the Handbook of the Economics of Art and Culture. Also present within the group was Annelies de Bie, a PhD student at the University of Antwerp......this was a really stimulating project, there should be more of these kinds of things I think, they are much more productive than conferences - (which are more like 'performances' and can tend to 'fllatten' out the issues)...here, by contrast, I felt that there was real dialogue, both across and within disciplines.......I hope that Bert and Ilja organise another one sometime!
Mark

The Big Draw: 'On Your Marks, Get Set, Design! at the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery

2010-10-07T16:58:00.004+01:00

Ooooh, while I'm at it, have you noticed those banners hanging around the café half of Parkinson Court? Good old Marks and Sparks! One almost gets excited about food rationing and nylon! Well, not just almost… In the spirit of old-fashioned Make Do and Mend and new-fangled Recycle Reuse Reduce the Gallery is bringing you a free, drop-in activity for all ages on Saturday, 9 October, 2010, 11am-4pm throughout the Parkinson Court. This free creative programme is organised as part of the Big Draw Campaign. October 2010 is Big Draw month in twenty countries and on five continents. Launched in 2000, this annual initiative has grown from 180 events in the UK to over 1500 worldwide. The Campaign aims to use drawing to connect visitors with museum and gallery collections, urban and rural spaces – and the wider community – in new and enjoyable ways.

It is, in the spirit of Big Draw, for those who love to draw and those who think they can’t. If you drop into the University of Leeds on Saturday, you can join in some creative recycling and make a sustainable statement for future fashion. Be inspired by the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery and the Marks & Spencer 'Marks in Time' Exhibition here in Parkinson Court to redesign and customise your cast-offs, or get creative with an M&S eco-bag. Can't be bothered with fashion? You can also create designs and drawings on paper, and think about new ways of packaging and think in terms of industrial design. But if you're into your handbags and gladrags: with all the vintage and crafts fairs going on (e.g. Handmade III right this coming Sunday and the Vintage Fair and Tea Party in Chapel Allerton on 16 October), and amazing student run initiations, like the Peanut Gallery in the Union, Leeds students are probably way savvier in this field than anyone else. If you need guidance and how-to, our volunteers will be at hand with help and stuff you may need: a selection of plain T-shirts, eco-bags, and materials to design and embellish your item will be provided along with help and advice. And, of course, feel free to bring along your own items and materials too. More about this event at our website.

'The People's Map of Leeds' at the Stanley and Burton Gallery

2010-10-07T16:56:00.001+01:00

Cartography and the Arts have always been embroiled in a long, sometimes inexplicable, love-affair. And this weird mix seeps into our lives on so many levels. As a footnote and introduction of myself, I have spent four years of my life researching medieval maps for my PhD and here I am newly appointed at the Stanley and Burton Gallery surrounded with what I enjoy most (almost as much as maps!): art at its best, paintings and drawings, and all that jazz! You’ll certainly hear excited noises from my direction every now and then, here and elsewhere, in the future.
Well, to get back to my original topic, it seems it’s high time to re-read ‘The Selected Works of TS Spivet’ by Reif Larsen (also: wouldn’t everyone want to be a child prodigy cartographer, even if somewhat disturbed…?)! I’m very pleased that these two, maps and art, meet once again, and this time everyone is invited to get involved… You can come to see us and play with your city! Join in our free, interactive 'People's Map of Leeds' with artist Louise Atkinson, throughout the evening in the Parkinson Court. Light Night visitors - both young and old - are invited to participate in the creation of a large-scale drawing based on a map of Leeds on Friday, 8 October, 2010, 5-10pm. Referencing the Gallery's current exhibition 'All Over the Place: Drawing Place, Drawing Space,' Louise will led visitors to experiment with drawing and mark-making techniques in response to the daily activities and memories of the places they inhabit. Participants will also be encouraged to bring 2D items such as pictures and letters to contribute to the map, as well as cut-out templates, which will be supplied by the artist. We’d love to see you leave your mark on Louise’s map as your move across the Light Night trail of activities of the city!
In the same vein, and at the same time, Louise will launch her awesome beta site designed to map independent gigs, venues and goings-on in the city: the first demo of the new collaborative geo-wiki www.independentfullstop.com. She'll be on hand to help you share all your favourite places and events in the city. Markers added on the night will receive a limited edition #onthemap badge.
Thinking about mark-making, as well as techniques of representing space and loci is no doubt an excellent pastime. This whole thing ties in wonderfully with the gallery’s Temporary Exhibition and find thinking about spaces in the context of art very inspirational. Take this from a woman who gets excited about the Tube Map.

A Walking Art Gallery... 'What the Flock?!'

2010-10-05T13:17:00.015+01:00

This is a follow up on my last blog. What seemed to be a static, one off happening has turned into one that is moving through time and space. Over the last week I have watched the spray painted stencils, which existed on the main route from Hyde Park to the University, become faded under the foot of many a student on the way to lectures. I thought these were the only remains. However, this morning I witnessed the return of the flock, or more precisely of 'what the flock?!' Cardboard cut outs of black sheep on sticks were yet again stuck in the marshy grass of Hyde Park. This time with the date 10/10/10 printed on them. What did the date mean? Perhaps it was informing us of the beginning of the exhibition, proper, or even more interestingly the end-date. This got me thinking about the life-span of exhibitions. Conventional exhibitions usually advertise when, where and how long the exhibit is going to be. We are too often used to planning to go to an exhibition at a certain time and place. However it is becoming an increasingly common occurrence to stumble across artworks in public domains, which, repeating what i said in my last blog, gives us an entirely different experience. It is a much more confrontational kind of experience, we see it and experience it whether we like it not. For example, like in the case of the Mysterious Banksy, who has given rise to graffiti art.

I thought my questions would be answered when I caught a glimpse of a black sheep out of the corner of my eyes whilst sat on the Parkinson steps. I looked up to see a parade of people dressed as sheep with the trade-mark black-sheep-on-stick in hand. They were anouncing the date through a megaphone. I ran over to see if they would shed any light on what the flock was going on, but apparnetly they had no idea either. I was simply instructed to go to http://www.whattheflock.org.uk/ at 10pm on the 10/10/10. The 'exhibition' was now moving to cyber space. This is interesting as the internet is increasingly becoming a platform for new-media art and an art space in its own right. This is reminisent of the previously blogged Art experiment 'Second Life' by Hayley Goodsell. Creating virtual environments in which art can exist, or virtual environments and web pages that are actually art, again bring to mind the question of the art gallery. What constitutes an art Gallery? As you have suggested Mark work by the likes of Christo, who makes huge landmarks such as the Reichstag, Berlin (1971-95) into art objects by wrapping them up, thus making the environmental space surrounding it the viewing gallery. Therefore if the art object exists on your computer screen your bedroom becomes the gallery. It won't be long until an 'art gallery' app will be come available, if it hasn't already, making anywhere you are an art gallery.

After checking out the web page, which is linked to LUU, I began to wonder whether it was an art project at all. It could be anything to do with LUU from elections to the promotion of yet another weird and wonderful society or even a marketing tool for a new product. In any case I think it is an intriguing 'project' that raises issues surrounding what constitutes an art gallery. I can't wait to see what is to be revealed on Sunday.

http://www.whattheflock.org.uk/ ... watch this space!

Alex

Food For Thought

2010-10-04T11:16:00.001+01:00

The museum restaurant, a place where once children dreamed of having a Faraday fudge Sundae or a tyrannosaurus Mex burger, now a place of limp pre-packed sandwiches, stewed tea and coffee the colour of dish water. Or is it?

With the recent growth of the stay at home holiday could the museum restaurant be on the rise?

With a recent trip to the Wallace collection, London, I got to thinking about the symbiotic relationship between the museum caterer and the museum itself. Can a restaurant add to a museum? Can a restaurant promote and gain an audience that otherwise might ignore the museums collection altogether? Can a restaurant provide a feeling of ownership and understanding of a collection which is in the nations hands? And can a museum use a restaurant to it's advantage without risks of expenditure?

Ask "who has heard of the Wallace collection?" outside of a set of friends, with whom one would be most disappointed, not many. It's a small national collection in Manchester Square housed in Hertford house. It has some of the best preserved porcelain on show, some fantastic armour, and paintings and furniture to rival any where in the world. Ask "who has seen the great British menu?" and I would suspect a lot more. It has national TV coverage, appeals to a nation that seems to be excessively drawn to cooking programs and contains a panel of three judges, one of whom, Oliver Peyton, is in the centre of the Wallace collection. Literally.

Within the central courtyard of Hertford house lay the Oliver Peyton restaurant, at the top of a google search for the Wallace collection you see table reservations for the restaurant, and as you walk through the collection you see the restaurant, busy, alive, creating an atmosphere of life within a house which, without it, might seem a little lifeless, and the restaurant reviews make sure people know where it is.

Can we learn from this? The Leeds museum has a fine cafe, it might even be more engaging than the museum itself for some adults, the tiled hall has had a fantastic influence upon the visitor numbers for the Leeds art gallery, the terrace at Harewood house gives a feeling of watching a shooting party returning across the grounds in halcyon edwardian days, and there by creating a slightly better understanding of the house, it's architecture and the upper classes. And the royal armouries? Well... not so great.

In the examples of the Wallace collection, the Leeds museums and galleries and Harewood house, rent is paid to the collections, the restaurants draw in a number of visitors who otherwise might pass on by and, in some cases, might allow the public to feel closer to understanding certain collections. All this with little or no risk on the behalf of the museum or collection who are always, especially in the current economic climate, in need of cold hard cash. The royal armouries on the other hand, has no such symbiosis with their cafe. Built as an example of how government and private enterprise could work together it has failed.

The building which houses the national collection is owned by a catering company, so no rent for the armouries, the private company has the rights to hold large functions within the building, using the exhibits as a draw, so no money for the beleaguered armouries, and the armouries has no control of opening times, which leads to complaints about the museum, and the armouries cannot provide catering so no historical food to tie in with joust weekend, or campaign food from the peninsular war. And the food? Yep! Limp sandwiches and cold chips are the house speciality.

So if we treat the museum and restaurant relationship with respect it can bring great rewards for both parties, free advertising, increased visitor numbers, greater income and greater interaction between visitor and collection, a relationship greater than the sum of its parts. And if we get it wrong? Well let's just not! Food for thought......

Now where did I put that Gauguintuan burger?

New Technologies in Museums

2010-10-03T12:13:00.003+01:00

Crossover Summit

Wednesday 3rd November

For those interested in the application of technology in museums and galleries, this is an interesting session being offered as part of Sheffield Documentary Festival:

'There will also be a special showcase of how archives, museums and galleries are exploiting new platforms to enhance public access to launch a new Crossover Lab programme designed to forge collaborations between film-makers, games, web or mobile developers and archive holders.'

Bring-a-thing-athon

2010-09-30T19:41:00.003+01:00

The Wellcome Collection have instigated a quite spectacularly named 'bring-a-thing-athon' for their next artist-led exhibition, Things. Intriguingly, you can bring them anything between 12 and 19 October as long as it's smaller than your head (although the small print says you can't lend or donate wet specimens, human remains or explosives. Boring.)

Gallery Wall to Hyde Park Floor, ‘What the flock?!’

2010-09-28T12:55:00.002+01:00

Hi everyone I’m Alex and this is my first blog. Where better to start than a trail of stenciled sheep, each titled ‘What the flock?!’ The trail lead me through Hyde park yesterday morning to a full flock of cardboard cutouts stuck on sticks and some hanging in the trees. Projects like these are now a normal site to behold when walking through cities and parks. Over the last 50 years art has slowly moved away from gallery and museum walls, and now pretty much anywhere constitutes an art space. There was no sign of an artist or establishment, which made it ever more intriguing. If I had seen this in a gallery or museum situation my experience would have been somewhat different. The spontaneity of time and place allowed me to look at, think about and make conclusions (or not) about the ‘piece’ without any preconditions. I think seeing art outside gallery walls brings new dimensions to a work as it engages with the environment and the minds of those who would not usually encounter art. All in all it got my brain ticking (which at 9.30 in the morning is quite an achievement) and gave me a cheap giggle on the way to uni. I am excited to see more of this kind of thing next week at Leeds Light Night!

Alex

MGHG Conference in Leeds

2010-09-18T12:12:00.007+01:00

The Museums and Galleries History Group Conference, 'Museums and the Market' took place at the new Leeds City Museum last weekend (10th-11th September). It was considered to be a great success by all attendees and speakers! You can read the conference programme in an earlier post on the Blog, but the event was buzzing and there was lots of debate...I just wish it could have gone on longer!
Thanks to all the people that came along, and the speakers (from USA, Germany, Belgium and across the UK)...and of course to our Keynote Speaker, Helen Rees Leahy....I'll load some more pics from the conference soon.....
I'm off to Antwerp later this week, for another Conference/Workshop...this time on the 'Location of Value'.....more anon!
Mark

Curator, there's a butterfly in my fruit

2010-08-27T19:46:00.004+01:00

This week I managed to put down my bucket and spade long enough to see what the many and various museums of Brighton and Hove had to offer. The Royal Pavilion was showing a particularly interesting installation/intervention of three thousand black ceramic butterflies by Clare Twomey called 'A Dark Day in Paradise'. It teetered quite efficiently between decorative and distressing, the play between theme and variation was satisfying. I'm not sure of the stability of their significance, I was reminded occasionally of the treasure hunts galleries and museums stage for children in that, paradoxically, concentration can become distracting. Also surprising that they weren't also for sale in the gift shop!

New Design Template...a new Blog-o-sphere

2010-08-22T09:53:00.005+01:00

The Blog has been a bit quiet lately, with only the valiant efforts of Rebecca to keep the lamp burning...(Thanks Rebecca!)....I've been a little bit preoccupied, writing some stuff I'm supposed to be delivering soon...(more anon.).
But anyway, I thought, in order to breath some more life into the embers I'd redesign the webpage...(well, it's more of a pret-a-webpage, rather than me actually fiddling about with photo-shop...and that comment demonstrates that I'm really not up-to-date with these techy things.....)...so what do you think?...or should we go back to the old design?

Anyway...thanks Rebecca for a really provocative post...and you're right, these 'traditional' museum displays are quite romantic...(in a positive sense, I mean....as in the poetics of history....)..and are part of the heritage of museum displays..maybe there should be a new body to protect museums from being re-displayed?....maybe we should develop a Grading for Museums...as they do for Architecture etc...?

More blogging to come...
Mark

In Praise of Independent Museums

2010-08-08T16:18:00.005+01:00

I think this might be the best one room, one pound museum I've come across on my recent travels. I thought these dioramas from Marazion Museum were really worth sharing. It's easy to be disparaging, but museums that lie outside centralised funding structures and formal accreditation can perhaps pursue more interesting, or eccentric, or alarming, modes of classification and conservation. At their best, independent museums seem to disrupt the ways in which the museum professional is figured, even revealing their efforts as just a little turgid. Or perhaps I'm being unintentionally condescending in implying an enthusiastic amateurishness at work, in a similar way to the contemporary perception of 'outsider art'?

MGHG Annual Conference

2010-07-20T15:42:00.006+01:00

Hello,
here is the programme for the annual Museums and Galleries History Group conference. Hope to see you in Leeds...you can book at
mghg.org

Mark

Conference Programme

Friday 10th September 2010

9.15 - Conference Registration
10.00 - Welcome
10.10 - Welcome to Leeds: John Roles, Director, Leeds City Museums
10.30 - Conference Keynote: Dr Helen Rees Leahy, Director of the Centre for
Museology, University of Manchester

11.10 – Coffee

11.40 – Conference Session 1: Commerce & Consumption
Steven Miles (University of Brighton) Contrived Communality: the gallery and museum as a themed space for post-industrial consumption
Christine Guth (Royal College of Art) Blockbusters and Museum Merchandise: Marketing Hokusai’s “Great Wave”
Gareth Williams (Royal College of Art) On Design Art

13.00 – Lunch Break

14.00 – Conference Session 2: The Formation of Taste
Julia Courtney (The Open University) ‘The stuffed animals will have to go’: Alderman Jacob, William Chalkley and Dr Cottrill
Stephanie Schumann (The Drawing Centre, New York) (title tbc)
Louise Tythacott (University of Manchester) The Power of Taste: the dispersal of the Berkeley Smith collection of Chinese ceramics at Cheltenham Art Gallery & Museum (1921-1960)

15.20 – Coffee

15.50 – Conference Keynote: Professor Jos Hackforth-Jones, Director of Sotheby’s Institute of Art, London

16.30 – Optional Guided Tour of the Leeds Discovery Centre

Saturday 11th September 2010

9.30 – Parallel Conference Sessions 3 & 4

Conference Session 3: Philanthropy
Andrea Meyer (Institut für Kunstwissenschaft und Historische Urbanistik, Berlin) Museum directors as money makers: a reinvestigation of the history of the National Gallery in Berlin
Jozef Glassée (The Catholic University of Leuven) Buying Art for Ghent: The Ghent Museum Friends and the European Art Market (1897-c.1930)
Martin Weiss (University of Leiden) ‘With a Little Tacit Encouragement’: Teylers Museum’s Paleontological Collection

Conference Session 4: Circulating Commodities
Savithri Preetha Nair (Independent Scholar) The Rise of the Natural History Dealer in Colonial India
Sam Alberti & Christopher Plumb (University of Manchester) The Beastly Marketplace: Animal Commodities in Shops, Museums, and Other Sites of Display
Lina Tahan (Leeds Metropolitan University) The role of the Lebanese agents and dealers in the development of the Louvre Museum near Eastern Collections

10.50 – Coffee

11.20 - Parallel Conference Sessions 5 & 6

Conference Session 5: Regeneration and the Cultural Economy
Susannah Eckersley (University of Newcastle) Regeneration by Museum? Case studies from Germany
Patrick Haughey (Wentworth Institute of Technology, Boston) Hamilton’s Classroom: the museum of American Finance and the education of a market citizen
Mariam Al-Mulla (University of Leeds) Heritage in Qatar: an example of culturally-led economic regeneration

Conference Session 6: Museums and Identities
Natasha Degen (University of Cambridge) A National Type of Imagination: Nation branding and the museum
Uta Protz (Kunsthalle, Bremen) Modern French Painting and the Musee du Louvre: the impact of the studio sale of Gustave Courbet 1881
Annalea Tunesi (University of Leeds) An enigmatic façade: Palazzo Mozzi-Bardini in Florence

12.50 – Lunch Break and MGHG Annual General Meeting

14.00 – Conference Session 7: Leeds in Perspective
Mark Steadman (University of Leeds) Mail Order Museums: Recovering the market forces behind Nineteenth-Century Natural History collecting practices
Rebecca Wade (University of Leeds) ‘A Love of Truth even in Trifles’: the exhibition of art and manufactures in mid-nineteenth century Leeds
Geoffrey Forster (The Leeds Library) William Bullock in Leeds

15.20 – Coffee

15.50 – Conference Session 8: Museums and the Art Market

Esmée Quodbach (The Frick Collection, New York) ‘Trying to catch a rising star’: Vermeer on the Art Market 1870-1920
Anne Helmreich (Case Western Reserve University, Ohio) Strategies of Display: the museum and the commercial art gallery in nineteenth-century Britain

16.50 – Closing Remarks: Alan Crookham, Chair, MGHG

Art workshop at Gallery experiments with virtual exhibitions in Second Life

2010-07-01T13:49:00.004+01:00

Next Saturday, 10 July, the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery is running an innovative new adult workshop, led by artist Hayley Goodsell. Hayley has been inspired by the Haunch of Venison's much talked about show, 'Shoebox Art,' which invited some of the country's top artists to decorate a room within a shoebox. Hayley is inviting her participants to do the same, creating a bedroom from their past, a dream or one from a photograph. Then, the works will be photographed and re-created in a virtual format online, in Second Life. Thus, anyone in the world will be able to visit the resulting artworks!

Second Life (for those of you as tech-savvy as I was a few weeks ago) is an online 'virtual world' where users - represented by avatar characters - can build their own environments and interact with other avatars. The University has leased some 'virtual land' for researchers to experiment with this phenomenon and many different projects have resulted. The virtual island where the University of Leeds and other sister organisations are based is called 'Education UK'. If you log into the programme online, you'll know you've found the right place if you spot our iconic Parkinson Building in virtual form! You'll also encounter the results of various research projects, including artificially intelligent beasts and a hip disco. (To get a sneak peak at the Education UK island, watch this You Tube video - though this is 3 years old and many new things have been added since!)

The workshop runs from 11-4pm on 10 July (with lunchbreak). Materials fee is £5 or £4 student concessions. To book, please contact Hayley by email: hayley@hayleylouisegoodsell.com

'All Over the Place' opening night

2010-06-21T18:13:00.010+01:00

Come one come all to our next exhibition opening! 'All Over the Place: Drawing Place, Drawing Space' opens tomorrow evening from 6-8pm at SAB Gallery. Among the 17 artists involved, 4 are lecturers in the School of Design. All are inspired by the relationship between space/place and drawing - with varied resulting images.

Hope to see you tomorrow, and if not, the show is on until 23 October 2010.

Image: Iguazu Falls, by Emma Stibbon, 2009, chalk on blackboard, (c) The Artist

Also open in the Education Room this summer (14 June- 27 August) is 'Representing the Romany' - materials from Special Collections Romany Collection. Includes a painting on a butterfly wing, among other treasures.

Have a great summer!

Image: Detail from Die Rotwelsch Grammatic, Augsberg, 1520, Leeds University Library Special Collections

Tate Trumps (the noun, not the verb)

2010-06-11T20:43:00.003+01:00

Another interesting app, perhaps more daft than edifying!

Tate Trumps from Hide and Seek on Vimeo.

'Write Me a Picture' creative writing workshops

2010-06-03T11:46:00.002+01:00

The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery invites you all to attend a series of creative writing/art workshops, 'Write Me a Picture'. Run by local poets Suzannah Evans, David Tait and Rosie Blagg, the 3 workshops (all different) investigate the relationship between visual art and verbal creativity. Participants will draw inspiration from the artworks on display to create prose and poetry responses.

This cross-displinary workshop should be of great interest to those of you who are interested in Gallery education and in creative ways of interpreting art. The first workshop runs this Sat, 5 June, 1.30-4pm, and subsequent sessions are 26 June and 17 July.

The workshops are £5/£4 concession rate. Book your place with Suzannah Evans directly by email: evans.suzie@googlemail.com.

MA Symposium 2010

2010-05-29T09:35:00.026+01:00

Some of the MA Museum Studies Postgrads, relaxing in the University
Bar after the three -day Symposium...they bought me a drink
(well Natasha did anyway).....Cheers to you all!

Hello All,

the MA students delivered their dissertation topics at the MA Symposium at the University of Leeds this week. This three-day programme of papers is an annual event in the School and allows the postgraduates from all programmes (Art History, Cultural Studies, Fine Art Practice, and Museum Studies) to share perspectives - the much vaunted 'interdisciplinarity' that Leeds is famous for!
The Museum Studies MAs presented excellent papers (as usual)...and we very much look forward to reading their final dissertations.....here's a flavour of the very varied themes and approaches...WELL DONE ALL OF YOU!

Mark

'Interpreting Heritage' Session Chair, Professor Catherine Karkov
Louise Flower - The History of Theobald's Palace

'Museums and Politics: Global Perspectives Session Chair, Professor Catherine Karkov
Natasha Roberts - Crossing Cultures, Crossing Time
Katherine Ernest - Presenting History in National Military Museums
Sotiria Pizania - Politics and the Museum: the new Acropolis Museum
Rebecca Price - Promoting Culture in Qatar: the political role of the museum
Helen Fairhurst - Preserving National Identity: the Iraq War and the Conservation of Cultural Property

'Considering Curation' Session Chair, Professor Griselda Pollock
Katherine Vaughan - An examination of the documentation of the Curator's work using the Mercer Art Gallery as a case study
Elizabeth Kilburn - The 1938 Loan Exhibition of Pictures and Furniture at Temple Newsam House
Emma Fikkert - Anubis within the Egyptian Galleries at the British Museum
Christine Cant - Curating the Outsider: Surrealist Exhibitionism Then and Now
Hattie Heng Shing Lam - From Democratisation of Culture to Museumification of Objects in the form of Cultural Souvenirs

'Consuming Spaces' Session Chair, Professor Griselda Pollock
Nell Crook - Restaurants in the Contemporary Art Gallery: Spaces of inclusion or elitism?

'Participant Observation' Session Chair, Professor Vanalyne Green
Elizabeth Hardwick - Viewing versus Experience: an exploration of physical and visual art encounters
Ashley Hamilton - Neo-Baroque Aesthetic: Claudio Bravo and the Contemporary Art Market

'Musuems & Politics' Session Chair, Professor David Hill
Jemma Conway - 'Experience Barnsley': reflecting the notion of the community as collector
Elaine Narrie - The Lowry: what role does Culture play in Urban Regeneration?
Melanie Marsh - The National Trust and saving Tyntesfield. Why?

More next year!
mark

Augmented Reality

2010-05-25T18:52:00.007+01:00

The Museum of London have recently brought our their own iPhone app called Street Museum that uses geo-tagging and augmented reality to overlay images from their archive in real time and space. Seems like it could have interesting implications for diffusing museum collections and content, and it's free!

Science & Heritage Talks

2010-05-22T17:46:00.003+01:00

Hello All,

you are warmly invited to our 'Science & Heritage' talk at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery at the University of Leeds on WEDNESDAY 26th May at 6.00pm - wine and nibbles afterwards!

'Metrology as an Investigative Tool'

Liam Blundt

School of Computing and Engineering

University of Huddersfield

ALL WELCOME

These talks are supported by a Higher Education Innovation Fund (HEIF) and the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, and the Centre for Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage at the University of Leeds.

Pavilion

2010-05-22T05:49:00.000+01:00

Hello everyone!

Pavilion will be presenting a series of screenings and events with artist Elizabeth Price in June (15-19) and I thought her work might be of interest to some of you. Elizabeth is an artist who uses "digital video and reprographic media, to reformulate and re-inscribes collections and archives using artefacts drawn from the debris of modernism, popular culture, consumerism and science-fiction." She is currently creating an ongoing series of work called The New Ruined Institute in which each video 'episode' unfolds a different room within a fictional museum. We will be screening the first two parts of the work - WELCOME (the Atrium) and USER GROUP DISCO (the Hall of Sculptures) at Pavilion during the week. We are also running two events with Elizabeth. There's more info about screening times and the events on our newsletter here: http://www.pavilion.org.uk/public/public_html/Newsletters/Elizabeth_Price.htm and there's also an interesting Art Monthly interview with Elizabeth and Paul O'Neill here http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_6735/is_326/ai_n31944778/ that gives some more insight into her practice.

If you are interested in the work and would like to come down as a group (or as individuals!) just let me know (gill@pavilion.org.uk) (It's a small space so we're asking people to book) The two videos last 19 minutes in total!

Best Wishes

Gill - Programme Producer (Interaction), Pavilion

Leeds Public Art Walk

2010-05-13T18:04:00.018+01:00

I had the pleasure and privilege of leading one of the monthly art walks organised by Pavilion and Project Space Leeds last week, for which thanks must go to Gill for the invitation and rounding up such an impressive array of lovely people for me to talk at, to and with. For those of you who couldn't make it, I've archived the route we took and works we saw on map below. The loose theme of the walk was culture and urban regeneration, taking in the redevelopment of the Corn Exchange, Brewery Wharf and Holbeck Urban Village in relation to the ways in which public art has been deployed in each of these reconstructed, reconstituted areas of the city.

View Leeds Art Walk in a larger map

Fragments of Conversation (and textiles)

2010-05-09T22:16:00.006+01:00

Hello All,

the textile thread (now that's a real pun!) has generated really interesting debate, and much of it remains hidden in the 'comments' section for the Textile Fragments posts...and in the interest of continuing this important discussion I've cut-and-pasted the comments into a main post here....
Here's Polly's post...

'Speaking as someone who is right in the thick of redisplaying a collection of Textile fragments I think it is important if not essential to both place them within some form of narrative context and display them as objects in their own right. I also think that this is entirely possible. On a very practical level, I have to cater for the casual visitor who needs immediate colorful impact to spark their interest. I need to support existing schools workshops which cover both style and design and history. I have to support the needs of design students who come for immediate inspiration. I also have to cater to the textile enthusiasts who are the biggest advocates of the collection. I am also duty bound to tell something of the collectors who generously gave these objects. Although telling the story of collectors can be considered a bit outdated, I do believe that the public should be aware that the availability of these objects is often due to the extroidinary generosity of others."Am I trying to do too much?" I sometimes wonder. What I am sure of is that textiles have the capacity to tell many stories. They are complete objects in themselves whose individual stories need telling. They are also parts of whole objects, tangible traces of people or places. If we wish to seek a theoretical framework for the display of textiles I would consider them as relics. Powerful in themselves and pointing outwards to the otherness of the past.'
And 'Leeds Tapestry'....response...
'In an ideal world I'm sure we would all want to see every single object in museums placed in context, each with the narrative of how it was made, used and by whom and why it has survived to the twenty-first century. I, too, can't resist the story and the context which is why I'm spending more time than I should justifying each piece on Leeds Tapestry.

If the Timorous Beasties quilt in the V&A exhibition is accessioned by the museum then this is exactly what can be done, though it won't exactly be a riveting story, missing the almost essential ingredient of previous ownership (OK, that's an entirely different discussion). The joy of many fragments is speculation and discussion between scholars. If curators decide that only textiles which can tell the story are to be displayed then surely museums would suffer.

The Textile Study Room at the V&A provides as many examples as possible in a small space. Maybe not riveting viewing for the general public but the place to go as a textile historian. Fortunately that particular museum is large enough to cater both for tourists and scholars. The new Medieval and Renaissance Gallery puts its textile examples in context and who knows it may be just the place to encourage further study of the subject.

From experience, I find textile scholarship very poorly served by country houses open to the public, in particular National Trust properties. Few of the guide books make much reference to the textiles or the wallpapers, concentrating largely on the reason the house was accepted by the Trust (vast collection of Chippendale, home of Churchill etc). I acknowledge we're a minority sport so perhaps it's time that museums and galleries came up with a plan to serve both scholars and 'the majority'. Some of the major art galleries have a printing machine where a visitor can put money in the slot and request a particular print. Wouldn't it be wonderful to be able to request a picture and the full details (if any known) of particular textiles, wallpapers, or any other individual item (presumably people researching other subjects have the same problem)?

Who knows, when fewer and fewer curators have time to spend on scholarship, perhaps the transfer of knowledge could be a two-way process.'
And Sally Tatters...
'Hi Mark, and thanks for the namecheck. Sorry to be a long time responding, but I've been a long time thinking. I find I am better at asking questions than at answering them. My concern, after reading your first post, was the same as that expressed by the Leeds Tapestry writer, that while the drive to 'tell a story' may improve the visitor experience for some, it may downgrade it for others. I think sadly of a favourite museum with a huge collection of costume and quilts, where the already small costume gallery has shrunk even further to make way for an 'interpretation room' in which a video (telling a story) plays on a loop and there are occasional practical demonstrations. A video, however interesting, is not something you can pause in front of and study in detail, the way you can the weave of a stunning brocade or the embroidery on a cuff. Live interpretation is dependent on willing volunteers, and on the visitor being there on the right day at the right time. Otherwise their experience is just of an empty room. In many museums now, staffing cuts, pressure on space, and even health and safety issues reduce access to items in store, so they are available only to the few who are groups or researchers. It is the interested amateur, neither new to the subject nor an accredited researcher, who I fear will fall between the two stools. And in the ageing population we are constantly reminded we are, there are a lot of us interested amateurs about.
The current Quilts exhibition at the V&A is a case in point. Titled 'Hidden Histories, Untold Stories', it is entirely designed around the context of the pieces. Arts correspondents from Radio 4 who readily admitted sinking hearts at the assignment went on to deliver rave reviews. However, some quilt historians (you may say obsessives) who found the presentation didn't always allow them to see and learn what they hoped for, in the way they hoped for, have been criticised for being 'picky and complaining', and by implication 'ungrateful'. Years from now the art correspondents will probably never have had another thought about the quilts, but the quilt historians may still be feeling shortchanged. So there were winners and losers. I'm sure the exhibition will have been a financial success, but is that the most important thing? As with my previous comment, I hasten to add that is a serious question, as I know we have to live in the real world. Is the financial imperative, the bums on seats, the most important consideration now in the museum world? Without it do we risk losing collections altogether through lack of financial support? Putting readers on the spot, I have another question. If you ran your own museum, had nobody to answer to, no political masters, no financial constraints, no visitor numbers to meet, what would your choice of display style be?'
And finally, Arwa's post.....
'Hi Mark and sally
My name is Arwa , I am from Suadi Arabia and I am here in Leeds university doing post doctoral.
My PhD was : Consolidation, Implementation & Documentation of some Saudi Arabian's Traditional Cloths.
Actually, I like your work and ideas about textiles and I think that we share the same interest. I would like to contact with you so we could discuss some relevant issues (the cultural values of traditional costume and textile)
My email is:

arwadk@gmail.com '

Whilst textiles are the focus of these debates it seems, to me anyway, that the 'problems' (if indeed they are problems?) remain central to the role and purpose of the museum itself. More discussion on this would be welcome....maybe even some kind of 'discussion group', conference, or other kind of 'space' would be useful?
Mark

Textile Fragments

2010-04-24T08:18:00.006+01:00

Hi All, and especially to 'Sally Tatters' - many thanks for the comment btw, it's good to know that someone is reading our museum blog...(and sorry for the delay in reply posting...I was stuck in Belgium....)

The blog entry on Fragments and History (see entry on 22nd March), has generated some interest and Sally has left some thought provoking comments - (I've cut and pasted it here in the hope of generating a debate on this important topic...rather than hiding it away in the comments list at the bottom of the 22nd March entry...hope that's OK Sally?....)

Anyway, Sally comments -
"Are you getting obsessed with form over function? As a lover of textiles I actually go looking for them in museums in order to study them as individual pieces, rather than to 'place them in the middle of a narrative'. The 'old textile displays' have served me well in the past. How would you see a change of display improving that experience for me?"

I don't know if this is about form over function...I suppose I was interested in how museums have changed over the past 10 years and what challenges there are for interpretation and 'use' for some kinds of objects in the museum (or fragments of objects...that's moot point I suppose..when is an object a 'fragment'?...aren't all objects 'fragments' of social life?....). I'm genuinely interested in this, as I say, because we (Leeds Uni) have been working on a project that addresses this very 'problem' - (and I take your point about the textile fragments being useful and interesting for you..that is obviously important - but it does draw attention to the notion that the meanings assigned to objects are just as much a part of the ways in which they have been collected (and used) before they enter the museum....).
I suppose my real point was in relation to the propensity (at present) for museum interpretation/exhibition designers to create 'narratives' for their displays...(this, I think is part of a much broader cultural phemonemon I think....you just need to watch the News to recognise that all news reports seem to be 'stories'(I'm thinking of the way that they are visually structured in particular)...everything seems to be a 'story' these days (I'm painting with a broad brush here I know...). And my question was (is), what does the museum do with these 'fragments' of textiles given this need to create 'stories'?.... Do we have 'stories' of collecting (a bit 'old hat' by now I think...(there's my first costume pun)...Do we have 'stories' of design?..Do we have 'stories' of cultural exchange?..etc etc etc...but all of these have been done before.....So what do we do (if we need to do anything of course) with these fragments?
The question becomes (is) important given the push by government/funding bodies to make culture an 'instrument' (i.e. to ensure it is put to use) and the requirement that objects in museums should 'speak' and be relevant beyond their 'conventional' audiences....

What do you think?

BTW....Sally Tatters own blog is fab...here's a link (I've also linked it from our 'Favourite Blogs' list)
http://textilehunter.blogspot.com/

Mark

Architectural Objects

2010-04-18T12:35:00.006+01:00

Alan Davie at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery

2010-04-01T11:36:00.004+01:00

Thanks to everyone who turned up at our recent opening night for 'Alan Davie' on 16 March 2010.

There were several familiar faces from Museum Studies on the evening, including our most wonderful work placement student, Nell Crook. Thanks Nell for helping us get the show up! I'm sure those who came to the event will agree that though the artist couldn't be there himself, his work was most inspiring...and certainly colourful!

Not sure what everyone thinks of the work, or the display itself? We did a 'snapshot' exhibition, as there wasn't a particular group of works Alan wanted us to focus on. As we're not a big space, we can't do a serious overview, so it was just a collection of highlights from his post-war career beginnings in 1948 to today. To augment this brief vision of his career, I've included some ephemera in a case: poetry he wrote to his father while serving in WWII and couldn't paint, jewellery he made in the late 40s-ea.50s when he had temporarily turned away from painting, his pilot's logbook from his gliding exploits in the 1960s and his recent rough sketches - to show the constant automatic drawing that informs his painting. We also have some experimental jazz recordings by Alan playing in the Gallery. Alan's had such a prolific career, and done so much in his life, it was really hard to represent it in such a small space! Does it work for you? Criticisms and thoughts are always encouraged...

Happy Easter all!

Layla

News: Jewish Museum reopened (and reimagined)

2010-03-26T11:21:00.004Z

For those interested in how cultural diversity is represented in London's museum scene: the Jewish Museum has reopened after a lengthy extension and total refurbishment campaign:
http://www.jewishmuseum.org.uk/New%20museum%20-%20now%20open!
I gather it has done some serious reimagining of how to re-present its collection.
I have not visited yet, but if any of you have a chance to visit over the next few months, I'd love to hear from you with your impressions!

Museology Seminar Series

2010-03-26T06:51:00.009Z

Hello All,

you are all warmly welcome to come along to our next Museology Seminar Series talk, supported by the Centre for Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage. We are very pleased to announce that Dr Rhiannon Mason, Senior Lecturer from the International Centre for Cultural and Heritage Studies at the University of Newcastle is coming to talk to us. The title of Rhiannon's talk is:

'One Voice to Many Voices: Co-production in Art Gallery Displays'

Wednesday 28th April 2010, 1.00pm - 2.00pm
Old Mining Building, Lecture Theatre

All Welcome

For more information on these seminars email Mark:
m.w.westgarth@leeds.ac.uk

Fragments of History

2010-03-22T09:40:00.025Z

The textile collections displays at the V&A....
Hello all you museum goers...I've been thinking about Textiles lately (mainly because we worked up an application for an AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award with Temple Newsam House on textile collections...more on that soon I hope)....and thought I'd go and check out the textile displays at the V&A in London - this was not my sole purpose of visit actually...I went to see the Strawberry Hill exhibition...which is interesting, but not as interesting as it should/could have been I think?....Anyway, I was not really surprised to see that the textile collection displays were rather dark (such material is quite obviously light sensitive), but was quite surprised to see how 'dated' they are. The comparison to the new displays, such as the Medieval and Renaissance Galleries........(shown here)....are too obvious to state - (and you'll notice that textiles are on display here too.....)
However, comparing them does direct attention to something that appears (to me anyway) to be interesting....i.e. the role/nature of the 'fragment'. The majority of the textile collections are quite literally 'fragments', (displayed in mahogany frames that you need to slide out to see, but this is by the bye)....and the things in the Medieval and Renaissance galleries are also 'fragments' - but there seems to be a kind of coherence in the new galleries that's absent in the old textile displays (maybe it's just to do with narrative....?)...Anyway, I only mention this because on my way between the new Medieval and Renaissance Galleries and the Textiles Galleries I came across a display of fragments that seemed to offer a similar kind of fragmentary narrative as the textiles displays..........the Cast Court (and more especially, Trajan's Column). The Column, cut in two, displayed and displaced, just reminded me of the cut squares of textile fragments in the textile displays. You kind of understand what they are, but at the same time you don't....if you get my drift?
Anyway...food for thought?....
Mark

Museum Studies Careers Workshop

2010-03-15T12:41:00.002Z

Following on from the Transforming Skills event organised by Mark, which took place in February, I have organised a Careers Workshop for Art Gallery and Museum Studies students. The event is aimed at teaching students (including myself) how to write a successful job application, CV and how to prepare for a job interview. A number of museum and arts professionals from around the country have been kind enough to give up their time to come and speak to the students about their experiences in the industry. The organisations involved include the Leeds City Council, Leeds City Art Gallery, Henry Moore Institute, York City Art Gallery, East Streets Arts, Marks and Spencers, Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery, Ryedale Folk Museum and the Museums and Libraries Association in Bristol. This event will give us a great chance to ask all those niggling questions we have as well as providing us with a great opportunity to network and meet people in the industry!

The event is taking place on Friday 16th April in the Old Mining Building, G.19, between 10am and around 3pm. Lunch is provided and their will be refreshments throughout the day - what more could you want?!

Hybrid Art & Science Symposium

2010-03-06T17:32:00.004Z

I'm going along to this symposium and I've heard there's still places available until the 13th of March if anyone else is interested, it's £15 for students and £20 for grown-ups. It looks like an excellent companion to the museum and heritage technology seminars we've been treated to recently. There's more information here.

The London Art Market

2010-03-05T09:43:00.007Z

Hi All,
me a just a few of the undergrads went on a field trip to London on Wednesday this week, as part of the level 3 module 'The Art Market: moments, methodologies and meanings'. Here they are outside of Sotheby's in Bond Street....we visited quite a few 'spaces and places' associated with the art market...including some major dealerships such as Marlborough Fine Art, Richard Green (who was packing off for the art fair in Maastricht), Mallet (the famous furniture and dec art dealers) and, of course, White Cube. We also took in an auction sale at Bonhams, Bond Street, and whilst there were'nt any spectacular prices at the sale, the students did see the intense social processes at work in these 'Tournaments of Value' (as cultural theorists call such events).
Anyway, more anon on the relationships between art market and the museum....
Mark

Fakes, Forgeries and Fear

2010-02-27T10:18:00.011Z

Hello All,

I popped into the V&A last week, had a look at the new Medieval & Renaissance Galleries, which are fabulous....I'd certainly recommend them..the V&A is beginning to change quite radically I think....it's becoming much more interdisciplinary in it's presentation of objects. Maybe it could go one post-post-modern step further and ignore/disrupt historical 'periods' such as Medieval-Renaissance....(I think it's trying to do that to be fair in these new galleries...)
But anyway, the most interesting part of my visit was the 'The Metropolitan Police Service's Investigation of Fakes & Forgeries' exhibition (hardly a snappy title!)....it's very interesting actually...There used to be a rather subliminal 'fakes' display in the British Galleries, right near the end of the route, in a case with 'dealers and the museum' displays....it's curious how when the dealer makes an appearance in the biography of an object, the work 'fake' is never far behind....but anyway, I thought this new exhibition (sadly now closed I think?) articulated a similar subliminal response....here the 'fakes' are hived off, in there separate 'cage', locked away like the 'criminals' that they are....And by extension of course, the rest of the objects in the museum are not to be contaminated by these aberrant objects...I think there is a 'fear' here....don't you think?.....
Maybe a much better strategy would have been to diffuse these objects throughout the museum, and have them pop up in unexpected places (as fakes do, in real life!)...that would highlight in a much more sophisticated way the critical role that 'fakes' play in the discourse....and it would be fun.....and there's not much fun in fakes if you're a museum!
Mark

Museology Seminar Series

2010-02-23T18:17:00.004Z

The Centre for Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage at the University of Leeds are pleased to announce the next in our Museology Seminar Series - all are welcome!...Do come along...

Thursday 18th March 2010 at 4.00pm - 5.00pm, Room B.22, Parkinson Building, Leeds University.

'Researching 70 Years of Jewish Exhibitions and Museums in London: Questions, Motifs, Results'
Kathrin Pieren, doctoral candidate, Institute of Historical Research, University of London.

We look forward to seeing you all at the seminar...
Mark

Museum & Heritage Technology Seminars

2010-02-10T08:22:00.003Z

Hi all,
the Centre for Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage at the University of Leeds is hosting a series of Networking Events as part of a successful Higher Education Innovation Fund application. The events take place at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery at the University at 6.00pm and you are very welcome to come along, they last about 1 hour (45 min lecture and time for discussion...followed by drinks and nibbles)...hope to see you there!

Wednesday 24th February 2010 at 6.00pm - Professor Robert Cywinski (Applied Sciences, University of Huddersfield) 'Neutrons, Nuclear Reactors, Particle Accelerators....and Museums'

Wednesday 3rd March 2010 at 6.00pm - Dr Martin Cooper (Conservation Technology Lab, National Museums Liverpool) '3D Scanning of Cultural heritage: experiences at National Museums'

More to come...keep your eye on the Blog...

Mark

Don't Ask for the Mona Lisa!

2010-02-08T15:46:00.003Z

Have you ever wondered how to turn your idea into an actual exhibition? Then this forthcoming seminar supported by the Association of Art Historians, on campus at Devonshire Hall may be for you!

Seminar: 'Don't Ask for the Mona Lisa: Collaborations between Academics and Art Galleries'

Thursday, 18 March 2010, 10.30-4pm

Tickets cost £30 for non-members, £18 for AAH members
The seminar, held at Devonshire Hall (University of Leeds) will focus in on three collaborative papers, where curators and academics will reflect on their experience of working together on exhibitions. The day will conclude with a roundtable discussion, with curators, academics and representatives of the key funding councils participating.

To book or for more information please visit the website of the Association of Art Historians (AAH):
http://www.aah.org.uk/museums-and-exhibitions

Supported by the Association of Art Historians, in collaboration with the Centre for Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage (University of Leeds)

With the increase in funding initiatives aimed at encouraging knowledge transfer and collaboration, the event is aimed at academic art historians who have had little or no experience of organising exhibitions and is meant to be practical above all. It aims to explore questions such as; Can particular academic research projects influence exhibition planning? Who contacts who; the researcher or the gallery and who has the initial concept? Should the aim be to fit into a wider set of themes proposed by the Gallery in its programme planning? How do you prepare the proposal; should it consist of a written proposal or a formal presentation? Should you use illustrations and suggestions for exhibits as part of your proposal? Does the gallery and the researcher develop their own views of how the exhibition might look, or is this the role of a designer at a later stage? Does the proposal have to progress through several stages before it is finally accepted? How long does this process take? How long does it take from having the proposal to the opening of the exhibition? At what stage do you agree the allocation of responsibilities between the curator and the researcher for producing the exhibition? How much is the average overall budget for producing an exhibition? What are the benefits/limitations/problems of working in collaboration with researchers from outside of the gallery?

We are hoping to attract an audience of both curators and academics and the afternoon session will aim to be as interactive as possible in order to assist colleagues in exhibition planning, funding application preparation and developing collaborative partnerships.

Speakers:
Prof Catherine Karkov (University of Leeds) with Ellen Tait, Curatorial Assistant-Exhibitions, Henry Moore Institute (now at National Railways Museum)
Prof David Jackson (University of Leeds) with Edwin Becker, Head of Exhibitions, Van Gogh Museum
Prof David Hill (University of Leeds) with May Redfern (former) Head of Collections, Learning and Access, Harewood House

Is Habermas a Twitterer?

2010-02-04T18:13:00.003Z

No.

But this really tickled me anyway:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/feb/02/jurgen-habermas-twitter-philosopher

Happy New Year

2010-02-03T21:49:00.002Z

February...Gosh is it that time already?
The Blog appears to have been in some kind of hibernation....but anyway, all the students are back to work, week 1 has started (week 2 has started!) and it's Supervision time for the Research PGs; Placement time for the Taught PGs; 'Miller Time' (I jest) for the UGs.
There's been lots happening on the Museums and Art Gallery programme, and the History of Art with Museum Studies Programme...some really fantastic placement opportunities for the PGs and some interesting visits/seminar sessions for the UGs.....So...STUDENTS....why don't you let us (the world) know what's been happening?

MARK

Curator Mel Gooding to speak at SAB Gallery

2010-01-21T14:50:00.004Z

Next week, on Thurs 28 Jan 2010 at 6pm, eminent art writer and critic Mel Gooding will speak at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery about curating our current exhibition 'A Discipline of the Mind.' The event is free and open to all, so it's a great opportunity to hear this experienced curator discuss his concept and methodology.

Mel is a fascinating individual, with plenty of stories about figures in the art world he's met in the course of his work - in particular, the many audio interviews he's conducted with major British artist in the past decades for the National Life Stories: Artists' Lives project. Well worth dropping by to meet him!

Image: Glacier Knot, by Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, 1978,mixed media, ink on card (BGT 76) (c) The Barns Graham Charitable Trust

Diplomatic Mission to the East Midlands

2009-12-16T16:03:00.004Z

After an indecently early train journey, Arwa and I were treated to a really excellent and diverse series of papers and events bookended by keynote speakers Dr. Kostas Arvanitis and Professor Sue Pearce. All the papers, including my own garbled attempt, were heroically summarised live by Leicester PhD student Jenny. You can find them, and much else besides, on the Materiality and Intangibility: Contested Zones Blog.

Svalbard Museum

2009-12-13T21:33:00.004Z

For the last couple of years my dad has been working on a project in Longyearbyen, Svalbard. Despite being the largest town in Svalbard, Longyearbyen is tiny with around 2060 inhabitants! In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, people came to Svalbard to hunt whales and seals, and the islands teemed with Dutch, British, Russian and Scandinavian whalers. Since the early twentieth century, coal has been Svalbard's gold and a lot of people have made a fortune from this industry (not my dad...) Think of it as the Norwegian equivalent of Jersey...

On his last trip over my dad managed to visit the Svalbard Museum, which just so happens to be the northernmost museum in the world! The museum first opened in 1979, and until December 2005 it was located in the oldest part of Longyearbyen. The new Svalbard Museum opened on 26th April 2006 in the Svalbard Science Centre, together with The University Centre in Svalbard, The Norwegian Polar Institute and The Governor of Svalbard's environalmental information. The main aim of the museum is 'to impart knowledge and understanding of the relations between nature, culture, landscape, human activity, technology and the environment in the Arctic.' The museum also engages in research to discover new ways of life and standard of living through 400 years of human activity in Svalbard. More museum orientated tasks include the coordination of all of the museum collections in Svalbard into a common record, providing access for all to the historical material and records. The photo collection is being uploaded onto the museum website at the moment....

http://karmatrendz.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/svalbard_science_centre_05.jpg Check out the external architecture of the museum....postmodern architect meets curator?

Check out the website and let me know what you think to the museum...there is a virtual tour type thing (not too dissimilar to The Talking Walls application I mentioned in my earlier post!) which allows you to look at the exhibitions more closely...

http://www.svalbardmuseum.no/eindex.php?kategori=1