Graphite drawing workshop at the Brindley

At the end of November I led a workshop for adults at the Brindley exploring graphite powder and animation. It was a successful day, with lots of interesting drawings produced which were made into animations on the day:

Participants experimented with hand cut stencils, graphite powder, mark making and using masking tape to create these drawings.

The Portal, work with HMP Wymott and the Harris Museum & Art Gallery

During November 2011 I've been working with 10 men and their tutors in the art class at HMP Wymott for the Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston. The starting point for our work has been a painting of 'Puck' by the artist Richard Dadd.

"Puck”, a central character from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, sits on a toadstool while smaller fairy figures dance around him in moonlight. Dadd's painting evokes the play in an abstract way featuring superb draughtsmanship, a powerful poetic imagination, an intense love of nature, and a mastery of dramatic lighting. For approximately 100 years the painting was in Preston, having been purchased during the early 1850s by Thomas Birchall of Ribbleton Hall, Preston and held by his descendents until the 1960s. In 2011 the painting was purchased for the Harris Museum & Art Gallery with the support of The Art Fund, the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Friends of the Harris Museum & Art Gallery and a bequest from Mrs Dorothy Wade, administered by Arts Council England."

Like the men who took part in this project, Dadd was an incarcerated man, and it is this situation that has inspired the Portal. The men produced collages which were compiled into a book seen here. Inspired by Puck's ability to change situations in A Midsummer Night's Dream, the collages consider what their creators would change in their own lives if they had the magical juice of the love-in-idleness flower that causes such confusion in Shakespeare's play.

Themes of time passing and a desire for luxuries are to be expected from those who have too much of the former and not enough of the latter, but from those basic responses flourish fundamental desires for love, health, family, nature and change, resulting in this appealing collection of collages.

The collages were an important step along the way to completing drawings, which we animated using series of still photographs. The book and animation, plus a drawing on perspex were exhibited as part of the 2011 Harris Open. Together they form a narrative about time passing and transformation providing a window to the lives of the men who created the works.

Made by:
Craig, Joe, John N, John S, Mark, Melvin, Michael, Mike, Rob, and Shane.

Harris Museum & Art Gallery Access and Inclusion Officer: Kyra Milnes

Tutors:
Lindsey Hill, Paul Sanderson and Suzanne Snape

Education Department:
Sue Blackledge and Suzie Doyle

Project volunteer: Sue Seabridge

HMP Wymott
Manchester College
Harris Museum & Art Gallery

Tearing Space Apart at Salford School of Art and Design

I've been working at Salford University as part of AA2A for the past 4 weeks, going in on regular Tuesdays to realise a piece of work that I've wanted to make on a larger scale. And it's been useful. I'm not sure its entirely successful, but it has brought me to a new idea about how to use the process and a link to some of my more theoretical research. I've taken a break this week to reflect on the work done so far and to plan more work to come.

So here is the process I followed to create 'Tearing Space Apart (Salford I)'

• A wall is covered in newspaper
• The newspaper is torn off the wall and methodically numbered
• The wall has co-ordinates marked along its edges
• Fragments of newspaper are placed on the wall at randomly allocated co-ordinates
• Each piece of paper is drawn around a number of times with pencil according to its catalogue number
• Lines do not cross
• The fragments of paper are used again, this time they are outlined using powdered graphite according to randomly allocated co-ordinates
• Ends

And some images.

And some video documentation:

St Helens Open 2011

The St Helens Open exhibition has come around again. I've submitted two works - one has been selected to be shown at the Godfrey Pilkington Gallery and the other is off to (what I term) the Salon des Refuses at MASH art cafe.

Tearing Space Apart. Pencil & Paper. 2011. 23x23cm, £100 framed

Private view takes place Tuesday 15th November 6-8pm and the exhibition continues until 17 December 2011.

Signpost, Schiedam. Stencilled graphite powder on Kraft paper. 50x70cm, £100 framed

St Helens Open
Godfrey Pilkington Gallery, 1st floor, Central Library, Victoria Square, St Helens
and
MASH art cafe, Haydock Street, St Helens.

Wednesday 16 November - Saturday 17 December 2011

Website update

My website has been updated with some recent works, including Motus:Immotus, Digi Dot-to-dot and Tearing Space Apart. New sections include a videos page, where I'll be posting digital works, animation and films documenting process-based work and a books page where you will find a couple of my new forays into artist book making.

An exciting discovery has been Issuu, where i've been able to upload a pdf of my book and embed it into my website, giving a better feel than posting individual images. Thanks to artist Kate Smith who mentioned it on her blog for putting me on to it.

Big Draw at Crmz, Widnes

Halton-based artist collective Markmakers have been in residence at the Crmz, a new youth centre in Widnes as part of the borough's Big Draw activities.

Artists Carys Anne Hughes, Jennifer Kenworthy, Sharon Lelonek and Claire Weetman spent the half term week working with young people at Crmz on a variety of drawing activities.

Carys Anne Hughes took her embroidery practice to the youth centre, creating a curtain with the young people that used continuous line drawing and pattern.

Jennifer Kenworthy, whose work features drawing, embroidery and landscapes, created images on a glass wall with the participants. Using sticky vinyl, they built up images in small pieces.

Right: Curtain with embroidered drawings made by young people with artist Carys Anne Hughes

Vinyl drawings made by young people with Jennifer Kenworthy

Sharon Lelonek is a printmaker who uses pattern and repetition in her work, often using marker pen to draw directly onto metal etching plates. As part of this programme of work, Sharon exhibited one of her prints in a new exhibition facility at the Crmz, sharing real artworks with the young people in the centre. For this big draw activity, Sharon used her technique of marker pen doodles, this time making them onto paper lined pillars that form part of the architecture of the building.

Also working with the architecture of the newly refurbished building was Claire Weetman. In one of her works 'Dicing with Drawing' participants were asked to generate random numbers by rolling dice. They were then able to connect two numbers on the glazed wall of the building using black tape. Young people also created versions of this on paper, using a variety of drawing materials, the results of which were exhibited in the new exhibition frames for their peers to see.

Drawings by young people using chance, dice, and a variety of drawing media

Claire also likes to use Graphite powder to create drawings and has started working with animation in her practice. Working with a small group of young people she helped them to create a short animation called 'Blink'. Using stop motion animation techniques, graphite powder and erasing, they created the following film:

The idea to make drawings of eyes came from the work that Markmakers member Sue Archer had created with a local primary school. The work pictured here is a hanging made from felt that features eyes, noses and mouths, creating abstract faces as it is viewed.

Right: Felt hanging produced by Sue Archer with a local primary school.
Photographer: Luke.

The Big Draw in Congleton

Claire Weetman worked with Cheshire East Council, Congelton Leisure Centre and it's visitors on Saturday 22 October 2011 to create a Big Draw sporting spectacular. Digi Dot-to-dot featured a numbered course, laid out like a dot-to-dot, with flags and fun.

Children, mums and dads all joined in to select a sporting way of navigating the course, which was laid out in the outline of the London 2012 logo for Track Cycling. Space hoppers abounded, hula hoops rotated and families teamed up for wheelbarrow races around the circuit. Skipping dads, crawling mums and crabbing kids competed for top spot on the power lap board, where, unlike Top Gear, points were awarded for a creative method of travel rather than speed.

All of this exhausting activity was filmed from above where the cyclist image could be seen to greatest effect and edited into the following video where the traces of the people can be seen to trace the outline of the figure.

Those who needed a breather from all this activity could release their creative juices on paper, completing dot-to-dots and making their own. Flowers, a combine harvester, sailing boats and a surfing cat were all drawn through the medium of dot-to-dot.

Artist in Residence, Salford University

I've been selected for the AA2A (Artists Access to Art Colleges) residency at Salford University. The AA2A project provides placements for visual artists and designer makers in Higher and Further Education institutions across England. In 2011/2012, AA2A schemes will run in 32 institutions, providing 128 placements nationally. In the last 12 years, over 1,200 participants have had the opportunity to undertake a period of research or realise a project, using workshops and supporting facilities in participating fine art and design departments.

I've proposed to develop Motus:Immotus and Tearing Space apart - two works that have been initiated over the past 6 months, but now need public installation space to develop them further. Salford University has installation spaces at it's studios but also exhibition and installation opportunities at the Lowry Outlet Mall and possibly also Media City.

More news about the residency will be posted here as things happen.

Drawing Showdown - Saatchi Online

I've entered a drawing from 2008 into this competition by Saatchi Online. There are currently 2000 entries open for public vote in an art face-off. You pick your favourite from a choice of 2 drawings and they are all ranked according to how folks vote. The top 300 go through to a judges panel.

My entry is 'One minute: Kyoto Station' a drawing from 2008, but part of a series that i'm revisiting with plans for drawings from my recent travels in Portugal, Holland and Ireland. One minute of digital video is taken from a high balcony, or at the top of a flight of stairs. The video is then projected, and a drawing made that traces the movement of the people in the image.

The drawing is currently hovering between 140th and 220th place, so hopefully it will go through to round 2, but you can vote for the work here: http://www.saatchionline.com/showdown/match/showdown/8/artist/301963
You either need to register or connect with Facebook to vote - Thanks for taking the trouble.

Invisible City in the news

The light at the zebra crossing in the Broersvest, Schiedam 
turns green. Six men and women walk across the street, but 
suddenly they begin to dance. They stand still, turn around and 
make a jump. The people in traffic look surprised.

This "Green Light" performance, by choreographer Mateja Bucar 
from Slovenia is one of the components during the festival 
Invisible City, which took place last weekend in Schiedam. This 
festival combines visual arts and dance. "We want to create a 
kind of city in motion," said Ans Kanen, who created this project 
together with Liat Magnezy and FionaWeir.

They invited 23 artists from around the world to Schiedam. Most 
of them displayed their work in the building Ruimte in Beweging, 
at Boterstraat. "This area is hidden. This is the idea of an 
invisible city", says Kanen. 'People who walk in and become 
part of it. They become part of that city'. This also happens 
at the Wennekerpand and on the street, as in Green Light. 
"Because we want art in the city, but not everyone from 
Schiedam will bother to come."

The six dancers create amazing scenes. A woman who is on her 
bike turns her head, a car stops in the middle of the Broersvest 
to watch. "We perform this dance in different cities in Europe. 
Usually we get nice comments, but sometimes aggressive reactions 
too", said Bucar. If someone comes at Ruimte in Beweging they 
will see more of these amazing performances. It starts with the 
entrance, where Daan Houter has filled ​​a whole floor with 1 cent 
coin. 

Inside you can find the work by Ozlem Uzun, from Istanbul. Last 
week she transformed a tram stop in Schiedam into a living room. 
She placed herself on the other side of the street to watch the 
reactions of the people and recorded it. She has now moved the 
living room to Ruimte in Beweging and her recordings can be seen 
on a television.

Uzun enjoys being in Schiedam. 'This city is much calmer than 
Istanbul'. Also Claire Weetman, an artist from Liverpool enjoys 
it too, though she knew no one. "It is inspiring to have contact 
with people from another discipline'.

Invisible City

2, 3 en 4 september 2011, Ruimte in Beweging, Schiedam

Opening op vrijdag 2 september, 19:00-23:00

Festival op 3 en 4 september 2011, 12:00-18:00

NL — INVISIBLE CITY is een kunstfestival dat draait om de beleving van de stad. 23 kunstenaars van over de hele wereld buigen zich over het fenomeen stad. Hieruit ontstaat een installatie, een integraal werk opgebouwd uit hun persoonlijke visies. Zoals een stad ontdekt wordt, zo ontdekt de bezoeker van Invisible City de schaduwstad die verrijst. Niemand neemt hetzelfde verhaal mee naar huis. Kom naar Schiedam en ontdek de onzichtbare stad.

EN — INVISIBLE CITY is an art festival that revolves around the experience of the city. 23 artists from all over the world examine the notion of the city. Their works form an installation, an integral piece built from their personal visions. The way a city dweller moves through a city, is the way a visitor of Invisible City discovers the shadow city that arises. Nobody will take the same story home. Come to Schiedam and discover the invisible city.

MEER INFORMATIE/ MORE INFORMATION

www.shadowingcities.com

BEREIKBAARHEID

INVISIBLE CITY vindt plaats in en rondom Ruimte in Beweging en is gemakkelijk per fiets, met de auto of met het openbaar vervoer bereikbaar.

Ruimte in Beweging
Boterstraat 81
3111NB Schiedam

Trein/Metro
Schiedam CS is slechts 10 minuten lopen verwijderd van het festival. Vanuit het station ga je direct rechts en volg je de Horvathweg tot aan het water. Dan sla je linksaf de Overschiesestraat in. Je loopt alsmaar rechtdoor langs het water, over de Broersvest, tot in de Boterstraat.

Tram/Bus
Met tram 21/23 van Rotterdam CS en bus 54/57, uitstappen bij halte Broersvest.

Fiets/Lopend
Met de fiets is het festival vanuit Rotterdam Centrum te bereiken binnen 23 minuten, lopend doe je er ongeveer 1 uur en 15 minuten over.

Auto
Vanaf de A20 volg je de borden richting Schiedam Centrum. Ruimte in Beweging is gelegen naast een parkeergarage op de hoek Herenstraat/Kreupelstraat.

Mede mogelijk gemaakt door: Albert Heijn, CBK Schiedam, Fonds Schiedam Vlaardingen, GAGARIN.NU, Gemeente Schiedam, Prins Bernhard Cultuur Fonds, Ruimte in Beweging, Satisfaire, Stichting DanceMotionPicture, VSB Fonds, Wennekerpand en vele anderen.

Opening op vrijdag 2 september, 19:00-23:00

Festival op 3 en 4 september 2011, 12:00-18:00

NL — INVISIBLE CITY is een kunstfestival dat draait om de beleving van de stad. 23 kunstenaars van over de hele wereld buigen zich over het fenomeen stad. Hieruit ontstaat een installatie, een integraal werk opgebouwd uit hun persoonlijke visies. Zoals een stad ontdekt wordt, zo ontdekt de bezoeker van Invisible City de schaduwstad die verrijst. Niemand neemt hetzelfde verhaal mee naar huis. Kom naar Schiedam en ontdek de onzichtbare stad.

EN — INVISIBLE CITY is an art festival that revolves around the experience of the city. 23 artists from all over the world examine the notion of the city. Their works form an installation, an integral piece built from their personal visions. The way a city dweller moves through a city, is the way a visitor of Invisible City discovers the shadow city that arises. Nobody will take the same story home. Come to Schiedam and discover the invisible city.

MEER INFORMATIE/ MORE INFORMATION

www.shadowingcities.com

BEREIKBAARHEID

INVISIBLE CITY vindt plaats in en rondom Ruimte in Beweging en is gemakkelijk per fiets, met de auto of met het openbaar vervoer bereikbaar.

Ruimte in Beweging
Boterstraat 81
3111NB Schiedam

Trein/Metro
Schiedam CS is slechts 10 minuten lopen verwijderd van het festival. Vanuit het station ga je direct rechts en volg je de Horvathweg tot aan het water. Dan sla je linksaf de Overschiesestraat in. Je loopt alsmaar rechtdoor langs het water, over de Broersvest, tot in de Boterstraat.

Tram/Bus
Met tram 21/23 van Rotterdam CS en bus 54/57, uitstappen bij halte Broersvest.

Fiets/Lopend
Met de fiets is het festival vanuit Rotterdam Centrum te bereiken binnen 23 minuten, lopend doe je er ongeveer 1 uur en 15 minuten over.

Auto
Vanaf de A20 volg je de borden richting Schiedam Centrum. Ruimte in Beweging is gelegen naast een parkeergarage op de hoek Herenstraat/Kreupelstraat.

Mede mogelijk gemaakt door: Albert Heijn, CBK Schiedam, Fonds Schiedam Vlaardingen, GAGARIN.NU, Gemeente Schiedam, Prins Bernhard Cultuur Fonds, Ruimte in Beweging, Satisfaire, Stichting DanceMotionPicture, VSB Fonds, Wennekerpand en vele anderen.

Rarities. An exhibition of miniature magnetic art in Hastings and St Leonards

Two drawings, Tearing Space Apart 4:3 and Tearing Space Apart 4:3, Black have been transformed into magnetic artworks which will be exhibited on the gates of Hastings Pier this Saturday 27 August as part of Alban Low's latest magnet exhibition, Rarities


From 4pm onwards, these miniature artworks will be placed on the gates of Hastings Pier, available for the visiting public to collect, take home, and create an art gallery on their fridge.

From the online gallery, the following works have caught my eye - if you are in the area, go and collect your favourites;

Scribble Drawing I, Xanthus Andrews
Joining Memories, Sharon Read
Derek Jarman's House - Flo Snook
The Hastings Moth Project
Rays - Juliet Guiness

Invisible City, Schiedam, 2-4 September 2011

Claire Weetman has been selected to participate in Invisible City, an event currently in production in Schiedam, NL. Artists, builders, architects, actors, dancers, players and thinkers are invited to react to the notion of the moving, invisible city culminating in a public event at Ruimte in Beweging, Schiedam between 2-4 September 2011.

"Invisible City is the first project of Shadowing Cities, a cooperation of Liat Magenzy, Fiona Weir and Ans Kanen. Its goal is to put the spotlight on Schiedam by means of art and culture. For the first time the city will be flooded with artists from all over the world. Invisible City aims to free Schiedam from the shadow of Big Brother Rotterdam.

Ruimte in Beweging on Boterstraat is the central point of Invisible City. Several entrances give access to the building. It has a large, open main space and some separated smaller spaces. Each has its own atmosphere and peculiarities. For Invisible City, the building will be transformed to a city in itself, a shadow city.

The individual visions of the artists form a city installation, an integral work built up from personal views of the city. The way the city dweller moves around in a city, the way a city is discovered, is the way a visitor of Invisible City discovers the town that springs from the artist’s imagination. Nobody will take the same story home."

During the next week, Claire will be producing new works that are a development from her Passing, Watching, Waiting, Following interventions, previously produced in Liverpool and Linz. Working with live projection, drawing and public spaces, Claire will produce a series of new works under the title Motus:Immotus.

Visit a-n's Artists Talking site to read more about Claire's preparation and activity as part of Invisible City.

Invisible City, New Work by Claire Weetman in Schiedam is supported by the National Lottery through Arts Council England and by Shadowing Cities.

New work - inspired by John Cage

'Every day is a good day' opens at the Southbank Centre today and is a chance to see this touring exhibition of John Cage's work. I saw it at Baltic back in September and in the past few months have been producing drawings inspired by Cage's process and his use of stones.

John Cage (1912-1992), Where R = Ryoanji (3R/17), 1992, Pencils on handmade Japanese paper, 25.4 x 48.3 cm, The John Cage Trust, Red Hook, New York, Photo: David Heald/SRGF, New York, © The John Cage Trust at Bard College. via arttattler.com

John Cage, Where R=Ryoanji: R3, 1983. Courtesy Henning Lohner. © The John Cage Trust. via www.hunterian.gla.ac.uk

Here is a selection of the recent drawings I have been working on:

Tabloid (Square Root 4), pencil on paper, 420x590mm

Tearing Space Apart 4:3, pencil on paper, 66x50mm

Tearing Space Apart 4:3 (black), correction fluid on tempera, 66x50mm

Cracks 1: Watersoluble Graphite and pencil on paper, 170x120mm

White postcard on black: Collage, black tempera and paper, 170x120mm

Contentores, pencil on paper

Net: 7 sided cobble, pencil on paper, 590x420mm

7 sided cobble, net x 7. Pencil on paper, 590x420mm

7 sided cobble, net squared. Pencil on paper, 590x420mm

Contentores, Lisboa, Portugal

I came across this project by P28 at the Belem Cultural Centre in Lisbon through an article in the guardian and decided to visit and respond to it on my trip to Portugal this month. A series of exhibitions are taking place in the containers, and the ones that I caught were by Inês Amado + Sonia Boyce, curated by Paul Goodwin (Tate Britain).

Boyce's dance of Belem includes a section, which appealed to me, where she follows and mimics members of the public within the gardens opposite the cultural centre.












Contentores - a response
As this project is due to come to Liverpool as part of Biennial 2012, I decided to create my own response to the use of the shipping container. Taking the format, I've created a net of the container and created a drawing onto it's surface.


I've taken this model to Lisbon and photographed it in situ with the containers there. If realised I'd like to have the drawn lines cut into the metal, with the box being lit from the inside creating a 3 dimensional drawing referencing the space and volume of the box.