A Belated Transmitting Andy Warhol

Well first of all apologies for my tardiness in getting this blog post up, two months in fact, that's quite good for me really.  Now if you have forgiven me can I wish you all a happy, prosperous and stylish new year?  OK now that's out the way shall we have a little look at what Tate Liverpool currently have on show until the 8th February?  It's only the first major solo exhibition in the North of England of the master of popular culture himself Andy Warhol!

You would be hard pressed to find anyone in Britain who has not heard of Andy Warhol, recognises his screen prints or uses the quote 'In the future everyone will be famous for 15 minutes'.  It was his belief that art should be for everyone, and from my way of thinking this was his greatest achievement.  He was instrumental in finding new ways to spread art, via his paintings, film, Interview magazine and most intriguingly lifestyle.  The Factory was one of the most iconic hangouts of not just the 1960s but the 20th Century.  Frequented by a vast array of people from all backgrounds, it gave birth to the Warhol Superstars and one of the most influential bands of all time, The Velvet Underground.  All were ways in which he democratized art.  Using easily recognisable images, and serial repetition 'transmitted' his ideas into the public consciousness.

The exhibition is not just a display of these well known paintings, there is a vast array of the other media which shows the breadth of his work.  The most special for me is the recreation of the Exploding Plastic Inevitable.  As a youngster I wanted to be Edie Sedgwick, all leotards and big earrings.  I devoured anything I could get my hands on which related to her and the Factory, which was not easy in those pre internet days.  I would have given several digits to have experienced the 'total art' environment, to have seen the Velvets live and to have lived that debauched glamorous lifestyle.  Now on a November evening down at the Albert Dock I got my chance, and it was boss.

I will leave you with some of the great man's quotes which I hope will leave you both smiling and thinking.

"My fascination with letting images repeat and repeat, or in films case 'run on', manifests my belief that we spend much of our lives seeing without observing".

"I think everybody should like everybody".

"Art is what you can get away with".

"Isn't life a series of images that change as they repeat themselves".

"I have Social Disease.  I have to go out every night.  If I stay home one night I start spreading rumours to my dogs".

Transmitting Andy Warhol is on till 8th February 2015 at The Tate Liverpool, go you won't regret it.

Liverpool's Winter Wonderland

Christmas shopping is a nightmare, Christmas shopping with kids is enough to send me into a psychotic state.  And, as every right thinking parent knows, the best way to get the little blighters to stop moaning/kicking off is to dangle a treat over their heads in exchange for a bit of peace.  Liverpool One has thought of this.  Oh yes, only this level of genius can come from my home city.

Up on Chavasse Park, they have built a little winter wonderland to not only pacify the sproglets, but there is also something for us harassed parents to enjoy.  Yes there is a Santa's Grotto, but at Liverpool One there is also a Santa's Workshop which has loads of crafty activities, a very nice touch.  The kids can make their own Christmas stocking courtesy of the Button Boutique or decorate a cupcake, most of which will thankfully be eaten before they thrust their crumbling efforts into your hand to hold.

Now onto the ice rinks.  There is a smaller one for the smaller people and the adult one.  I have to own up, I didn't have a go.  Owning a centre of gravity that sits somewhere on my forehead, this was always going to be a non starter.  However, Liverpool One, if you are listening, if there was a little penguin I could have clung onto  like you provide for the kids, then I might have have chanced it.

What's in this for the adults? I hear you asking.  Well you could pretend you are in Scandinavia and pop along to the Ice Bar for a cocktail.  Made entirely out of ice, you can sup whilst wearing the thoughtfully provided thermal cape.  Wear it, it is freezing, it is an ice bar remember, this is no time for worrying about showing your frock off.  You do have to book to go so I would suggest you pop up and do this before you do your shopping.

As well as the above delights, there is an Apres Bar for drinks and snacks and loads of other activities.  The only problem you are going to have is persuading the kids (or your mate) to go home.

I haven't mentioned Liverpool One very much on this blog, not sure why, because it has in a very short time become an intrinsic part of Liverpool life.  Choc a block with the usual high street names, it also has to coin that old cliche, something for everyone.  For me I can swoon away in Whistles and The Kooples and my beloved John Lewis, whilst others prefer Pretty Green and the Doc Martin shop.  Oh and don't forget, Harvey Nicks have done another pop up shop for food, you can all buy my presents from there.  It is a bit of a fashion mecca, which covers all tastes and prices points, as well as hosting some niche and local brands such as Utility.

It's not just shopping at Liverpool One.  It has quite a few nice restaurants and bars.  you could do like I did and pop along to Jamies Italian for some porchetta, or La Lunya for tapas.  Basically whatever you fancy, you can get it here from posh burgers to sushi.

And finally, one thing you probably don't know about Liverpool One.  The Liverpool One Foundation, which provides support for good causes in and around our fair city, for the following three themes:  The prevention and relief of poverty, education and skills and social and community advancement.  They can provide funding with grants ranging from £500 to over £5000.  I like a bit of feelgood.

Star in a Bra

Fancy being the face and boobs of lingerie brand Curvy Kate?  Sick of seeing skinny models as the face of full figure brands?  Think you could do it better?  Head on down to Debenhams in Liverpool One this Saturday, 16th March then.

The Star in a Bra search encourages D cup plus women to enter the competition to win a 12 month international modelling contract with the brand, as well as a years supply of frillies (wondering how much a years supply of scanties really adds up to).

As well as the search for the brands new face and bod, the event will have instore competitions and free bra fittings.  More interestingly, the search is supported by Body Gossip, who are UK based body confidence campaigners who have won multiple awards promoting a positive body image.  They also run an education programme which has taught self esteem classes to more than 13,000 teenagers within Britain.  As well as confidence building the programmes help students combat issues such as eating disorders, self harm and bullying.  Any company which works alongside such a cracking organisation deserves all our support.  Oh and there is £200 worth of lingerie up for grabs at the Liverpool event, all you have to do is tell the Body Gossip chaps why you love your body and you will entered into a prize draw.

The event is open between 10.00 and 6.00 and further information on both Curvy Kate and Body Gossip is available on their websites Curvy Kate and Body Gossip.  Now get practising that pout and jiggle in the miirror ladies.

Liverpool Fashion Live

Thursday saw the first Liverpool Fashion Live event at the PanAm.  An event which used models from all age ranges, shapes, sizes and colours, we need more of this way of thinking.

The evening was in aid of Claire House Children's Hospice, whose work in the North West is second to none.  I urge you all to donate as much as you can to this wonderful charity.  Click on the website and you will not fail to be moved by the work these people do and the effect it has on families with sick children.

The Medium is the Medium

Those lovely folks over at The Double Negative have been at it again, curating the following event with Liverpool Biennial.

A day of expert debate around why critical writing is important in a mature and thriving arts landscape. 

Curated by The Double Negative and Liverpool Biennial as part of the Biennial Public Programme 2012.

At a time of rapid technological and cultural change, we increasingly take to new media for information. With everyone able to write or start a blog, where does this leave traditional art criticism? The Medium is The Medium asks whether open participation points to more democracy and a richer debate. Special guests include Miranda Sawyer (The Culture Show, The Guardian), Cherie Federico (Editor, Aesthetica Magazine), Rachel Jones (writer, The Double Negative), Edgar Schmitz (lecturer in Critical Studies, Goldsmiths) and Franceso Manacorda (Artistic Director Tate Liverpool).

Read Creative Tourist's article on the event, 'Liverpool Biennial: art blogs vs the critics': http://www.creativetourist.com/news-culture/news-and-blog/liverpool-biennial-art-blogs-vs-the-critics

SPEAKERS

Miranda Sawyer (born 1967) is an English journalist and broadcaster. She moved to London in 1988 to begin her career as a journalist on the magazine Smash Hits.

In 1993, she became the youngest winner of the Periodical Publishers Association Magazine Writer of the Year award for her work on Select magazine. She formerly wrote columns for Time Out (1993–96) and The Mirror (2000-3), and was a frequent contributor to Mixmag and The Face during the 1990s. She is now a feature writer for The Observer and its radio critic. Her writing appears in GQ, Vogue and The Guardian and she is a regular arts critic in print, on television and on radio. She was a member of the judging panel for the 2007 Turner Prize and the panel that awarded Liverpool its Capital of Culture status.

In 2004, Sawyer wrote, researched and presented an hour-long documentary for Channel 4 about the age of consent entitled, Sex Before 16: How the Law Is Failing. In 2006, she made a highly personal documentary for More 4 on abortion rights in the US, A Matter of Life and Death, as part of its Travels With My Camera strand.

Her first book Park and Ride, a travel book on the Great British suburbs, was published by Little, Brown in 1999.

She is also an occasional guest on the UK arts programme Newsnight Review on BBC2, The Culture Show (BBC 2) and also BBC Radio 2's Radcliffe and Maconie Show.

http://mirandasawyer.com/

Cherie Federico is Managing Director and Editor of Aesthetica Magazine. Aesthetica is a British arts and culture magazine. Founded in 2002, Aesthetica Magazine covers literature, visual arts, music, film and theatre. It has 60,000 readers and national and international distribution. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Aesthetica was founded by Cherie Federico and Dale Donley, when they were students at York St John: A College of the University of Leeds (now York St John University) in 2002.

Cherie thinks the art of conversation is truly important. She enjoys good coffee, nice people, travelling, speaking foreign languages, art exhibitions, gigs, films and walks in the countryside. Her favourite place that she’s visited is a little town in southern Italy. One of her favourite films is Il Postino.

http://www.aestheticamagazine.com/

Francesco Manacorda was appointed Artistic Director of Tate Liverpool in April 2012. He was previously director of Artissima, Turin's international art fair, and a curator at London's Barbican Art Gallery. Manacorda graduated with a MA in Curating Contemporary Art in 2003 and is now visiting lecturer at the Royal College of Art. He has been working with Artissima since 2010. As well as his work in London, he previously curated pavilions at the Venice Biennale art show.

Tate Liverpool, which attracts around 600,000 visitors a year, opened in 1988 in a former warehouse on the city's waterfront.

http://www.tate.org.uk/visit/tate-liverpool

Rachael Jones is a freelance copywriter and social media manager based on the Wirral. After gaining

a degree in English Literature from Newcastle University in 2008, she began assessing the various

career options available to her. Eventually settling at From the Red Carpet, a rad film news website,

she discovered an ideal platform to develop and showcase her natural flair for social media while

indulging her fanaticism for all things film. She also works as a web copywriter for clients across the

world, and feels incredibly lucky to be making a living doing what she loves.

When she’s not up all night chasing deadlines, Rachael enjoys sampling new flavours of cheesecake, the art of punnery, being perpetually connected to the Internet and filling her house to the rafters with various pieces of charity shop tat. If you asked her she’d call herself a writer, web aficionado and cineaste, but her primary expertise lies in all things Twitter.

https://twitter.com/theresabluebird

Edgar Schmitz is an artist, the co-director of A Conversation in Many Parts, an international discursive platform for contemporary art and concepts, and a lecturer in Critical Studies at Goldsmiths. Recent exhibitions include British Art Show 7 – In The Days of the Comet, Hayward Gallery and touring (2010/11), extra added bonus material, FormContent (2010), Dictionary of War, Steirischer Herbst Graz (2006); A-C-A-D-E-M-Y, Vanabbemuseum Eindhoven (2006); and Liam Gillick: ‘Edgar Schmitz’, ICA London (2005).

He has also written extensively on contemporary art, with contributions to Kunstforum international, Texte zur Kunst and artforum as well as contemporary, tema celeste and numerous catalogue essays, including texts on Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Phil Collins, on Brian Jungen’s animalities, on humour in Deleuze and Slominski, and on Sarah Morris’ LA. His book on Ambient attitudes is under negotiation with Sternberg Press, Berlin/ NY.

http://www.gold.ac.uk/art/research/staff/es/01/

HOSTS

Liverpool Biennial - The UK Biennial of Contemporary Art. For ten weeks every two years the city of Liverpool is host to an extraordinary range of artworks, projects and a dynamic programme of events. It is the largest international contemporary art festival in the UK.

Liverpool Biennial unfolds through a programme of exhibitions and projects that lead to a rediscovery of the city. Newly commissioned and existing artworks and projects are presented in diverse locations, including unusual and unexpected public spaces as well as the city’s galleries, museums and cultural venues.

http://www.biennial.com/

The Double Negative - Passionate about the arts in Liverpool and beyond. The Double Negative is an online magazine featuring the latest arts, design, film & music coverage in the Liverpool City Region. Our mission: to hold a mirror up to the creativity of the city and reflect it, uncovering and exposing the best of the city and the talent based here.

http://www.thedoublenegative.co.uk/

Camp and Furnace - A new kind of venue. Pop-up, fold-down, drive through. We’ll be rolling out an exciting programme of events over the coming year as well as adding a bar/eatery, photographic studio and boutique caravan hotel. Events to watch out for include Art installations, exhibitions and performances; theatre, cabaret, comedy and music; street food markets, dinners, pop-ups and food slams; arts festival village; thrift market and a vintage bike shop. Why not add your own?

http://www.campandfurnace.com/

The Medium is The Medium

2-5pm Saturday 22nd September 2012

The Blade Factory, Camp and Furnace, 67 Greenland Street, Liverpool L1 0BY

FREE EVENT, BOOKING ESSENTIAL: https://uk.patronbase.com/_LB/Seats/NumSeats?prod_id=1000&perf_id=1&section_id=M&seat_type_id=S

Roller Derby

Last Saturday I was fortunate enough to be invited to the latest roller derby involving the Liverpool Roller Birds.  Not knowing anything about this corner of life, and not being a huge sports fan, I went along just to see what it was like.  And I am glad I did.  This was a very enjoyable Saturday afternoon.

It did take me a while to work out how the sport works, but once I did I was cheering them along.  The pivot and blockers, from both teams form a pack and start skating on the first whistle.  On the second whistle the jammers start.  The aim is for the jammers to pass the opposing teams blockers and get through the pack as quickly as they can.  Once a jammer laps the pack, she begins to score one point for each opposing blocker she passes.  It is fast and furious and above all good natured fun.

Two things about the day struck me more than anything.  The women in both teams were so confident and athletic, they looked beautiful, all shapes, sizes, colours and ages racing round, lighter and more agile on their skates than I am in a pair of sensible shoes.  Despite the cartoon names and make up, there was no doubt I was in the company of a lot of very strong women, just doing what they enjoy, inspiring.  The second highlight was just how friendly everyone was.  Although there was some rivalry between the teams, this was strictly for the track, the rest of the time everyone mixed and chatted to each other, and smiles were plentiful.

If you are interested in learning more about this unusual sport you can contact the Liverpool Roller Birds on www.liverpoolrollerbirds.co.uk.

Summer Shovin

Today I went to a roller derby.  A roller what?  I hear you ask, well check out the blog tomorrow and I will be doing a full post on it.  Each derby has a theme, and this was was the 1950's.  Called Summer Shovin, it was a match between the wonderful Liverpool Roller Birds and a team from Newcastle called Canny Belters.  These are just some of the fabulous outfits on show.

Pirate Style

Two of the best dressed pirates from the Pirate Festival at the Albert Dock.

The Double Negative at Camp & Furnace

Saturday night saw the launch party of Liverpool's best arts magazine The Double Negative.  You may remember I photographed Laura last year and promised to cover the magazine when it was launched.  

The party was held in the best venue ever, Camp and Furnace.  Recently opened it is currently a bar and exhibition space, with facilities for live acts.  Two things which make it stand out is the boutique caravan hotel due to be rolled out soon.  If you are planning a trip to Liverpool, please check availability with these guys first, it has to be the best way to stay over.  Secondly is the fag garden.  Yes you heard me right, the fag garden. It is a high walled triangular courtyard with two fire bowls lit with scented crackling fires and wooden spools so you can sit around the campfire smoke fags and chunner nonsense to the others gathered round.  It was magical.

I did remember to take my camera, although due to the huge glasses of wine they serve most of the pictures are a bit blurry, but enjoy...

Well I did warn you they were blurry.

Giant Street Style

It's not easy making an effort for a 9.30 start, but these two have managed it.

Wakey Wakey Little Girl

On a beautiful sunny spring morning in a quiet park in Liverpool, an estimated 15000 people have gathered to see a lost little (giant) girl and her faithful hound wake up and set off on her journey to find her Uncle.

Once again Liverpool has given us an event where words quite simply fail me it is so moving. The sight of thousands of school children dressed in period costume and adults with huge amazed smiles on their faces.  An event which instills the wonder of childhood in us all.

Competition - Design a T Shirt

 My lovely friends over at Liverpool's finest arts webzine The Double Negative are hosting a competition to design a t shirt as they explained:

Everyone likes a kick ass t-shirt. And we at The Double Negative are no different. That’s why we are looking for 3 people to re-imagine The Double Negative as an image to adorn a range of the best t-shirts ever. We want people to include the words somewhere ‘The Double Negative’. Thats it. It can be any interpretation of that as long as those words are included.

The winning designers will be made immortal through a profile in Little Black Book, and will be interviewed by us for a special written feature that will be posted on The Double Negative site. They will also receive a percentage of every t-shirt (of their design) sold.

All you have to do is come up with a cracking idea (using no more than 3 colours), and send the design (high res images please) to competition[@]thedoublenegative.co.uk by 5pm on Friday 10th February 2012. The shortlist will be selected by The Double Negative Team, and the winners be decided by our discerning readers over a period of 10 days. Good Luck!

Full Terms on our website

World Aids Day

This is how the University of Liverpool is celebrating World Aids Day, a way in which I think it will be hard to beat in terms of scale and utter flipping nora that's gorgeous factor.  If you have never gone past the Engineering Building on Brownlow Hill of a night and watched the kaleidoscope of changing colours which light up the building, then you have missed an absolute treat.

Hope Street Feast

For the last few years, mid September has seen one of my favourite events in Liverpool, the Hope Street Feast.  Held in what is probably the second most famous street in Liverpool, it is infinitely richer in cultural gems than the ubiquitous Matthew Street.  With a cathedral at both ends, there is in the middle the Everyman Theatre (currently being rebuilt), The Philharmonic Hall, The Unity Theatre on Hope Place and LIPA.  Alongside this are a number of restaurants, all worth a visit, the Philharmonic Pub, for the toilets and my favourite pub Ye Cracke which is just off on Rice Street.  With every step down this thoroughfare you have enough history and culture to overwhelm the soul.  I dare any other city to rival it.


Enough of that, back to the feast, one of the most entertaining parts of this event is the street theatre which always raises belly laughs every few yards.

And of course, the food.  stall upon stall of street food, cheeses, breads and fruit and vegetables.

One stall which has caught my eye for the last two years is The Derimon Smokery mainly for their smoked butter which is one of the most delicious and versatile foodstuffs which has ever passed my lips.  They don't just sell butter, but smoked meats and cheeses to make you want to faint with pleasure.  They have a stall at the Farmers Market in Lark Lane and I can't recommend a visit strongly enough.

And best of all is Laura's Little Bakery maker of the finest cupcakes in Liverpool, nay possibly the world, although if cupcakes aren't your thing, try the New York Cheesecake, a taste you won't regret.

And finally, what about the style on show?  Well the weather was a tad changeable so most people had dressed practically for that.  I did however, come across one example of style which put the rest of us to shame.