Category Archive for ‘2008’ at tenantspin

Archive for the '2008' Category

Community Film Night…the feedback!!!

Published by tenantspin on December 9, 2008 in 2008, Event, Films, Liverpool, News and Projects. 0 Comments

tenantspin’s first community film night (25th November) went down really well with all invited.

Our idea for this film evening came from feedback we received from other screenings of this ilk including Love Lane Lives (Leon Seth/Ron Noon) and Gardens of Stone (Paul Sudbury) which both have a very local focus but looked outward toward national schemes which changed the lives of people living in areas effected by mass demolition and redevelopment of social housing as well as the closure of huge, historical firms like Tate and Lyle who at one time employed 80% of the people living in the Vauxhall area of Liverpool.

This commuity film night featured the work of Ray Walsh local filmmaker and resident and the now famous documentarist Nick Broomfield. The first, Ray’s film Disappearing Communities was an 1989 production which documented the changing face of inner-city Liverpool and the social housing around the Bronlow Hill, London Road, Scotland Road and Byron Street areas. In someways, it provided a classically scouse nostaligic look at the importance of these commnities in the development of a city but with such a rounded outlook it was hard to stick on the side either of the goverment or the people.

The second, Nick Broomfield’s Behind the Rent Strike saw a very young Broomfield exposed to a world of socialism, ideology and strength of the masses that was pretty prevelant in some parts of Liverpool in the 70’s. The film documents a period of 12 months during which a group of residents from the overspill town Kirkby fight back against a rent increase and pay freeze which was part of a controversial government bill eventually scrapped in the early 80’s.

Some of the comments:

‘Hopefully this will be the 1st of many more screenings and understanding’

‘I loved the subject matter (of the film night) and the honest and open way it was portrayed’

‘Keep it coming’

‘Very impressed. More of these’

‘Good format - relaxed atmosphere’

‘Just hope more people can get involved - love the community aspect’

‘good. film lengths were ideal’

‘good split between inner city and subhurbs’

‘this is a fantastic idea - I hope to see a lot more community film nights’

The William Carling Bold Street Pavement Artist Comp

Published by tenantspin on November 12, 2008 in 2008, Event, FACT, Liverpool and News. 1 Comment

Ropewalks Square recently played host to variety of talents from the world of fine art al fresco. The idea had been honed a year or so ago by Ronnie Formby (Scottie Press) Michael Kelly (author of Liverpool’s Irish Connection amongst others) and Mike Lea (Maggie Mays Bold Street) when they stumbled on the idea of opening a gallery in Maggie Mays dedicated to the life and works of James William Carling the original Liverpool pavement aritst.

Finally, one slightly wet day in October the plan came together and the square saw the gathering of artists intent on winning the prize and creating the best piece based on a famous work from one of the regions famous painting galleries.

tenantspin was there to film the whole thing and the results of this, the work of John Scotland, can be seen on www.fact.tv.

The long Night…of the Biennial 30th Oct 08

Published by tenantspin on November 12, 2008 in 2008, Event, FACT, Liverpool and Projects. 0 Comments

tenantspin took part in celebrating the city-gallery-and-arts-spaces late night opening extravaganza The Long Night. The evening was a roaring success enticing late-night art revelers out from the warmth and comfort of their homes to experience the best of the biennial arts shows with a few surprises thrown in for good measure.

FACT celebrated by starting the evening of the launch of their seminal new tome celebrating the new studies and ground breaking research undertaken by FACT and professor Andy Miah throughout the year (you might remember our own inclusion in this in the guise of Titanium tenants and Where is my World?) Human Futures which looks at the very essence of future human existence and expansion through art and science.

This evening also saw the launch of our newest and most impressive project fact.tv. It has been weeks in the making and is the work of MITES, Paul Hendrick, Mike and many others. fact.tv is a platform which opens the doors for new types of artistic expression and documentation away from the gallery, arts centre and macbook. tenantspin has its own channel which looks set to play a seminal part in our upcoming gallery show at Tate Liverpool opening 16th December this year (more about that later…!!) www.fact.tv

Aside from these two evening defining events there was also an appearance from a Tarot card reader who had her hands full giving people predicitons and hope for the future through the shady corridors of allegorical interpretations the cards offer.

Last but certainly not least, Fiction@FACT the super-popular evening of spoken word, music and visuals which used to take place pretty regularly at FACT in the days of Eddie Berg came back for a sly reprise which saw the cafe transformed into a haven for both non-literary and literary types supping the delicious pumpkin soup available exclusively in the cafe that night.

Cultural Commentators part 3

Published by tenantspin on November 12, 2008 in 2008, Broadcasts and News. 0 Comments

As part of our year-long commentary on cultural events in Liverpool 2008 tenantspin invited Mandy ‘Queen of Culture’ back onto the couch to host an hour-long discussion with artists and commentators from around the city. Red Wire, The Royal Standard, Wolstenholme Projects and artinliverpool.com joined us to look at the last 5 months of events and celebrations and discuss what we all are aspiring to in the looming year of sustainability 2009.

There was much discussion around what we wish we hadn’t missed what we want to see and indeed the future of Liverpool once the coverted year is over. The debate will be uploaded to www.google.com/video soon so keep your eyes peeled!

We will also be doing our year round up from our studio in Tate Liverpool in January.

IDEE visit tenantspin

Published by tenantspin on November 12, 2008 in 2008, Projects and Related Work. 0 Comments

Monday and Tuesday last week IDEE visited tenantspin from Dresden. The group is made up of artists and young people from a housing estate in Prohils, Dresden who started a arts club in the middled of the housing estate around 1994. Prohlis is an interesting looks at how Germany responded to the housing crisis after the 2nd World War. It was once in Eastern Germany before the Berlin wall came down and is made up of mostly 1950’s high-rise blocks, built originally to house 25,000 people. Since the fall of the wall most people have left for better experiences in other parts of Germany and those who are left tend to be young, unemployed and male.

Adam, an English artist who has lived around the estate for since 1994 saw the problems involved in these young peoples lives and started a media club which trains young people in film production, video editing and other interesting modes of creative development through media such as stop frame animation. They also make really interesting video blogs with other young people from the estate about their experience of being unemployed in Prohlis, what they do on Sundays, a week day and pay-day. The result of these are poignant and touching examples of an excellent way to get people to open up to a camera which can sometimes be problematic.

We took the group to the Liverpool Lighthouse on Oakfield Road, Anfield to have a look at the facilties they have there and then got together with them to run a workshop from FACT on the Tuesday - the group produced a small film which mixed flash animation techniques with stills and some moving image to give their reaction to coming to Liverpool and to seeing the large-scale regeneration of some areas and degeneration of others - the film isn’t ready as yet but watch this space……..

On Tuesday night Adam gave a talk to a group in the Renew Rooms looking at ways you can work as an artist in an environment like this and what can ultimately be gained for participants and practitioners.

For more information about IDEE and their projects go to http://idee-01239.webconsulting-dresden.de

Ways of Seeing - Part Four

Published by tenantspin on August 21, 2008 in 2008, Broadcasts, Event, FACT and Liverpool. 0 Comments

Part four of the Ways of Seeing series 2008 is available below. On this installment, tenantspin welcomed artist David Blandy and Bluecoat Blueroom onto the couch.

Watch live video from tenantspin on Justin.tv

webcasts, webcasts and more webcasts!

Published by tenantspin on June 16, 2008 in 2008, Broadcasts and News. 0 Comments

tenantspin has had a hectic couple of weeks in the world of webcasting. On April 9th, we played host to a film made by FACT-based filmmaker Leon Seth and merseyside historian Ron Noon; Love Lane Lives. The film documents the rise and fall of Liverpool-based Tate and Lyle throughout the 20th century and the effect the closure of the two sites, Love Lane (now the Eldonian Village) and the river-based plant had on the local community. The event was well attended by past employees of the sugar giant and reflected the need to us to have a regular spot in our programme for screenings of films which have a strong community flavour.

on 7th May we held an afternoon discussion looking at the rise of gun related and violent crime in Liverpool. Our panel was made up of esteemed experts in this field including a representitive from Merseyside Police Matrix unit, a retired officer partly responsible for the Citysafe initative, a mother with a son currently in prison for committing murder and who is writing a screenplay about violent crime and a representitve from Liverpool Echo. The show was chaired by Liam Fogherty who dissected causes, effects and the representation of gun crime in Liverpool.

On 21st May (as seen below) we held the first of our Ways of Seeing webcasts with a virtual Nancy Davenport, University of the 3rd Age and The Windows Project.

June 4th saw the second part of our Cultural Commentators series this time chaired by Mandy Queen of Culture We began discussion with each person in the room listing their favourite event of 2008 with choices ranging from the Youth Orchestra to the decapitation of the Ringo topiary in South Parkway train station! What ensued was an interesting and diverse debate which concluded with one and all looking forward to the second half of the year and of the programme with great gusto. The event was covered by Liverpool Confidential to see the article click here.

Finally, last Wedensday 11th June tenantspin were on the couch with our second set of Ways of Seeing guests. Swedenish artist Otto Karvonen joined us via live skype-link-up from Helsinki for a discussion around the up-and-coming projects he is working with the Off the Page Writers group from North West Disability Arts Forum. We talked about writing in the public/not so public realm, signage and the effect it has on the cities citizens as well as the work of the Off the Page Group and how important the written word is to our everyday lives. Otto will be visiting Liverpool over the next couple of months to start his work so we look forward to seeing him in the flesh (and 6 foot smaller!)

Over the coming months there is no promise of a reprive in our schedule as we welcome Toxteth TV to FACT on 8th July 6.30 - 8.00 for L8A, a third Ways of Seeing webcast on the 9th; Hubbard and Birchler and Walton Youth Projects, on 30th July our Park Road Market debate surrounding local v’s global, 13th July The End of My World - a debate about the now topical global warming issues facing modern humans, on the 14th August we have the 4th Ways of Seeing with the Bluecoat Blueroom project and David Blandy and last but not least 17th September which is the last Ways of Seeing webcast, an open session days before the launch of the festival 2008 featuring a range of different artists and curators in Liverpool for the biennial. Phew!

Ways of Seeing 2008 - Part One

Published by tenantspin on June 16, 2008 in 2008 and Broadcasts. 0 Comments

tenantspin is very excited to present the first discussion in our six part Ways of Seeing Series 2008. For those of you that are new to us, tenantspin have been working with the Liverpool Biennial over the last 3 festivals, and in the build up we host a series of discussions aimed at giving us a bit of background leading up to the festival’s September launch.

In the broadcast below we welcomed, The Windows Project, University of the 3rd Age and artist Nancy Davenport who joined us all the way from America. Click here for more information about this years Biennial.

Sefton Park summer carnival

Published by tenantspin on June 8, 2008 in 2008, Event and Liverpool. 0 Comments

tenantspin hosted an afternoon of dancing, eating and singing (as well as the occasional drink!) at Sefton Park community Centre last week to usher in our great British summer.

The afternoon was partly organised by Katie Yoxell a student of community art from the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts who worked with Margo Hogg, Jean Niblock, Lily Clarke and John McGuirk and other residents from Sefton Park to put together a summer themed party which included everything from grass skirts to sangria.

Everyone had a truly lovely time and our thanks go to harpist Charly, Pat for the wonderful line dancing, the Twirlies for their creative writing, the girls from LIPA for their 4 piece acapella performance, Margo for her help with organising the day and for her perfomance, all the ladies and gents who brought along homemade cakes (which we all enjoyed) John for his legendary spoon playing and for everyone who turned out in their summer best - lets hope this is the start of a great summer at Sefton Park!

Also, congratulations to Katie for passing her assesment with flying colours with an getting such a great mark in her assesment.

Loaded: a discussion about Gun Crime

Published by tenantspin on May 12, 2008 in 2008, Broadcasts, Event, FACT and Liverpool. 0 Comments

on the 7th of May, in the Box at FACT, tenantspin hosted a discussion about gun crime. Guest host Liam Fogarty welcomed onto the tenantspin couch: Andrew Edwards, Deputy Editor of Liverpool Echo and lead on Liverpool Unites charity and campaign, Ian MacDonald, Retired Police Officer and Initiator of CitySafe, Stephen Moore, Merseyside Police Matrix Unit and Tracy Dunn, Film-maker.

We asked the question: is Liverpool losing the battle against gun crime? See the discussion below.