Posts tagged: RA Walden

Limited places left – please book here.

Next month, Hybrid Futures: Making, Showing and Collecting Art in a Time of Climate Crisis, will be hosted in Salford. This symposium will see a day of activity and conversation around the ambitious three-year hybrid Futures project. 

What are the environmental issues currently facing museum collections, art galleries and artists? 

Is it possible to make your work more sustainable in the visual arts sector? 

How can arts organisations and their local communities work together to influence change?

Is there the potential to test ideas and new ways of working in order to create a robust and effective model to change the way that galleries should operate in the future?

Join us and our Hybrid Futures partners, along with the Hybrid Futures artists (Shezad Dawood, Jessica El Mal, Parham Ghalamdar & RA Walden), commissioners, local authority staff, funders, community members and consultants, for a day of conversation and activity; sharing our learning and exploring together actions our sector can take to create enduring and effective models of sustainable practice for galleries and museums.

You will leave having met like-minded colleagues and equipped with practical knowledge and encouragement to make changes and take action. 

 Book your place at the symposium here.

Speakers & Conveners Announced! 

We’re delighted to share with you some of the names who will be a part of the day’s programming on the 10th of May. 

Speakers and convenors:

Kit Abramson, Collective Futures, Creative Producer; Paulette Brien, Grundy Art Gallery; Rachael Burns, Touchstones Rochdale; Danny Chivers, Hybrid Futures Sustainability Advisor (Gallery Climate Coalition); Helen Cooper, Senior Manager, Philanthropy/Visual Arts, Arts Council England; Claire Corrin, Salford Museum and Art Gallery; Shezad Dawood, Hybrid Futures lead artist; Paul Dennett, Salford City Mayor; Mark Doyle, Touchstones Rochdale; Jessica El Mal, Hybrid Futures artist; Parham Ghalamdar, Hybrid Futures artist; Mishka Henner, Artist in Residence at Energy House 2.0, University of Salford; Matthew Pendergast, Castlefield Gallery; Rowan Pritchard, Exhibition Coordinator, University of Salford Art Collection; Emily Speed, Artist in Residence at Energy House 2.0, University of Salford; Lindsay Taylor, University of Salford Art Collection; RA Walden, Hybrid Futures artist (via video link), Kate Wafer, Hybrid Futures Evaluation Consultant; Helen Wewiora, Castlefield Gallery.

There is also a Marketplace where you can meet relevant organisations to get the latest information and guidance. Participants confirmed include Museums Development North, The Carbon Literacy Project, LANDS (Lancashire Arts Network for Developing Sustainability), GMAST (Greater Manchester Arts Sustainability Team), University of Salford Sustainability Team, and SPARK.

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Want to know more about Hybrid Futures so far? Visit the Hybrid Futures website for more information on the Symposium, the Hybrid Futures partners, artists and exhibitions, case studies & resources. You can also now read all the reflections from the Collective Futures community engagement project. 

We are delighted to share that we’re bringing Hybrid Futures, a new group exhibition exploring sustainability and the climate crisis, to Salford, launching in March 2024 at Salford Museum and Art Gallery.

Bringing together all the work from across the Hybrid Futures project, you’re invited to join us to celebrate the exhibition launch on the 21st of March.

Exhibition Launch: Hybrid Futures

5-7 PM, Thurs 21st March 2024
Salford Museum and Art Gallery

Open to all and free to attend, refreshments provided.
RSVP here: https://salfordmuseum.com/event/opening-hybrid/

A prayer room, water and dates will be made available to anyone observing Ramadan. Want to attend earlier? We will be offering a quiet hour ahead of the exhibition launch. Please contact Rowan Pritchard if you would like to attend from 4 pm.

Hybrid Futures is an ongoing partnership project from Castlefield Gallery in Manchester, Grundy Art Gallery in Blackpool, Touchstones Rochdale, University of Salford Art Collection and Shezad Dawood Studio exploring collective and more sustainable ways of working.

Marking one of the final phases of the 2-year project, the exhibition brings together the new works co-commissioned for Hybrid Futures from Shezad Dawood, Jessica El Mal, Parham Ghalamdar and RA Walden, each exploring universal threats of climate change, informed and inspired by their own perspectives and backgrounds.

Also featured is the wider work of the project including Collective Futures, a test bed community engagement programme and the findings and recommendations of Hybrid Futures’ Sustainability Advisor, Danny Chivers whose work has been integral to the project and the partners.

More to come from Hybrid Futures:

• Interested in the behind-the-scenes of the project? The exhibition will be accompanied by a national symposium on 10 May 2024, where learning from Hybrid Futures will be shared. Find the booking and full programme details here on Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/837365973167
• Alongside the exhibition at the Museum, two additional works by Hybrid Futures artists Parham Ghalamdar and Shezad Dawood will be screened at the New Adelphi Exhibition Gallery, University of Salford, to coincide with the exhibition. Part of the Gallery’s art film season – showing works from the University Art Collection with an international focus – Birds or Borders by Ghalamdar screens 18 March – 3 April, and Leviathan Cycle, Episode 1: Ben by Dawood screens 10th – 24th April – visit the UOSAC website for full details.
• PLUS: A new exhibition by RA Walden will open at the Grundy from 20 April – 15 June. Object transformations through the coordinate of time is a solo exhibition of newly commissioned and existing works. Spanning sculpture, installation, text and moving image, the works in this exhibition mark and measure the passing of time. Drawing on reference points as varied as, quantum physics, the ecological crisis, ancient timekeeping and the life cycle of worms, Walden is asking us to consider time at both a macro and micro level. More specifically, as an artist with lived experience of a disability, RA Walden also uses their work to explore and express non-normative experiences of time. From sculptures made from hacked office clocks to texts that ask who and what defines, ‘work’, Walden’s exhibition also provides a poetic meditation on lives and bodies whose timekeeping does not conform to the supposed ‘norm’.

Find out more about the Hybrid Futures Project:

Visit the dedicated Hybrid Futures Microsite to explore the exhibitions so far, learn more about the artists & partners, and read about the work of Collective Futures now.

Hybrid Futures, a multi-part collaboration focusing on climate, sustainability, collaborative learning and co-production between Castlefield Gallery, Manchester, Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool, Touchstones Rochdale, University of Salford Art Collection and Shezad Dawood Studio, and generously supported by Arts Council England and Art Fund with additional funding from Henry Moore Foundation.

? Download the full press release here.

Castlefield Gallery Manchester, Grundy Art Gallery Blackpool, Touchstones Rochdale, University of Salford Art Collection and Shezad Dawood Studio are working in partnership on a pilot project that they believe will make a difference to the way that they operate. Hybrid Futures will explore collective and more sustainable ways of working that will influence how the partnership commissions, exhibits and collects new work by visual artists to benefit and be more relevant to their audiences, now and in the future.

A series of exhibitions across the North West of England will feature new work and commissions by artists Shezad Dawood, Jessica El Mal, Parham Ghalamdar and RA Walden that address the urgent thematic focus of climate change.

The partnership will also be working with a group of people from their local communities with a shared concern about the climate crisis. This group called Collective Futures will investigate how creative production can help to shine a light on these issues and create solutions to the problems caused by the changing global environment.

To find out more about Hybrid Futures, and explore the artists, partners, and venues involved, visit the Hybrid Futures website: hybrid-futures.salford.ac.uk

Coming Soon: Hybrid Futures at Touchstones, Rochdale

The first public instalment of Hybrid Futures, Shezad Dawood: Leviathan: From the Forst to the Sea, launches this week from Saturday 3rd June at Touchstones, Rochdale.

Shezad Dawood’s exhibition premieres the latest episode of his epic film series Leviathan Cycle, titled Episode 8: Cris, Sandra, Papa & Yasmine, alongside related textiles, paintings and research material. Set in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest – one of the most ecologically diverse and threatened biomes on earth, Episode 8 charts an embodied, spiritual and ecological journey along the age-old Guarani path that links the forest to the sea. 

Read more about Hybrid Futures at Touchstones, here.

You’re invited to join Touchstones on Friday 2nd June from 6pm to celebrate the exhibition opening.
To RSVP, email culture@yourtrustrochdale.co.uk
Please note, RSVP is ESSENTIAL in order to manage capacity. Without RSVP, you may not be guaranteed entry to the exhibition.

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Hybrid Futures, a multi-part collaboration focusing on climate, sustainability, collaborative learning and co-production between Castlefield Gallery, Manchester, Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool, Touchstones Rochdale, University of Salford Art Collection and Shezad Dawood Studio, and generously supported by Arts Council England and Art Fund.