Posts in Highlights Category

Hi, I’m Rowan and I have been working with the Art Collection for just over two years as a Team Assistant. Now in December 2023, my time as Team Assistant comes to an end.

Trying to sum up the last two years in just one blog post is quite a challenge. Here are just a few ways I’ve tried to summarise my time working with the Art Collection:

• Over 400 meetings
• Over 20 exhibitions
• 41 (now 42!) blog posts
• 12 major collaborative projects 
• 1 entire store move

(plus an incalculable number of cups of coffee!)

Here are some snapshots that capture just a few of my standout moments from working with the Collection.

The many exhibition installs and take-downs I had the opportunity to work on, particularly installing Mollie Balshaw’s garden chair self-portrait for Theirs, Yours, Ours in the New Adelphi Exhibition Gallery back in 2022. I am still quite envious of those flaming socks.

I have loved learning about the nerdier side of collections care, from the agents of deterioration to environmental monitoring and the museum vac. Even a visit from the air quality control man was thrilling in the moment.

Learning all about Albert Adams through the Albert Adams: In Context project, and digitising so many of his works that they began to haunt my dreams. Alexandra Lawson’s presentation during the symposium diving into her conservation work on one of Adams’ paintings was truly fascinating, and I particularly loved seeing the microscopic layers of paint. And Greg Thorpe’s beautiful blog exploring Adams’ life and work through objects from his archive will stick with me for a long time.

Working with Gwen Riley Jones and the young people she connected with through Action for Conservation and Salford Youth Service. I was blown away by their confidence and generosity when sharing their thoughts about artwork. They have taught me to be more open-minded in the way I think about artwork.

Going Green! Being the Collection’s Green Champion over the last two years has been really rewarding. From stiffy bags (the silver reusable alternative to bubble wrap!) to Hybrid Futures, working with sustainability underpinning what we do, and seeing that work recognised through programmes like Green Impact and the recent Green Gown awards has been fab. Earlier this year I attended Art Action >> Climate Crisis, a two-day conference held by the Gallery Climate Coalition and Whitechapel Gallery; seeing and hearing from the network of people within our sector and beyond who care passionately about the environment and are taking steps to protect it has restored my faith a little.

It would be completely remiss of me not to talk about the amazing curatorial opportunities I’ve been entrusted with over the past year. Being invited to curate a collection exhibition for the New Adelphi Gallery was a huge honour. It was a daunting prospect choosing from all of the artwork in the Collection, but the work I chose for Visibilities I hope reflects just a little of the brilliant work the Collection has been doing over the past ten years.

Finally, I’ve still not completed processing Salford Scholars at The Manchester Contemporary, where months of planning, studio visits, and working closely with our partners at Castlefield Gallery culminated in one whirlwind of a weekend. I am so pleased with our presentation at the Contemporary, and working with all of the artists and partners involved was a treat. The Graduate Scholarship Programme really is something to shout about, with over 50 scholarships offered to graduates over the last ten years.

It would be impossible to touch on all of the things I’ve had the opportunity to be involved with while working in the Collection, and I think trying to capture all of the ways it has impacted me is futile as I won’t be able to do it justice. Working with Steph and Lindsay has been an absolute joy and I want to thank them both for being so generous in sharing their expertise and experience with me. I am excited for Sam Parker, the new team assistant who has joined the Collection as a fresh 2023 Graduate just embarking on this journey. Best of luck Sam! You can read his introductory blog and get to know more about him here.

Rowan Pritchard

Dec 2023

Following on from 2021-22 where the Art Collection took home a platinum Green Impact award after participating for the first time in the University-wide Green Impact Scheme, this year for 2022-23 we are delighted to share that we have once again achieved a platinum Green Impact award for our ongoing sustainability efforts. 

Green Impact is a United Nations award-winning sustainability engagement programme, run internationally by SOS-UK. Throughout the year, organisations across the globe work on sustainable actions in the Green Impact toolkit, each worth either 5, 10 or 15 points. 

By completing actions worth over 500 points throughout the year, the Art Collection team has achieved a second Platinum award. Actions undertaken this year have included completing an energy audit with Marta Strzelecka, University Sustainability Engagement Officer and continuing to reduce single-use plastic and make sustainable swaps where possible across our work; swapping out bubblewrap for re-usable silver stiffy bags as recommended by the Gallery Climate Coalition, and continuing to use ecoboard over foamex and vinyl in our exhibition signage and materials. 

In addition to day-to-day actions, our Green Impact submission this year also included our wider thematic work around sustainability, including the ongoing Energy House artist residencies and the Hybrid Futures programme. 

For our Hybrid Futures‘ work, particularly around the Collective Futures collaborative engagement programme, we were awarded the special Community Action Award. Collective Futures brings together individuals, invited by the Hybrid Futures‘ partners for their perspective on the climate crisis. Connecting around Hybrid Futures’ ongoing activity, the collective is collaborating to explore new ideas, possible solutions, and examples of creative work that has made an impact in local and global communities. With each member able to both bring their interests, experiences, and insights and share the group’s work back out to their communities, the collective is already proving a fruitful site of collaboration and sharing. 

Additionally, Lizzie King was awarded the Student Leadership Award for her work on Sustaining Photography. MA Contemporary Fine Art student Lizzie has co-developed Sustaining Photography with socially-engaged photographer Gwen Riley Jones as an exhibition and programme of engagement for fellow students and the public, showcasing and promoting plant-based alternatives to traditional toxic photographic methods. If you would like to find out more about Lizzie’s work on Sustaining Photography, click here. 

Art Collection Team Sustainability Champion, Rowan Pritchard shares: “Once again we are so pleased to be recognised for our ongoing sustainability work. From day-to-day activity to our overarching thematic focuses, working sustainability has come to underpin everything we try to do at the University of Salford Art Collection. It has been great to take part once again in Green Impact, and to see and celebrate all of the brilliant sustainability work happening across campus.” 

Find out about all of the teams who participated in Green Impact across the University PLUS read more about the Green Impact programme on the University’s sustainability blog, here. 

Hello, I’m Sam Parker, and I’m thrilled to be joining the University of Salford Art Collection team. I recently graduated from the University of Salford BA (Hons) Fine Art programme earlier this year, and have taken up the position of Art Collection Team Assistant (Graduate Associate). I bring with me a passion for the arts and contemporary ways of working – I wanted to get stuck in as soon as possible, and the team here has not disappointed!

Joining the team in October, my first few weeks coincided with the launch and development of many UOSAC projects. I’ve had meetings with Hybrid Futures, a partnership between many art organisations across the North, exploring a collective and more sustainable ways of working with various artists and communities. Alongside this was the installation process of Craig Easton’s touring exhibition; Is Anybody Listening? Working with the extremely kind technicians from M&G, and speaking with Craig Easton himself about his exhibition and way of working; I also helped with the Photo Ethics Discussion in early November with Craig and Gwen Riley Jones.

I’ve aided in tours of exhibitions, current UOS Fine Art student queries, collections care, condition checking, and even took part in the Manchester Contemporary! Installing with Castlefield Gallery and the curator of our booth Rowan Pritchard. I introduced members the public to our organisations, discussed art and artists, spread the word of our Graduate Scholarship Programme, and even garnered possible collaboration opportunities for the collection.

 I’ve been thrown into the deep end, however, I couldn’t have wished for a better start!

I have come to the Art Collection Team with my own artist practice, along with a variety of experience from different areas within the creative sector. Installing a variety of different exhibitions across the Northwest and Yorkshire, commissions, graphic design, community engagement, photographic documentation, and volunteer work with organisations like the British Textile Biennial. Alongside this, my bachelor’s degree gave me the drive and the ambition to delve further into the logistics of exhibitions, collections, museums, and galleries; how they run, how work is acquired, the installation and technical challenges that each element poses – I wanted to know the inner workings, and how they operate. My ambition led me to support many exhibitions and events outside of the university programme, giving me valuable skills and knowledge that I will continue to build upon with the UoS Art Collection Team.

Part of my new role here includes problem solving, networking, and overall, just helping out wherever is needed. I find supporting the team and the University of Salford in any and all ways extremely rewarding, be it with AV equipment expertise, manual labour, or the various spouts of knowledge I have that can be applied in unique ways. I pride myself on being easy to talk to, this being especially evident during the Manchester Contemporary. I engaged with as many people as possible, and as a result of this, I had many interesting conversations with people from a plethora of different backgrounds. Artists, curators, students, suppliers, collectives, families, and even a circus performer. Having a dialogue with each of them about what the collection does, whilst also getting to know them and what they do was a brilliant experience that I hope to do more of during future events.

As I briefly mentioned above, I maintain my own artist practice outside of my work with the collection, as well as supporting my peers who are also making the jump from education to the art world. My personal practice at present combines the traditional medium of oil painting, with contemporary digital process like projections mapping, animation, and sound work. I aim to bring audio visual experiences to those who view my work, to create visual representations of sound and a physical form in which it can inhabit. This blend of traditional and contemporary processes has helped me in my new place with the Art Collection, providing on-site technological support with artists that are working with the team for future research and exhibition opportunities. My knowledge and skillsets will help me help the collection over the next 2 years, providing support wherever needed.

I’m looking forward to 2024, with the continuing work for Hybrid Futures, seeing what our artists in residence at Energy House create, and just to be a part of the team that will bring you new opportunities and ventures moving forward!

Sam Parker

November 2023

Throughout November, artist Lizzie King and Socially Engaged Photographer Gwen Riley Jones have been sharing recipes and reflections from their project Sustaining Photography.

Sustaining Photography is a project led by Lizzie and Gwen, exploring and promoting plant-based and sustainable alternatives to traditional photographic processes. 

You can read all four blogs, including recipes for anthotypes and 35mm film developer from Gwen and Lizzie and find out more about the project here: Sustaining Photography

Sustaining Photography has been funded by the Salford Advantage Fund and The University of Salford Art Collection.

University of Salford Art Collection and Castlefield Gallery are pleased to share that they will be at The Manchester Contemporary this weekend, celebrating 10 years of partnership on their Graduate Scholarship Programme.

Curated by Rowan Pritchard, Salford Scholars brings together the work of 5 recent graduate scholars Katie Aird, Mollie Balshaw, Jeffrey Knopf, Katie McGuire, and Adam Rawlinson, working across mediums including sculpture, photography, and painting.

The Manchester Contemporary takes place annually alongside the Manchester Art Fair, and this year runs from the 17th to the 19th of November. The Manchester Contemporary showcases the strength of the UK’s regional artists and galleries alongside key international presentations that can only be seen in Manchester. 

You can find out more about the University of Salford Art Collection & Castlefield Gallery at The Manchester Contemporary here. 

Over the course of the year, current MA student and past Graduate Scholarship recipient Lizzie King, and socially-engaged photographer Gwen Riley Jones have been working together on Sustaining Photography.

Sustaining Photography is a collaborative project to connect and engage students at the University with sustainable photographic processes. Lizzie and Gwen have been working together throughout the year to grow produce in the Community Growing Space and explore how these can be used to create plant-based alternatives to traditional photographic methods, which use harmful chemicals.

Now Open!

An exhibition showcasing the collaborative artwork Lizzie and Gwen have created during the project so far is now on display in the University’s Community Growing Space. Alongside the artwork, you can see the produce being grown, and find recipes they have developed for the plant-based photographic methods they have used to make the work.

Feeling Inspired? You can now get involved in a series of events being held as part of the wider Sustaining Photography exhibition. The events programme includes artist talks from Edd Carr and Tamsin Green, photography workshops, and portfolio reviews for current students. You can find the full details of each event here.

The Sustaining Photography project is based at The University of Salford and has been funded by the Salford Advantage Fund and The University of Salford Art Collection.

Earlier this month, Mike Pinnington paid us a visit to Visibilities: Shaping a story of now, our current on campus exhibition curated by Collection Team Assistant Rowan Pritchard.

“Visibilities manifests as a focused, thoughtful display that brings works together to address diversity, both in regional communities, and globally.” Says Mike in his article for The Double Negative.

Last chance! It’s the final week to see Visibilities at the New Adelphi Exhibition Gallery. Visibilities closes this Friday the 25th of August. The Gallery is open 10am – 4pm, weekdays, and is free to visit and open to all. For more information on visiting the Gallery, click here.

The Double Negative is an online magazine featuring the latest arts, design, film & music coverage in the UK. Their mission: to hold a mirror up to the national — in particular the North-West — art scene and reflect it, uncovering and analysing the talent based here.

August’s artwork of the month is Salford Faces by Gwilym Hughes. This artwork is currently on display in our New Adelphi Exhibition Gallery as part of Visibilities: Shaping a story of now. For this artwork of the month, Visibilities Curator Rowan Pritchard explores the work in more detail. 

In Salford Faces, four layers of giclee prints in cyan, magenta, yellow and black are superimposed to form a portrait

Gwilym Hughes found this face in a photograph at the Salford Local History Library. With an ongoing interest in anonymous faces, whose names are no longer recorded, or who might never have known they were having their photograph taken, Gwilym’s work brings close attention to these people who are ‘lost’ in the archives. 

The image is painstakingly hand-drawn using slow and intensive techniques. Rendered first as an intimate relief etching, the portrait is then enlarged and presented as a lightbox. The face, once forgotten, can no longer be overlooked when displayed at this scale, illuminated as it stares back at us. 

Speaking about Salford Faces, Rowan shares: 

“I picked this work because it speaks directly to the ideas of preservation, questioning whose names we write down and record. 

In Visibilities, I wanted to dig a little into who is represented in the University’s collecting; whose stories, artworks, and achievements are we preserving as an institution? And this work relates to that directly. In the exhibition, Salford Faces is presented next to Silver Triple Pop by Gavin Turk, an artwork full of reference and reverence for men like Elvis, Andy Warhol, and Sid Vicious, whose names and images are inviolably linked to our understandings of culture – preserved and remembered. 

In contrast, Salford Faces not only begins to question why some people are remembered while others are not but creates a space for those forgotten voices to be remembered, re-enshrining them into the archives through their new representation in the University Art Collection.”

Visibilities continues at the New Adelphi Exhibition Gallery until the end of the month, closing on the 25th of August. You can read more about the exhibition here. 

Want to hear more from Rowan about Visibilities? Join Rowan and Stephanie Fletcher for a curators tour of the exhibition next week! 1:30pm, Tuesday 15th August ? Click here for more information & to book your free tickets. 

Join Visibilities curator Rowan Pritchard, with Stephanie Fletcher (Art Collection, Assistant Curator) for a lunchtime tour of Visibilities: Shaping a story of now, our current exhibition on display at our New Adelphi Gallery, before it closes at the end of August!

Visibilities brings together works from the Collection to explore and examine who and what is represented in our contemporary collecting, and how these visibilities shape what we think of as our ‘stories of now’.

Read more about the exhibition, here.

This informal tour will provide greater insight into the themes behind the exhibition and the work of the University’s Art Collection, as well as offer a chance to ask any questions you may have for the curatorial team about the exhibition.

The University of Salford Art Collection, alongside Castlefield Gallery, Manchester are pleased to announce the five recipients of the 2023/24 Graduate Scholarships. 

Each year, a number of bespoke scholarships are offered to graduating students from the University of Salford School of Arts, Media, and Creative Technology. This year the recipients are: 

Adam Rawlinson
Megan Brierley
Lucy Claire
Zan Atkinson
Maggie Stick

Each recipient will receive 12 months of bespoke support tailored to their individual needs and aspirations, including a programme of mentoring, coaching and professional development, Castlefield Gallery Associates membership, and studio space or place on a programme with one of our industry partners; Hot Bed Press, Islington Mill, Paradise Works, and Redeye, The Photography Network.

Director and Artistic Director of Castlefield Gallery, Helen Wewiora says:

We are delighted to welcome Adam, Megan, Lucy, Zan and Maggie to the 2023/24 Graduate Scholars programme. We can’t wait to start working with everyone. The standard of applications this year was particularly high. I know all those involved from across the Graduate Scholars programme partnership will agree that it was really tough deciding on the final awards. As the programme enters its 10th year it is really exciting to know we’ll be working with such a talented and committed group of practitioners and we look forward to another 10 successful years of the working with Salford Scholars!

In Autumn 2023 we also celebrate the 10^th year of the Graduate Scholarship scheme. Over 50 graduates have taken part in the scheme since it began, from across the School of Arts, Media and Creative Technology.  Throughout the year we will reflect on and celebrate some of our scholars stories, journeys and successes – watch this space for more announcements soon!

The Graduate Scholarship Programme is run annually alongside Castlefield Gallery, with support from our studio partners Hot Bed Press, Islington Mill and Paradise Works, and Redeye the Photography Network.