Created in Birmingham |

Topshop Bandstand Picnic

16 June 2010 - 12:00pm

Topshop are putting on a series of picnic gigs in London, Bristol, Liverpool and Birmingham for Teenage Cancer Trust and the Birmingham one is this Sunday (20 June) at University of Birmingham’s Vale Village from 12pm.

Topping the bill are my old Cardiff University chums done good Los Campesinos!, with support from I Blame Coco, Eliza Doolittle and Summer Camp, as well as DJ sets from Broken Hearts, Blonde Ambition and special guests.

Tickets are £10, with all profits going to the Trust, and are available from this link here and the Bullring Topshop store. They’re limited to 500, so get your skates on if you want to go.

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Kings Heath Big Summer Party

16 June 2010 - 10:00am

There’s a promise of bunting on the flyer, so you can guarantee there’ll be a party atmosphere at the Kings Heath Big Summer Party on Saturday. Here’s that flyer I mentioned:

So, if food, craft, sports and games are your thing, you could do worse than to get yourself down to Kings Heath High Street for some free, all-day fun courtesy of Kings Heath Centre Partnership. Here’s a little map and some more detail:

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Some rather good promos

15 June 2010 - 4:52pm

Some people send a press release. Some people go a little further.

First up is this film for Bright Space’s Platform project. Filmed by Courtney Salmon and starring Matt Windle.

And secondly, there’s this rather good promo for the Birmingham European Theatre Festival 2010 (30 June to 3 July).

Update: seems the BE Festival trailer’s been deleted. Shame that.

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Synth Eastwood in Birmingham

15 June 2010 - 11:50am

Synth Eastwood come to Birmingham for the Flatpack Festival. They turned up early, ran around taking photos (some in the CiB Shop – hello Aaron and Pete) and used them in the visuals for their show.

This video (spotted by More Canals) explains things better:

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Travelling Menagerie at Here and Now Gallery

15 June 2010 - 8:48am

Local illustration collective Girls Who Draw – including Gemma Correll, Anke Weckmann, Mary Kilvert, Sarah Ray, Kate Hindley, Ruth Green, Currentstate, Yee Ting Kuit, Karoline Rerrie and Michelle Turton – are taking their exhibition ‘Travelling Menagerie’ to the Here and Now Gallery in Falmouth throughout July. More info at menageriebook.blogspot.com

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Treasured – A Secret Journey

14 June 2010 - 2:27pm

Jane Packman’s mac-commissioned show, Treasured, is on from now until 27 June. Book here.

This gentle, interactive performance offers a fleeting experience of a different world. Centred around three pieces of sculptural jewellery – specially commissioned from West Midlands jewellers – it is influenced by dressing ceremonies and fantastical storytelling

The jewellery’s provided by Mikaela Lyons, John Moore and Louise Bryan.

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Roadworks

14 June 2010 - 8:59am

If you’re out and about today you might catch the over-capitalised (shouty?) ROADWORKS project, Birmingham’s contribution to PARK(ing) Day.

Located in close proximity to Victoria Square, St Phillips Cathedral (Colmore Row) and Waterloo Street the ROADWORKS will feature:

‘Not My Type’ by Fluid Design and collective illustrators
Three easels will be set up and some of Birmingham’s best graphic designers will be demonstrating their skills, illustrating letters forms and numbers, as the public look on.
‘Camera Obscura ‘ by Arlene Burnett
This will be a ‘walk in camera’ in a light proof garden shed, projecting an image of some of Birmingham’s impressive civic buildings onto its inside surfaces.
‘The Incidental Estate’ by Trevor Pitt
A domestic, suburban garden transplanted into the city centre. A space to sit in, enjoy the flowers and consider the sense of freedom it can give you.
Human, All too Human’ by Nat Pitt
This is a bird spotters hide, fitted with periscopes for members of the public to view animal characters who will be appearing nearby, you may spot an owl with a pushchair, a cat traffic warden or a badger with a briefcase.
‘Digger’s Revival’ by Uddin and Elsey
This artist’s duo will create a growing environment, inspired by Van Gogh’s painting of the ‘Potato Planters’, with wooden pallets, grow bags and plants. They will invite the public to take away seeds and encourage them to grow their own vegetables.

(Via Birmingham Newsroom)

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Birmingham degree shows

13 June 2010 - 11:40am

I’ll admit I’ve slightly lost track of what’s going on where and when.

More Canals Than Venice has the list of BIAD shows.

We’ve mentioned Birmingham Metropolitan College’s show for the Diploma in Professional Photo Imaging. There’s a show called We Are The New DNA at the FEED and fashion labs at Millennium Point too, but I can’t find any info online (see photo of poster below instead).

What have I missed?

Also, if you’re doing a few of these shows you might want to check out clichespotting.com.

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A bit of voting

12 June 2010 - 10:16am

Ian and Pip from 7 Inch Cinema/Flatpack Festival have been nominated for The Hospital Club 100 which is:

a search for the most influential people in the creative and media industries, with the emphasis on current contribution and importance, not just the size of someone’s celebrity status, profile, bank balance, titles or past reputation

I’ve no idea what the award would mean but they say it’ll make their mums proud, which is good enough reason for me. Besides, Ian and Pip are good souls who do some good work. Speaking of which, they have some events coming up.

Trawling down the other nominees, I spotted Sue Collins in the ‘Art’ category. The blurb says this about her:

She has recently just completed a her first solo museum show at IKON in Birmingham, and in response was dubbed by the Mirror as the ‘worst artist in Britain’

Which was enough to secure my vote.

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Links for 11 June 2010

11 June 2010 - 6:54pm

CRAIN report « D’log
“A useful seven page report from the West Midlands Cultural Research & Intelligence Network conference (PDF link), held in Birmingham on 2nd June 2010″
Audition Call « Stan’s Cafe Theatre Company
Quick, bright female capable of playing between 18-30 wanted to perform with Stan’s Cafe in Beijing in November. Click the linky for details
Birmingham Post – New chairman for Cre8us
“Professor Michael Tovey, responsible for leading and co-ordinating design education and applied research at Coventry University, has been appointed to the board of Cre8us”
Birmingham School of Media runs best courses in the country
Huzzah!
Screen WM & BAFTA Present: Filmmaking and Archive Workshops
Courses. Not for horses
Artist Talk @ Eastside Projects and Durational Performance @ The Rea Garden | Behind Closed Doors
“We would like to invite you to the finale of Brigid McLeer’s residency at The Rea Garden on Saturday 19th June”
art hamster in the city
Don’t think I’ve linked to this one before, but probably should have. Contains mentions of arts stuff happening around Brum. Sarah Silverwood is the author
Signal box L
Someone’s built a fairly impressive model of the New Street Signal Box
The Interview: Ben Javens « The Internationalist
Ben did some stuff for 8th Continent, a Californian soy milk company. Someone interviewed him about that
A seismic shift in the UK landscape
CiB got props in PR Week at the end of April: “the artistic and creative community website Created in Birmingham, which won a Blog Award in 2008, is popular”. Not sure why that made me laugh so much, but it did. The award was 2009, btw

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Platform

11 June 2010 - 4:11pm

Bright Space are doing a project called Platform and they’re after youngsters:

Platform will be a blog written by 16-19 year olds, featuring articles, reviews, events listings and much more. Written by young people for young people it will represent a unique perspective on arts activity in Birmingham.

We are now looking to recruit 15 young people aged 16-19 years old who are interested in reporting, reviewing and attending the many cultural events in and around the city, including exhibitions, theatre, dance, launches and gigs.

Successful applicants will receive a £200 bursary and the opportunity to attend a week long intensive summer school in August, which will highlight the many techniques and skills they will need to become fully fledged Platform bloggers

Which sounds like a pretty decent deal. All you have to do to take advantage is write a 200 word article on a creative passion that you have, including your name, address, date of birth and contact details and send it to Bright Space. You need to be 16-19 years old and available on certain dates. More info on all that on the Platform website.

Seems a shame to let the young folks get all the fun though – I reckon doing a project like this with OAPS/accountants/badminton players/whatever could be fun.

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Art Heist

10 June 2010 - 11:36am

I just had an email about an upcoming thing called Art Heist at New Art Gallery Walsall, which looks really interesting – something between an exhibition, a game, theatre and… who knows what. Here’s some copy/pasted info:

Artist collective Coney and artificial intelligence consultancy Winterwell are joining forces to create an adventure in The New Gallery Walsall about conceptual art, forgery and the moment ideas become art.

They would like to invite you to go on a little adventure with them, made especially for you and exploring adventure as a way to engage audiences with art. Your expert input will help shape this new piece where the general public become art thieves and forgers planning and staging a daring heist!

The Game of Art will take place on Saturday 26 June from 10am – 4pm at The New Art Gallery Walsall, Gallery Square, Walsall WS2 8LG

The full thing will be on between 26 June and 31 October. More info via the gallery’s website.

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I’m a photographer, not a terrorist!

9 June 2010 - 10:00am

I’m a photographer, not a terrorist! is a project by Birmingham Metropolitan College’s Diploma of Professional Photo Imaging students.

Their end of year show will be for one night at Masonic Buildings on Severn Street, Birmingham on 25th June from 6.30pm till 9.00pm and the after show party will be at the same venue from 9.00pm till late, by invitation only.

Here’s some background to the project:

The students, this year, have chosen to voice their displeasure and resentment at the draconian and ill-conceived Section 44 of the Terrorism Act. Many of the students have been accosted and questioned by the police and security guards whilst in the act of taking photographs for assignments in the course. Also, many of the public have confronted the students during their photographic activities accusing them of potential child offences even though they were clearly photographing a tree or derelict buildings etc.

There’s more on their website here.

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Does Birmingham Future interest you?

8 June 2010 - 3:33pm

Birmingham Future bills itself as:

Birmingham’s leading membership organisation for young professionals working in the professional, financial and creative services sectors

Chris Brown is involved with them and has a question or two:

One of the things I’ve been tasked to look into is why there is a lack of creatives at these events. Is it cost, type of events or simply a lack of understanding to what Birmingham Future is. Perhaps it is the speaker or even the lack of other creatives attending

I’m guessing that there are a few people who read this who would describe themselves as working in the creative service sector (and several more who would rather be beaten with a stick than referred to as ‘a creative’). Have you got any thoughts on this?

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Heard and Not Seen

8 June 2010 - 11:00am

Heard And Not Seen (HANS) is an arts project and exhibition at Gallery 36 at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery by artists Sandra Hall and Mitra Memarzia, in association with Friction Arts.

Here’s what the project’s website has to say about it all:

The project aims to create a unique, safe space for people to meet and ask questions with each other, of each other; particularly about faith, religion and spirituality.

There is a clear need for ordinary people to discuss, express and enquire about aspects of daily Muslim and religious life in response to the climate of polarised media reporting.

Visitors will be invited to interact with the installation that consists of a series of freestanding sculptures, photographs and projections. The exhibition contents were generated from community workshops and invites audiences to ask and explore.

For more information on the project, which runs from 10th July to 22nd August, check out the Heard and Not Seen website here.

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D8 Magazine

8 June 2010 - 11:00am

D8 are a design consultancy firm based in The Custard Factory and they’ve just launched the first edition of their D8 Magazine. You can have a browse by clicking this link or the image below.

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MOM – a meeting of minds

7 June 2010 - 2:08pm

There’s been lots of examples of Birmingham artists banding together to do stuff and put on shows together recently – Not My Type, the Grand Union, stuff happening at the Lombard Method, the Freestyle/Untitled exhibitions at the Hare and Hounds and plenty more besides.

The next one to add to that list is the Meeting of Minds exhibition (also mentioned on Best Believe) which is the next up in the series of really rather excellent exhibitions at the Sauce Gallery.

This one brings together a bunch of people I’ve heard of (Lucy McLauchlan, Mac 1, Matt Watkins, Gavin Campbell) and a bunch I’m as yet ignorant of (Andy Tattoo, Glenn Anderson, Jon Paul Hollinsworth, Kevin Kafesu, Guy Carlos, Kosmic Neil, Lisa Travers, Richard Coldicott, Skank, Stuart Styles, Tony Graffiti and Victor TX).

The launch party will be on Thursday 24 June from 5pm at the Sauce Gallery (Custard Factory).

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I Am Camera

7 June 2010 - 10:00am

I Am Camera is an exhibition featuring 25 photographers displaying work at Boxxed on Floodgate Street in Digbeth between 10th and 19th of June.

Here’s some more words about it:

I Am Camera is a collective showcase of work put together by a group of emerging and established artists who are currently rooted within Birmingham.

The exhibition will showcase the work of these artists who all come from a wide range of visual media professions including Fine Art, Documentary, Landscape, Fashion and Commercial roles.

I Am Camera is happy to be bringing this event to the heart of Birmingham between the 10th & 19th of June. There will most certainly be something for everyone to feast their eyes upon so why not pop by say hello and enjoy the work on show?

There’s also a handy list of all the artists on show on the I Am Camera website here.

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Alexandra Theatre summer brochure

5 June 2010 - 10:00am

Alexandra Theatre’s summer 2010 brochure is online now and you can have a browse through it here.

A notable highlight from the programme is the acclaimed Monty Python’s Spamalot, which comes to the Alex in the winter. Even better, if you book your tickets for before 31st August 2010 you’ll get £5.00 off per ticket. Nice.

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Stirchley Thought Exchange

4 June 2010 - 5:03pm

It’s Stirchley Thought Exchange on Pershore Road on Saturday 5th June. There will be a range of activities that will run between 11am – 4pm, including:

People, Plants and Places:

Add you name and favourite plant (and why) to a mini-flag and pop it
on the Birmingham map – so we can trace people’s favourites…

Say it with Flowers:
You will be invited to contribute to the garden of thoughts…

Plant thought exchange:
Plants rescued from Stirchley’s derelict sites will be given back to
the community – come and take a plant and its story – information on
where it has come from and where it would like to live, but be quick,
there are around 40 plants looking for new homes, and they’re sure to
be popular!

Plant Poetry board:
Feel inspired by the plants and their stories? Contribute to the plant
poetry board…

Plant quiz:
Take a quiz sheet and try your hand at identifying parts of Stirchley
by its plant life… there might be a prize in it! So be sure to
enter…

To find out more, have a peek at their blog here.

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