Art from the heart - 9 November 2009

Now in it's seventh year, Art from the Heart, is an art sale in aid of Epilepsy Scotland. This year it's featuring many well know Scottish artist's such as Denise Findlay, Jock Mcinnes, and Bryan Evans will be displaying in Scotland Street School on the 9th November 2009. There will be an open sale during the evening of paintings, ceramics, jewellery and crafts.

There will be wine and nibbles included in the ticket price. Tickets are £12 and admits 2 people

Call Rachel or Helen on 0141 427 4911 for tickets or e-mail fundraising@epilepsyscotland.org.uk

Autumn/Winter Show at the Tramway

The Tramway will launch their Autumn Winter exhibitions this Friday night with the opening of two major shows. Lara Favaretto, an Italian born artist, sculptor and performer will exhibit new work alongside London based film artist Hilary Lloyd until 20th December.

Lara Favaretto, uses sculpture, photography, film and installation to create artworks that produce a sense of magical fantasy and urgency, forming an immediate bond with the viewer through a sense of play.

For Tramway’s epic main gallery space, Favaretto will create a kinetic sculptural environment with various motor powered elements. These choreographed and durational sculptures will explore Favaretto’s ongoing artistic investigations into the idea of festival in its various incarnations, drawing on its popular forms and associations such as the carnival or circus. These themes often assuming the form of sculptural objects, installations or events united by the careful planning of their collapse, disintegration or corrosion, thus exploring the significance of an artistic gesture that accepts eventual compromise.

Lloyd creates video, film and slide installations which to date have focused on the themes of the modern city, its subcultures and the people that operate at it’s fringes, her gaze articulating both a personal relationship with her subject, and the processes of reconstructing the act of looking. Lloyd creates a form of ‘anti-portraiture’, shooting situations and protagonists with a contrived passivity that allows the viewer to form their own narratives from her rhythmic and highly charged compositions.

For more information click here

Queens Park Performance Project

[Queens Park Bandstand 1920]

Last week we were invited to a presentation by the Queen's Park Performance Project which is a community group, set up by a pilot Government Funding scheme, to explore regenerating the old queens park bandstand space.

The talk by Evelyn Silber and Bob Marshall was very interesting and they discussed the origin of the pilot funding scheme and the works which have been undertaken so far. The project has only been going for about 5 or 6 months but they have already made good head way getting the area surveyed, carrying out a questionnaire with locals and drawing up some rough proposals for basic costing purposes.

[Queens Park Bandstand 1995 by Monkeyiron]

Its been 13 years since the last band stand burned down and I think if done right, this project could be a huge benefit to the park and the local area.

The steering group have identified their aims as

• 
  
  creating a modified seating area for around 950 people.
• 
  
  a flat performance space suitable for use with or without staging, canopy projection
• 
  
  providing an electrical supply for sound and light systems
• 
  
  performer wc/ changing facilities
• 
  
  flexible space able to host drama, music, film, children's events and exercise classes
• 
  
  the capacity to host free and charged events
• 
  
  possibly a unique space capable of attracting city, national and international performances

All sounds good to me. With the Tramway, the Ballet and the Citizens also all in the Southside now we are building up quite the cultural flare.

In terms of visitors to the park I think it would be a great boost and in turn could result in the park being able to attract for funding for its maintenance and upkeep. Designed by Sir Joseph Paxton, Queens Park is one of the nicest parks in the city and with the Glasshouses, the reptile room and the free sports in the summer it already has a few fun things to get involved with but with a carefully designed and detailed bandstand it could become a real strong tourist attraction. I love wandering through Queens Park but I always feel it could do with something extra- possibly some modern sculptures or art works to give it another layer of interest.

[Queens Park Bandstand 2009 by Monkeyiron]

I guess ultimately the project will succeed or fail on the quality of the design and on the commitment and maintenance of both the finished construction and the programme of events that it stages.

So far only very basic designs have been drawn up by the Council's in house team - examples from the presentation are below. Don't judge them too harshly, I know they are not particularly very inspiring images but they are meant to get you thinking and to assist with costing purposes.

At the presentation someone raised the idea of a design competition and details have been passed on to the Steering group relating to the Glasgow Institute of Architects work with local projects and the RIAS matched funding schemes for getting advice and ideas worked up. I'm sure that this kind of project would be of great interest to local artists and architects etc but it's such an attractive project I could see it attracting interest at a national level.

The Scottish Government Funding £15k runs from April 2009 to March 2010 and will enable preliminary consultation, planning and costing to take place. The next steps will include discussions with potential users and the application for various grant funding based on fully researched and prepared costings - including the various community area committees and to external bodies such as the Lottery. The aim would be to have the work beginning on site in 2011.

There is a fair amount of information on the QPPP website but I understand there might be a public meeting further along the process to present the work and ideas to the wider area so we will let you all know when that is when it is announced.

In the mean time to be kept up to date with whats going on or if you have any questions or just wish to send the group messages of support then you can email chair@qppp.org.uk.

Seedbom

We had meant to mention this ages ago when the product launched back in August but completly forgot.

Seedbom, the brainchild of Darren Wilson an artist based at the Southside Studios in Govanhill is an innovative and eco-friendly guerrilla gardening tool. As the website says-

"Filled with flower seeds and made from recylced materials, Seedboms are ready to explode with life and colour. Join forces with nature and make a visible impact by throwing Seedboms into derelicy land, neglected spaces or even your neighbours garden and watch them grow."

Guerrilla gardening is becoming a bit of a craze at the moment with more and more occurances happenings around Glasgows streets. You can read a bit more about upcoming events here. There can't be any harm in trying to brighten up some of the waste ground sites. The only sad thing is that eventually the developers seem to roll in and all the hard work and flowers get concreted over - like the community garden that was set up just off Pollokshaws Road in the line of the new motorway, but I guess the fragile nature of the guerrilla gardens is also a part of their charm.

Anyways - if you know of a spot of waste ground in need of some brightening up then why not get out your gloves, a trowel a Seedbom and get gardening.

Dresser Room Evening

We have had a message from Jade of the Dresser room about a whole new range of stock in her shop. Given that Ann loved the place last week when she went in, I thought I should pass it on to everyone else in the hope that you buy everything before Ann gets a chance.

Here's Jades message

"The shop is now bursting with all the new stuff and I can honestly say it's the best stock I've ever had in, without a doubt. I'll not be putting photos of the new stuff up until after Thursday night's event, so if you fancy some drinks, chat and first dibs on all the fabulous new stuff, come along! 7pm-9pm, this Thursday (15th) The Dresser's Room, 47 Skirving Stree, Shawlands. Thanks, hope to see you here! Jade x"

This weekend - 02 - 04 0ctober

And another weekend is here.

As it's the first of the month the Farmers Market in Queens Park will be on, we'll be going along to stock up on local veggies and square sausage. Also on Saturday,the first Art and Craft fair at Beanscene, on Skirving Street, will take place between 11am and 3pm. The Patricia Cain exhibition is on at House for an Art Lover in Bellahouston Park, it's worth making a special trip over to see this.

It's La Roche Rumba night on Saturday night and the Tramway have a new performance piece being shown on Saturday night called An Argument About Sex.
A response to Pierre de Marivaux's comedy, 'La Dispute', writer Pamela Carter and director Stewart Laing's new work examines gendered attitudes towards risk-taking and settling arguments, in the context of relationships, the economy and a sociological experiment involving isolated teenagers. Tickets are £14

Samuel Dow's has a free acoustic gig on Sunday night from 8.30pm and of course there is also the free Ha Ha comedy night at the Ivory Hotel.

If you know of anythig else let us know or leave a comment