Louise Hobson awarded Library Residency 2014

Former FORUM speaker, Louise Hobson will begin her residency in the WARP library space in January 2014 running through until March. We are all really happy for her and hope it all goes well!

For updates on her residency and to see what else is going on in warp and g39 see: http://www.g39.org/warp/ 

Hobson stated that she is "...interested in the idea of the trade route and how as a theoretical and visual concept, it can be used as a tool to explore the exchange of art, knowledge and ideas on a global scale. In the Warp library there is a book called 'Connect: Public Art in Transit Project. Belfast to Dublin Rail Link' by Frances Dowds and I would like to take this catalogue of a project that explores making points and forging links, as a starting point."


Image Credit: © Louise Hobson, Theatre 2012

Bartosz Nowicki's New Book: CITY - The Season

Bartosz Nowicki - CITY - The Season
Launched November 2013

This is not a story of the club but of the people who support it – Bartosz Nowicki

CITY – The Season follows Cardiff City FC fans during the 2012-13 campaign, when the Bluebirds wore red. Nowicki presents his own record of the season, weaved in with text from City fans to celebrate the club’s charge to the Premier League and explore issues of identity and belonging generated by the club’s controversial rebrand.   Nowicki gets to the heart of what it means to follow Cardiff City, home and away, the anguish and excitement of watching the game, journeys to away grounds by cramped coaches, the harrying presence of stewards and police, the drinking, the singing and the joke playing and always the colours, shirts and tattoos that were the contested symbols of belonging during a season in which, according to Nowicki 'the shadow of the rebrand followed us to every corner of Britain’.

The book includes text from renowned authors and columnists: Annis Abraham Jnr (the author of 6 books, which have sold in excess of 160000 copies); Carl Curtis (South Wales Echo and Wales Online); and James Leighton who wrote the acclaimed biography of Manchester United legend, Duncan Edwards, which became the no. 1 bestselling football book on Amazon.   The book contain never before published photographs of supporters, but it also includes behind the scenes insights, such as meetings between former owner Sam Hammam and current owner Vincent Tan as well as Hammams meeting with fans in the Holland House Hotel. Of course, as befits a book about a football club, you will also find photographs of players, including Craig Bellamy, David Marshall and Matt Connolly.

Lost and Found | The Obscure Camera Photography Exhibitions

Lost and Found Community Photography Exhibition &

The Obscure Camera Abstract Photo Exhibition

Exhibitions open Wednesday, 11 December - Tuesday, 31 December 2013

Open: Tue - Fri 10.30 - 2, 3.30 - 6, Sat 11 - 6

26 Church Street, Abertillery. NP13 3HD

"Lost and Found” and “The Obscure Camera” are the sixth and seventh photography exhibitions organised in Abertillery, Wales by the*kickplate*project.

“Lost and Found” features copies of analogue photographs submitted by the members of our local community, including Abertillery, Six Bells and Brynmawr. In the times of omnipresent digital photography we wanted to remind everyone about the importance of physical prints that don’t get deleted easily and that can last for generations. We asked people to have another look at their photo albums, that all of us used to have and fill up with memories of holidays, celebrations and snapshots of everyday life. We discovered some real treasures, accounts of both people’s past and the past of photographic and printing techniques that are no longer used on a mass scale. We’d like to thank everyone who trusted us with their photographs and thus gave us an insight into their lives and artistic endeavours.

“The Obscure Camera” is an exhibition of abstract photography featuring German photographer Florian Schmidt. We decided to present these two contrasting types of photography – the very well-known scenes from family albums and a selection of abstract work that many of our viewers may not be familiar with. We’d like to show that abstraction is not necessarily inaccessible to an average viewer and to show that photography can be used to create an aesthetic or emotion and not just record the real world as it is. 

Jacob Aue Sobol - Close to You

Jacob Aue Sobol - Close to You

Exhibition opens Saturday, 14 December 2013, 7pm

Artist talk and book signing Friday, 10 January 2014

Third Floor Gallery, 102 Bute Street, Cardiff, CF10 5AD

"When I photograph, I try to use my instincts as much as possible. It is when pictures are unconsidered and irrational that they come to life; that they evolve from showing to being. In this process I will not only use my camera to take pictures, but also as an instrument to create intimacy and closeness in a poetic, direct and unsentimental way. In spite of photography’s seemingly concrete form I hope to expose layers in people that are not immediately visible, but nonetheless shape who we are and give meaning to our lives. I believe this way of working will bring me closer to a feeling of what the term home means to myself and the people I photograph."

In the exhibition “Close to you” we encounter photographs from various projects Jacob has worked on over the past decade. The majority of the works are from the famous series I, Tokyo; but there are also pictures from Bangkok Encounter, Home, Copenhagen, as well as Arrivals and Departures. Common to the photographs is his unique, expressive style of black-and-white photography, giving the photographs a distinctive materiality.

3AM: Wonder, Paranoia and the Restless Night

3AM: Wonder, Paranoia and the Restless Night

Exhibition open: Saturday 14 December 2013 - Sunday 2 March 2014

Chapter, Market Road, Canton, Cardiff, Wales CF5 1QE

Francis Alÿs, Tonico Lemos Auad, Jordan Baseman, Sandra Cinto, Dorothy Cross, Dornith Doherty, Anthony Goicolea, Marc Hulson, Rachel Kneebone, Nathan Mabry, Michael Palm & Willi Dorner, Hirsch Perlman, Ed Pien, Lucy Reynolds, Sophy Rickett, Paul Rooney, Anj Smith, Fred Tomaselli, Danny Treacy, Bettina von Zwehl and Tom Wood

Bleary-eyed sleepers woken up to be photographed, prowling coyotes caught on specialist digital cameras, and a helicopter spotlight searching the night time waters for a missing person. These are just some of the highlights of this exhibition curated by Angela Kingston and toured from The Bluecoat in Liverpool this autumn.

The exhibition features 22 UK and international artists, including Francis Alÿs, Sophy Rickett, and Fred Tomaselli, and includes paintings, drawings, sculpture, photography and video, some made especially for the show.

The exhibition demonstrates how this particular nocturnal hour has captured the imagination of artists. They explore various themes – psychological, sociological, natural and astronomical – to capture something of the strangeness of the night and the extraordinary range of emotions, states and experiences it witnesses.

The featured artworks show teenagers running wild and free, a woman’s rapture at the cosmos, a man quite alone and afraid, the steely imaginings of a frightened child, and an emboldened fox.

A 100-page anthology for insomniacs, featuring contemporary and historic night-related material and illustrations of artworks has been produced to accompany the exhibition and is available for purchase from the Gallery and Box Office.

3AM is a Bluecoat touring exhibition.