Image © Akshay Mahajan

The surprise we took to the North East Photography Network discussion group talk we did this Wednesday was a print-on-demand book we had made about the Blindboys Wideyed collaboration. It's very exclusive - we have just two copies of it for reference only, it's not for sale, and if you missed the talk you may never get another chance to look at it in person... But we've made this little video so we can show it in another way (with apologies for the hissy sound).

BLINDBOYS WIDEYED - the book from Lucy Carolan on Vimeo.

North East Photography Network have invited us to give a talk about BLINDBOYS WIDEYED, the exhibition and interventions we produced in Newcastle in collaboration with Blindboys.

And the timing couldn't be better - taking place at the Lit&Phil this Wednesday 19th May, from 5.30pm - 7pm, the talk is the perfect way for us to sign off the UK part of the collaboration just days before Blindboys take up the baton with BLOWUP IN BOMBAY on Saturday 22nd May. Blindboys' BLOWUP street exhibitions have previously taken place in Bangalore, Delhi and Paris, and they're planning to make the one in Bombay their biggest ever. GO BLINDBOYS!

Oh, and we'll be bringing a little surprise to the talk with us...

"The University of Sunderland in collaboration with North East Photography Network and the Folkwang University in Essen, Germany has organised a photographic exhibition on the theme of urban experience. The project creates a visual mosaic of the cities we inhabit in a wide range of formats that depict urban space, architecture, the people and the buzz of the city."

The end is only the beginning

This weekend we had to go to Newcastle to clear the Forth Lane billboards of Lenskap's 'Where are you going Mr Mahajan?' piece, ready for the next artist. We were a bit sad (especially as the posters were still intact!), but it was a beautiful day, and even good things must come to an end sometime.

So now that our part of this collaborative exchange has come to a close, and we've had some time to think about it, we've realised that one aspect of the whole BLINDBOYS WIDEYED experience we haven't mentioned, but which was really a key factor, is chance.

The empty shop we originally hoped to use as our gallery is steel clad, which is where the idea of using magnets to hang the exhibition came from. But if we had been able to lease that space instead of 67B Westgate Road, we wouldn't have also had the billboards on Forth Lane for Mr Mahajan.

When we first approached Blindboys about exhibiting their work in Newcastle, they asked us what we wanted them to send us. So we told them that the size of shop/gallery we secured (which we didn't know at the time) would determine the size and number of prints we could display, but that wasn't their problem and anyway, they should just send us whatever they wanted us to see and show. Had we tried to prescribe the exact quantity and kind of photographs we wanted, we might not have had the foresight to select the images we received - the wealth of work that we were then able to respond to and, thanks to the fact that Wideyed doesn't have its own permanent gallery space, be flexible and inventive about how and where they were displayed.

Take Charli Bikaner. After we'd worked out the sequencing for 67B, we were lamenting the fact that we didn't have enough space to exhibit Charli as well (because we heart Charli!)... when the idea of approaching the Mining Institute occurred. As for the billboards, the option of using those came about as we randomly chatted to Mike Tilley (of Newcastle Arts Centre, who rented us 67B) about Blindboys and their 'Blow.Up' street exhibitions - and it was as we told him we thought it such a shame we couldn't do anything similar, that he offered us the billboards on Forth Lane as well.

And here we circle back to Mr Mahajan. We turned up yesterday with buckets, sponges and scrapers, ready to remove the posters completely, but when it came to it we were asked to just smooth away any ridges and cover over the darker areas with paint, leaving as much paper in place as possible. While we worked, so many people passing by told us how much they had enjoyed Mr Mahajan, saying they wished we could leave him in place. So we couldn't resist - we mostly did as asked and covered everything... but the cones. Hey. Last chance to play, and we didn't hesitate to take it.

It will be interesting to see what happens to art works subsequently placed on Forth Lane - whether they're respected as well as the Mr Mahajan piece or not - because as far as we know those billboards have not been used for that kind of display before, and everyone we've spoken to has been both amazed and more than happy that the posters lasted so well. Which raises questions. For example, that series of images (however they've been read) have obviously been enjoyed, and it makes us wonder - is the evident pleasure they've given, both to us and passersby, necessarily a guilty pleasure?

Does it really, really matter if it is?

More important than anything though is something Blindboys and we agree on - that work needs to be seen. BLINDBOYS WIDEYED has been all about making that possible. And while the internet has been incredibly useful, digital is not the last word.

Chance is. Woo, did we dare say... chance? Well yes! We are photographers, so we do have some experience in either making or recognising luck when we see it. And really, there's nothing wrong with that either.

Touch wood.

Nil magnum nisi bonum

We're quite proud (and justifiably too, we think) of our resourcefulness in funding BLINDBOYS WIDEYED, but while financial considerations are a necessary part of the process, money is only ever raw fuel for a project like this, not the driver, the journey, or the destination.

Our aims with this exhibition were many, and despite limited means at our disposal we believe we've pretty well achieved them all, and some.

In the process we were able to experiment with new (for us) methods of presenting printed works, and try out fresh ways of promoting what we were doing online (all needs a lot more development, but we made a start at least). Primarily though, we hoped to build on our previous experience with producing the Newsha Tavakolian exhibition - to continue exploring the potential of crossovers between the online and real world, creating new and fruitful links between us and photographers elsewhere, and sharing our discovery of their work with an audience local to us.

About the audience

• Including speakers, roughly 70 people attended the North East Photography Network symposium on 12th March. Amusingly, not all of them noticed the Charli Bikaner installation, but we think most did. Charli stayed in place at the Mining Institute for a fortnight, during which time the auditorium was used for other conferences or visited by lots more people (we'll add numbers when supplied).
• Following the symposium, many attendees also came to the exhibition opening at 67B Westgate Road. Adding the extra people we'd invited, around 100-120 interested bodies passed through the gallery during the preview, steaming up the windows and between them drinking all the wine. That's 24 bottles of plonk in all (well, let's say 23, as one of us probably knocked back one of those all by herself, no prize for guessing who...).
• From the next day until the exhibition came down on 25th March, 263 people popped in to see it, and 38 of those took the time to write some really great feedback about it on the postcards we had printed for that purpose - as we couldn't afford to fly Blindboys over for the opening, the postcards provided anyone who wanted to a nice way of connecting directly back to them, and as soon as Blindboys tell us where to send them we'll be sticking them all in the post.
• As for the Mr Mahajan billboard piece, it's impossible to guess how many people might have seen it in passing, but Forth Lane is quite a busy walkway. The really interesting thing about it though is that, while we were putting it up, the people working in the offices opposite (who all loved it) told us we'd be lucky if it remained intact more than 24 hours. We walked past it again last night though, three whole weeks after placing it there, and not a single poster has been graffitied. While there are some rips around the edges of most, they're really minimal - it's like people have tried to see if they could remove one so they could keep it, but as soon as they realised they couldn't they've stopped, preferring to leave them in place and undamaged.

Let's talk dirty...

So back in August 2009, when we were starting to think about what we were going to do next, we also looked at the state of our bank account and the cupboard was bare. Realising that no matter what we eventually decided to do it would be difficult to achieve with zero cash, we thrashed out some ideas and began to come up with a cunning plan...

First, we started frequenting auction houses, and at the beginning of September won a few job lots of camera equipment. Next, we started selling off the things bought bit by bit. Initially, the plan was mainly to sell enough to recoup our investment and put much of the remainder of the equipment into the pool of stuff we sometimes use when running workshops and projects, but by the beginning of December, when we approached Blindboys about exhibiting their work, we realised we needed money more than anything and kept selling.

In this way we raised around £500 over the 3-4 months between December and the present. We used this as match funding in a successful application for a Newcastle City Council DCLG 'Art in Empty Spaces' scheme grant, and doubled to £1,000 our total budget for the BLINDBOYS WIDEYED project, in addition to which the wine and nibbles for the preview were generously provided by North East Photography Network.

With £1,000 we were able to put on the exhibition in the empty shop, the site specific installation in The Mining Institute, and the billboard piece on Forth Lane. It covered the cost of rent, window lettering, poster, postcard and exhibition printing... basically, our shoestring budget has covered everything bar labour. Apart from the time and effort we (and our lovely helpers) have put in, ultimately this project hasn't cost us anything.

And while everything was hung with double-sided sticky tape and physics, or wallpaper paste and elbow grease, or magnets, if we'd waited until we could afford to do it all better, we'd still be waiting.

Where's the fun in that?

So, how did we get here?

Shortly after founding Wideyed in February 2008, the organiser of Tees Valley Photography Festival approached us and asked if we would be interested in producing an exhibition of work by Newsha Tavakolian. The festival set up the connection with Newsha, arranging for her to send her work to us, and Wideyed put the physical exhibition together (selecting and sequencing the images to print and frame, flying Newsha over for the opening etc).

Newsha's exhibition was the first thing Wideyed achieved as a collective, and it seemed an auspicious start. The three of us were keen to develop the experience, but it took a good year for us to work out how...

In August 2009, via Yaohong's excellent Asian Photography Blog, we discovered Blindboys online and started watching what they were doing. We particularly loved their 'Blow.Up' guerilla exhibitions, "bringing photography to the streets" from Bangalore to Paris. And then, in November they 'Blew.Up' Delhi, and at the end of this blog post about it they said, "Can [you] contribute? Of course you can – firstly if you think this is cool – spread the word. If you want to submit or help us print, design and plaster – write to us."

So that was it. The offer we couldn't refuse. We didn't just want to send work though, we wanted to get involved. So what we suggested was a collaboration - we really hoped Blindboys would include work by us in one of their 'Blow.Up' street shows, and while Wideyed couldn't help print and show work in South Asia, in exchange we could show work in England, in our own way.

We have to mostly credit Blindboys for the initial idea though. Would we have contacted them if they hadn't posted that open invitation? And Yaohong deserves some credit too - at the end of this post about Blindboys' 'Blow.Up' shows he asks, "Would you consider doing this in your own country? What kind of obstacles do you think you would encounter? What kind of works do you think would be well-received?" Well, we decided to try and find out.

And finally, we really recommend watching the video below. After seeing that, we just could not resist.

blow.up in Delhi! from lenskap on Vimeo.

Understanding your own sexuality is a struggle. Telling your family you're gay can be difficult, so finding a rag-tag bunch of people you can share your feelings with helps. The search is for broad, reassuring chests, shared cigarettes, gossip exchanged over too much coffee - because being queer is as much about this new family as it is about sexuality. 

Lovers may comfort desires, but the queer family is also there for you, drinking with you at your local bar, discussing difficult decisions - be it the college you want to go to or the colour of skinny jean that will suit you best.

Akshay Mahajan's images present an intimate view of Bangalore's queer community. His observations of the interactions of lovers and friends embrace their complexity, their moments of drama, solicitude and calm.

Wideyed is pleased to announce that 'Queer Family in Bangalore' is being exhibited for the very first time as part of the Blindboys Wideyed show.

Akshay Mahajan has traveled to some of the most dangerous and unlikely corners of South Asia. His work has brought him face to face with members of the Mumbai land mafia; helped him gauge the entrepreneurial spirit in Dharavi, one of Asia's largest slums; taken him onto the sets of Bollywood films, on the trail of the Microfinance dollar in Rajasthan, across North India and Nepal in an all out auto-rickshaw race; and to Asia's largest garbage dump, where rubbish is turned to profit at the cost of Cambodia's environment and the health of the people who work and live there.

Akshay has been published in Tehelka, La Repubblica, Le Monde, Wired Magazine, Silk Route, The Daily Telegraph, Hindustan Times, Haaretz Daily, Air Magazine, and The New Indian Express. In 2009, he attended the prestigious Eddie Adams workshop.

Based in Mumbai, India and travel are continual inspirations for his work.

For more about Akshay, follow this link.

-----

*In the run up to the opening of BLINDBOYS WIDEYED on 12th March, we are blogging about each of the Blindboys photographers and the work they have sent us for the exhibition.

Toran Natak is one of four surviving traveling theater groups in Gujarat, India.

In a state which has lost thousands to communal violence in recent years, these 25 artists coming from varied castes and religions reaffirm the idea of peaceful and positive co-existence.

In the 1970s, traveling troupes were at the height of their popularity. Supporting over a hundred artists and a repertoire of over 50 plays from different genres, competition between rival troupes was immense and many performers were nothing short of being stars.

Since the 1990s, television and mainstream cinema have practically destroyed their livelihood. With the number of people attending performances dropping every season, the remaining troupes find it very hard to continue. For the government these artists simply do not exist. They are provided with no support, monetary or otherwise, in fact, putting on a show often involves paying bribes to various government institutions.

Election times are particularly difficult, as there is a law stating that no more than five people can congregate together. This can put a working troupe out of action for months, and reflects the lack of respect and acknowledgment for performing artists outside of the mainstream in present day Indian society.

But at least for now, Toran Natak are continuing, even if it’s just for takings of 5000 rupees (roughly £70) a night to be shared between its 25 performers.

They know it better than most - the show must go on!

For more about Lenskap, follow this link.

21 year old Sophie Ashraf is an artiste of her times, a creative force informed by the post 9/11 world, a daring new voice like no other.

"It’s like when you really like a band, you wear T-shirts of that band... Well we really, really like Islam, so we wear the burkha. I rap because I can’t sing. But I love music, so it had to be rap. Soon, the burkha and the rap formed an identity, and people started recognising me as The Burkha Rapper.

The Justice Rocks Concert was the first platform where I felt the setting and the timing was right to talk about Islam. The Mumbai attack had just happened and everyone was waiting for a proactive Muslim to come out and say what Islam was about. I was just blown away by the response.

People tend to think that someone who tries to be different and someone who breaks the rules are the same. I work within the rules, but I find those little loopholes that allow me to do my thing.

There are those who are not convinced about the burkha, sure. Now that we wear it, we feel empty, naked without it. There is a line in the Quran that says: “To you, your religion, and to me mine.” And so they are letting me express myself the way I want to."

Carlo and Nick invite you to the opening of the brand new Empty Shop HQ.

Set over two floors and featuring 6 exhibitions, this is the biggest Empty Shop event yet and also celebrates the opening of our first ever full time venue.

The event features:

• The 2nd Annual Empty Shop Open
• Work by the new Empty Shop studio group, The Freebirds
• The first residency in the new Stairwell Gallery
• A new mixed media exhibition by photographer Toby Lloyd
• Original wall drawings by the Cloud Commission
• Expanse Gallery Expanse: The smallest gallery in the world curated by 50ft Long Horse

"MAstars is an annual online selection of the most promising artists from the UK's leading MA courses. Selected by influential artists, curators, academics and arts professionals, MAstars keeps you up to date with the artists to watch and gives you an insight into the future of the UK art scene."

For more about Richard and other MAstars, follow this link.

North East Photography Network yesterday released the details of its first major event - 'Photography (w)here?', a two day symposium and portfolio review.

"Explore some of the pressing issues facing contemporary photographers and share some of your ideas with our panel of leading curators, editors and practitioners. What new opportunities exist for photographers? What are the pitfalls and how can we sustain our professional practices in the current economic climate? How are new photographic practices being supported and disseminated?"

Symposium, Saturday 12th March: Photographer Sarah Pickering will be the key-note speaker. The round-table discussion will be chaired by Alessandro Vincentelli, Curator, Baltic.

Portfolio Reviews, Saturday 13th March: An exciting opportunity for one-to-one conversations with reviewers of your choice. Each review will last approximately 20 minutes, and booking is essential.

Reviewers: 

• Camilla Brown, Senior Curator, The Photographers’ Gallery, London

• Malcolm Dickson, Director Street Level Photoworks, Glasgow

• Patrick Henry, Director, Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool

• Greg Hobson, Curator of Photographs, National Media Museum

• Marc Prüst, Freelance Photography Consultant and Curator, Paris

• Alistair Robinson, Programme Director, NGCA, Sunderland

• and others TBC
  

Venue: The Mining Institute, Neville Hall, Westgate Road, Newcastle, NE1 1SE

Admission to the symposium is free, but booking in advance is essential.    

Portfolio Reviews cost £5 per session. For more information, follow this link.

Cheers, Lucy

News just in that the 'Tattoos of the Tees Valley' exhibition will definitely be touring to two more venues this year.

It will first open on Saturday 30th January Saturday 20th February at the Maritime Museum in Hartlepool and run there until sometime in April 11th, then afterwards ship to The Head of Steam Railway Museum in Darlington for the 2010 summer season.

We'll post more precise info as it comes in - updated 22/01/2010.

Cheers, Lucy

It took Richard and me longer than we thought to get to Cowshill for Louise's opening, but though we were late there were still quite a few people there, and plenty of wine and nibbles. These pix were all taken by Louise before we arrived though, the place was heaving all afternoon she said, so the event was obviously a success! In the photo above you can see people holding or leafing through their copies of the centenary book.



Louise's photo exhibition is part of a multi-faceted heritage project undertaken over a period of a year. With other members of the Heatherycleugh community, Louise has been involved with many aspects of it - a massive amount of work, and a fantastic achievement! And as if that weren't enough, she also cooked us dinner before taking us down the local pub for the evening.



We got another chance to see the exhibition this morning before heading home, and it was packed out again. It runs until 5th December - and for anyone passing next Saturday morning, the bacon butties are also highly recommended!

So, Louise is opening 'Centenary' tomorrow afternoon.

Information above, and also on the 'Centenary' page of the 'What We've Done' section of this website.

"Directed by Franny Armstrong, The Age of Stupid casts Pete Postlethwaite as a mournful archivist in 2055, looking at footage from 2008 of flash floods and rampant air travel and wondering where it all went wrong." Guardian

6pm on 1st December, there's a screening of the film at the Friends Meeting House, Skinnergate, Darlington...

AND IT'S FREE.

Arts collective BLIMEY! are hosting an event on the theme of 'social', 2-8pm on Saturday 21st November at the Darlington Railway Institute. Curated by James Lowther, BLIMEY! members and selected guest artists - including Wideyed's own Louise Taylor, who will be giving a sneak preview of some images from her upcoming exhibition 'Centenary' - will show and create work, and the event will end with an auction.

For more info about the programme and participation, email blimeydarlington@yahoo.com or look for BLIMEY! on Facebook.

We were all too busy chatting and scoffing jelly babies last night, so by the time any of us remembered to take any shots of the preview the gallery was closing...



But this installation shot of Richard's work couldn't have been taken before the end (too many people in the way).



The man himself in situ.



Zhou Lucun's installation.



And Zhou Lucun. His piece about employment prospects for the nearly 2.5 million students who graduate in China every year is really interesting.



Class of 2009 - from the left: Zhou Lucun, Siwan Liu (his work is amazing, but best seen in print), Yu Zhu (whose piece on homosexuality in China is interesting too), Patritsia Panayi and, of course, Richard Glynn. Congratulations everyone!

First outing for Wideyed this month! Details of Richard Glynn's MA show opening at NGCA below.

And for more info about Richard's part of this exhibition, see 'Lost Waltz' in the "What we've done" section.