Richard Creme: The Paintings / Curation May 2, 2012

We worked on this exhibition in close collaboration with Richard, his wife Shelley, Chris Larkin from the Stroke Association, and Clive Parkinson from Arts For Health. It was part of a Stroke awareness month and also the first major event for the newly re-branded Stroke Association.

Richard Creme paintings in the Link Gallery:

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Curators’ Statement for the Richard Creme exhibition:

We are extremely privileged to be able to curate this exclusive show. Richard Creme ran the incredibly successful L’Homme fashion boutique in Manchester until he had a stroke in 2007, which meant that he could not carry on with the business. As part of his recovery he started to create artwork in his sketchbooks and later onto canvas. The experimentation and artistic progress helped him through a difficult period learning to live with the effects of the stroke, which most noticeably have affected his speech. Arts For Health and the Stroke Association asked us if we would like to curate and host the exhibition in the Link Gallery. We went through Richard’s entire collection of work and were given the freedom to pick the pieces we thought would tell his story best.

The exhibition starts with the Porkinson series. They are positioned asymmetrically to indicate a continuation of one scene not realised until we took them out of the sketchbooks. The piece features a private joke between good friend and noted fashion photographer, Norman Parkinson. The emphatic upward pointing finger is a motif repeated in all three pieces to guide the eye up through the scene.

The headless bodies are unusual pieces made in the early part of Richard’s recovery. The intensity of the biro markings in particular, with distinct missing head, reveal a frustration brought out onto the paper. We decided to frame the opposite ink-imprinted page as another dimension to the piece, and to show it within the context it was made. The perforated edges of the paper continue throughout the exhibition to leave the raw creative space of the sketchbooks intact. The sketchbooks were a lifeline in his recovery, so we felt it was important not to hide it behind more traditional mounting techniques.

The central hexagon of the gallery holds a section of portraiture. On one side there are Richard’s self-portraits which reveal different emotional states, as well as documenting his experimentation with diverse artistic styles. Directly facing these, in a form of conversation, are portraits of his wife, Shelley, a significant figure in his life and throughout his recovery. Central to the whole exhibition is the unusual double-sided self-portrait, which is mounted in a specially designed frame. We decided to suspend it high up to give the viewer a sense of the man himself – a large man with an impacting personality.

Finally, the end hexagon holds the ‘list’ series – bright copies of important lists and receipts pertaining to his former life as owner of an iconic fashion shop. Deeper meanings and stories run through these pieces, which elevates them past mere representation.

Elisa Artesero & Roger Bygott

Link Gallery Curators

Richard Creme: Opening Night May 2, 2012

Last nights grand opening was really amazing. We had a full house with lots of guests from Richard’s life, the fashion/art world, the VC of MMU, Mayor of Salford. We had a great team of volunteers from the Stroke Association. The whole journey and the story of this exhibition needs a full write up, but for now here are some photos from the opening:

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Future Foundations 3 March 19, 2012

This is the third exhibition of self-selected group MMU Foundation Course work. The first Future Foundations show was in 2010 – co-initiated by and including work by Elisa Artesero, current curator/organiser of the Link Gallery.  Then last year Future Foundations 2 included work by Roger Bygott also current Link Gallery co-organiser/curator. So this show has a healthy lineage and good momentum. As with the previous Future Foundations shows there is a great sense of variety, exploration and experimentation across several media.

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Colour Block the Link February 27, 2012

This weeks show focusses on colour blocks – an eclectic presentation from across the Arts Faculty: textiles, paint, sculpture, fashion, linocut prints and photography.

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Call for submissions – Colour Block the Link February 1, 2012

Colour Block the Link

We’re going to take last year’s colour blocking fashion and apply it creatively to the Link Gallery in a curated exhibition on 27th February – 2nd March.

We are looking for textiles or works on paper which are predominantly one colour, or combination of two colours, which we can display so as to colour the Link Gallery into a bold exhibition. The work does not have to be an item of clothing, it just needs to be bold and colourful!

Please submit a photo of your textile or paper-based work including dimensions to mmulinkgallery@hotmail.co.uk by 8pm Tuesday 14th February.

You must be available to install your work from midday Friday 24th February and take it down again at the end of the exhibition the following Friday.

 

 

Threads exhibition January 11, 2012

The new term at the Link starts with work from the curators, Elisa Artesero and Roger Bygott, with the addition of work from guest artist Hannah Leighton-Boyce.

The theme of the work on show is threads/lines, be they real threads or lines of light. Roger’s work uses threads from shoes to frame the vista of two windows, the shoes create an absence and loneliness when viewed upon entering the gallery, the male and female shoes point outward towards the world outside, an optimistic stance on one level, but on another they are  turning their backs on each other in such a definite position. However, when a visitor stands just behind the shoes to look out at the view, particularly in the evening when they can see their reflection, it is as though they fill the shoes for that moment.

Elisa’s light sculpture uses white thread to reshape the end gallery space in a mix of sharp angular shapes, some covered with paper as platforms for the bright slowly moving projections to bring the sculpture to life. The light from the projections also catches on the strings, illuminating them and giving a sense of movement. The shadows cast from the sculpture also moves across the back wall as the light and dark areas of the projection slowly shift across the space. The Light Paintings I & II projected and framed on adjacent walls are there to be viewed like a painting which happens to move, to watch the swathes of colour and patterns slowly move across the framed area in a slow considered manner. In the evening it is possible to watch the Light Paintings as reflections in the window while positioned in front of Roger’s work.

The Foyer space contains Hannah’s series of intricate pencil drawings from the movement created from stitched pieces of work, laid out as if a large landscape piece.

Also in the Foyer space is an installation and related video pieces by Roger. The foil lined ‘Accumulator’ is a phase in an ongoing series exploring  space, fiction and memory. There is some reference to Psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich’s ‘Orgone Accumulator’ a quasi-scientific/mystical invention devised by Reich in the 1960s. He claimed his ‘Orgone boxes’ could enhance the life-force and the libido. In no way attempting to recreate Reich’s box, this installation nevertheless proposes an accumulation of creative energy in the form of artistic process and fictional possibility. The meaning of the piece is undefined, yet meanings can accumulate and develop in relationship to it. The material lends itself to Sci-fi imaginings, and yet there is a cone of red thread in there harking back to the past maybe. There is a contrasting connection of the Industrial Revolution and the Technological Revolution.

The three looped video pieces also document various phases of the ‘Accumulator’ in the form of performance, poetry and music. We are presented with fragments of a story, part abstract, part science fiction.

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John Brindley Show: Closing Party November 2, 2011

John Brindley Solo Show (31st Oct – 4th Nov) October 29, 2011

This weeks Link Gallery show exhibits the work of second year Fine Art student John Brindley.

In his artists’ statement John says:

“I see my work as experimental, exploring how the basic elements of colour, structure, line and texture can generate emotional impact and express energy in the work.

When starting a painting I do not hold a preconceived idea of what the work might become as it is important to me that the paint and the visceral application of the medium should eventually speak for itself. 

The meaning in the work is subjective and varied, and can appear emotive, enigmatic, energetic and structural. It is generally developed with an eye to the aesthetic. 

I am interested in the psycho-spiritual (secular) aspect of ‘creativity and the unconscious’, particularly as discussed in the books of Stephen Newton, Rudolf Arnheim and Anton Ehrenzweig. “

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We also congratulate John on winning a Merit Award at the recent Stockport Artists Group Exhibition at Stockport Art Gallery. His winning painting can be seen at Stockport Art Gallery until January 2012.

This show was co-curated by Elisa Artesero and Roger Bygott

Call for submissions : The Secret Life October 26, 2011

This is a call for submissions with a surreal/dreamlike theme for an exhibition at the Link Gallery 7th-11th November. The work can be in any medium that fits into the theme. Please send photos (or stills if film based) of the completed work together with dimensions, a short description, and any special install requirements you may have by the submission deadline of Tuesday 1st November to mmulinkgallery@hotmail.co.uk

The exhibition will be curated but you must be available to install your own work at midday Friday 4th November.

This is a show with a very short window of time for submissions, so don’t delay! I really look forward to viewing the work that is sent through.

A new year at the Link Gallery October 7, 2011

It’s been a long summer indeed, but now the Link Gallery is back for another year of exhibitions! The layout of the foyer space has changed now that the stairs have been removed, so we now have even more wall space to play with.

I (Elisa Artesero) will continue to be the curator of the gallery; however I am looking for a small team of volunteers from the Interactive Arts course (particularly our new first years) with an interest in curating who would like to help with the running of the gallery this year. I will post more information a little later, but if any students from the course would like to get in touch with an expression of interest please email mmulinkgallery@hotmail.co.uk

The gallery is also now open for submissions to artists from any degree. Along with the more traditional mediums of work, I am keen to open up the space for more unusual proposals; be it for film, events, theatre, fashion or music to ensure another eclectic year of exhibitions. Do not worry if this is your first exhibition, I will work with you, all I ask is for a certain level of ambition for the use of the space.

So, please email me at mmulinkgallery@hotmail.co.uk for a proposal form.