Bright Space recruiting youth bloggers for new arts and social media project
Bright Space is launching a new and exciting social media project entitled Platform(www.projectplatform.org.uk) for 16-19 years olds living in Birmingham. Platform will be a blog featuring articles, reviews, events listings and much more, written by young people for young people and will represent a unique perspective on arts activity in Birmingham. Bright Space is now looking to recruit 15 young people who are interested in reporting, reviewing and attending the many cultural events in and around the city. This includes theatre, dance, exhibitions, launches and gigs. Deadline for applications is Monday 19th July 2010.
Successful applicants will receive a £200 bursary and the opportunity to attend a week long intensive summer school, which will highlight the many techniques and skills they will need to become fully fledged Platformbloggers. During the week they will take part in workshops led by industry experts including; journalists, photographers, bloggers and film-makers. Subjects covered will include:
Journalism, writing, reviewing and interview techniques
Podcasting with audio and video
Photo blogging and social media tools
Events management, promotion and marketing
The Platform bloggers will then organise a live launch of the website to their peers, parents, friends and mentors. The group will meet regularly throughout the project with continued access to and mentoring from industry professionals who will support them in creating content, researching articles and building their on-line readership.
The core group will improve skills in; ICT, literacy, independent learning and critical thinking. The project will also support those wishing to pursue a career within the creative and cultural industries.
The aspiration for Platform is to amplify young people as unique, dynamic, cultural commentators that successfully communicate, inspire and engage other young people, while at the same time propose significant debate about their cultural offer. It is also hoped that Platform will become a vehicle that cultural organisations, venues and promoters connect with to ensure their programming reflects the breadth and individuality of young people in Birmingham.
How to apply:
Applicants need to write a 200 word article on a creative passion that they have
Include their name, address, date of birth and contact details
Send the completed article with all the necessary contact details to: Bright Space, Studio 222 The Custard Factory, Gibb Street, Birmingham, B9 4AA
Bright Space (www.brightspace.org.uk) is committed to developing and encouraging activity that helps young people find creative progression routes in and beyond the arts. Bright Space works actively to encourage sustainable cross-sector partnerships that broaden the horizons and opportunities available to young people.
Just peeped this over at Ideal Skate Supply, looks like they have secured a screening of the Vans film just out. This is a high coo by any standard. The film will be shown at the shop down at The Custard Factory on 24th April, for all the info peep here.
…Just had Kris Vile in the store and we worked out a date for a Birmingham premiere of the Vans Europe DVD. We are going to hold it in the Cinema space at 5.30pm on Saturday the 24th of April. Tickets will be on sale in the store this weekend and for a measly £2 you will get to see Chris Pfanner, Danny Wainwright, Ross McGouran, Flo Marfaing, Sam Partaix and more in the first video to come out under the Vans banner. And of course you will be able to shake Kris by the hand and congratulate him on his section which, so I have heard, is rather good.
Underneath Eastside’s arches you’ll find a whole host of organisations making and presenting film, music, visual arts, digital media, craft, literature, and photography – and some great pubs and cafes too. We Are Eastside is a guide to some of these hidden treasures.
A couple of exciting developments in the We are Eastside camp in Digbeth, Birmingham is the addition of a new photographic gallery space called Rhubarb East Gallery situated in the Rhubarb Building and a performance by Japanese artist Atsuhiro Ito.
Vivid and Capsule are combining forces to present Atsuhiro Ito. Atsuhiro uses a fluorescent light with pick up mics attached, and alters the voltage applied to tubes causing the lights to flicker. Microphones pick up electromagnetic noise perfectly synchronised with the flickering lights in a light/noise/electric eye festival at only a fiver it is well worth a look next week on Wednesday 10th March 2010, more information can be found here.
This is very exciting! On Thursday 4th March The Electric Cinema will be screening Beyond Biba a portrait of the life of 1960s fashion legend Barbara Hulanicki. All information can be found here with tickets available from The Electric.
Our first screening in Birmingham. We’re screening for one night at the Electric Cinema, Birmingham. The cinema is the oldest working cinema in the UK first opening on December 27th 1909. The building is now home to luxury sofa seating, waiter service and a full bar.
There will be a post screening Q&A with Director Louis price and Producer James Collie, which will be hosted by Tom Lawes, owner of the Electric Cinema.
Special edition DVDs signed by Barbara Hulanicki will be available after the screening.
Eastside Projects is an artist-run space as public gallery and incubator of new ideas for the City of Birmingham and beyond.
Eastside Projects is a not-for-profit organisation, working in partnership with Birmingham City University and STATE Enterprises, revenue funded by Arts Council England West Midlands; it aims to commission and present experimental contemporary art practices and exhibitions and fully participate and support the cultural activity of the city both inside and out.
Eastside Projects was conceived by artist-curator Gavin Wade and is organised by a founding collective comprising Simon & Tom Bloor, Celine Condorelli, Ruth Claxton, and James Langdon.
Abstract Cabinet Show // 26 September to 8 November 2009
Part of The Birmingham Comedy Festival 2–11 October and The Event 4–8 November. Featuring Laureana Toledo & John Taylor, Mithu Sen, Support Structure, Para/Site Art Space, Heather & Ivan Morison, Magnus Quaife & David Osbaldeston, Shedhalle Zurich, Michael Takeo Magruder, Bedwyr Williams, Grizedale Arts, The Hut Project, Malgras & Naudet Contemporary Zurich, Stan’s Café, Freee, Daniel Salomon, Juneau Projects, Stone Canyon Nocturne, DJ Simpson and Clarke & McDevitt.
Featuring the Premier of a new multi screen film, sound, bass amp and newspaper publication project, CORRESPONDENCE/ CORRESPONDENCIA, made collaboratively by Mexico City based Laureana Toledo and Duran Duran Bassist John Taylor. Toledo and Taylor’s Super-8 footage of Birmingham and Mexico City (with Taylor filming Mexico and Toledo filming Birmingham) - is a “meditation on local and international constructed space and identity, the sound of cities and an inquisitive meeting of difference, coincidence and shared passions”.
Typography and lettering is an expressive part of Birmingham’s visual identity.Islamic calligraphy, neon signs, tags, mysterious handwritten signs in Mandarin stuck to dirty windows and the fallen glory of broken shop lettering – which now reads ‘Ma l ather s ores’. The aim of ‘Graphic DNA’ is to document these letterforms and to trace the changes to the city’s graphic DNA brought about by regeneration, recording the evolving lettering landscape before the opportunity is lost for ever.
Graphic DNA is a long term project which aims to delineate and profile the graphic character of Birmingham through photographing, gathering, curating, cataloguing and describing the letterforms found in the city’s urban and civic environment. The Project is led by Type with the able assistance of Alexander Barton, Hilary Lovell, Matt Murtagh, Veronika Pechova, Hannah Wood all students at the Birmingham Institue of Art & Desgn.
Why Birmingham?
Birmingham is in a state of metamorphosis, evolving from a city dominated by manufacturing to one led by the creative sector. Industrial Birmingham is being redeveloped and regenerated and a new city is emerging: letterforms that have been obscured for decades are being temporarily exposed before the developers move in, and new letterforms are being added daily. Further more, Birmingham is a hybrid city that for centuries has been home to immigrants from across the country and around the world. The history and evolution of Birmingham’s immigrant populations are relvealed in the letterforms on its streets and the marks left by the city’s multicultural society will be documented and curated by the project. The project is in part graphic rescue.
Why lettering?
Street lettering is an artistic amalgam of letterforms mixed with substrate, language, placement, and proportion. Letterforms are excellent vehicles for demonstrating how the environment, human judgement, necessity, and repetition can add visual music to the streets. This project will capture, catalogue and curate images of letterforms culled from Birmingham’s streets - both past and present – to show the city’s unique graphic character.
To read more about this project check here. If lettering and design is your bag then you may fancy a look at Helvetica a documentary film by Gary Hustwit.
Helvetica is a feature-length independent film about typography, graphic design and global visual culture. It looks at the proliferation of one typeface (which celebrated its 50th birthday in 2007) as part of a larger conversation about the way type affects our lives. The film is an exploration of urban spaces in major cities and the type that inhabits them, and a fluid discussion with renowned designers about their work, the creative process, and the choices and aesthetics behind their use of type.
Screen WM has announced that on 14th October Power to the Pixel is bringing a satellite event to Birmingham. The day long event will be held at Novotel Birmingham on Broad Street. This event is free to attend and will be of interest to anyone working in content creation (film, television, animation, games) and digital media.
Power to the Pixel’s London Forum is firmly established as the leading event in the UK film industry calendar for creators to connect with key digital innovators: pioneers who are developing new models of storytelling, film financing and film distribution across multiple platforms.
Power to the Pixel’s Birmingham event will feature sessions directly from the London Forum as well as studio debate from Birmingham. Sessions brought to you from London will include award-winning producer Ted Hope’s keynote presentation. International speakers including Slava Rubin, Co-Founder of New York-based IndieGoGo and Rachel Mordecai, producer and digital content strategist.
October is Black History Month and in Birmingham and the West Midlands there are a bunch of things going on to celebrate Black History, many of the events do so organically and also regularly and don’t necessarily need a specified ‘month’ to do their thing. Here are some of the events that I think would be worth checking out…
Black History is important to Birmingham because of the significant contribution made by Black people to the socio-economic and political foundation of this city and as an Afrikan saying goes: “A people without a history are like a tree without roots”. Birmingham Black History Website
This photographic exhibition captures the essence of Black artists through a series of portraits, which documents their everyday lives, living and working within Birmingham. BirminStrong is a major new exhibition commissioned by The Drum as part of the BirminStrong and Black History Month Season.
In a culturally diverse city like Birmingham, the impact and positive contribution that African, African Caribbean and Asian artists have brought to the city and also to the arts fraternity has been eminent. From the music world right through to the theatre world, Black British artists have transformed the different artistic genres and made it their own. Giving us a flavour of what it means to be Black and British through their creative ideas and bodies of work in today’s society.
Nominate your favourite black music track of all time to be part of the night’s play list. Songs that mean something to you, your generation, songs that are integral part of Black heritage and traditions or associated with major moments in history.
To commemorate the 50th anniversary of Motown, Mel Day will perform some of the most representative songs from that golden era accompanied by relevant film screenings and activities.
To tell us of your favourite track email Ioannis Ioannou on ioannoui@walsall.gov.uk by Friday 25 September.
Free food and a free drink on the night and another opportunity to have a look at the Gordon Cheung, Neal Rock and Steffi Klenz shows!
To find out more about Black History Month events in Walsall check here.
Gigs
Nu Century Arts presents… Femi Temowo
Sun 18 October // 7.45pm // Nu Century Arts // £5 (£3 concessions and members) // Hare and Hounds Kings Heath // 0121 523 5551
Appearing here as part of the Live Box anniversary tour, Temowo is also a key figure in the Soweto Kinch Quartet - who shared Mercury Prize nomination glory for Kinch’s debut album ‘Conversations with the Unseen’. The producer and guitarist has performed with George Benson, Cleveland Watkiss and Jason Rebello, and was a musical director for Amy Winehouse.
A young British-born Black woman finds her aspirations of comfortable, respectable married life called into question when her partner is sent down for assaulting a police officer. Her political consciousness grows as she finds strength through a Black women’s group, asserting her needs while supporting and planning a future with her partner.
