Posts tagged: University of Salford Art Collection

Mediated Realities
1 September 2025 – 30 January 2026
New Adelphi Exhibition Gallery, University of Salford
Free entry

What does it mean to witness crisis in the digital age? This powerful exhibition brings together works from the University of Salford Art Collection and university staff, exploring how conflict, disaster and protest are filtered through news and social media. Featuring artists including Richard Hamilton, Joe Tilson and Thomson & Craighead.

Mediated Realities is co-curated by Team Assistant Sam Parker, as part of a two-year traineeship role with the Art Collection Team. The exhibition is open from 1st September 2025, with a special evening opening event 4.30 – 7.00 8th October 2025 co-inciding with our MA Art & Design Degree shows.

A new artist development opportunity for emerging and early-career artists who want to explore creative technologies

Project dates: Monday 22nd – Friday 26 September 2025, 10am – 6pm
Deadline to apply: 11th August 2025
Fees: £250 participation bursary available; and up to £5000 for one selected commission
More information and apply now: at the Lowry website

Are you an early career or emerging creative connected to Salford and committed to learning about creative technology? (CreaTech) 

This opportunity is for artists from any non-digital discipline who would like to develop their practice and discover new ways of making. You may have taken initial first steps into the tech space, but no experience is required.

Taking place from Monday 22nd – Friday 26 September 2025, 10am – 6pm at the University of Salford’s DevLab in MediaCity, the project will include participatory workshops, practice development and a commission opportunity.

You will have the opportunity to explore a variety of applications and test out new ideas in a supported peer to peer learning environment, with a chance to share ideas, explore collaborations and pitch projects for further development. 

We encourage you to bring your current practice with you, whether that be illustration, performance art, ceramics, visual art, dance, textiles etc, we are able to accommodate for a variety of mediums, you will have the opportunity to tell us more in your application.

Across four days,  along with four other participants, you will take part in one participatory workshop per day with the following CreaTech specialists:

Mishka Henner 

Vicky Clarke

Noelle Nurdin

Hattie Kongaunruan

On the final day, all participants will be encouraged to develop and pitch a solo or collaborative project idea based on your learning.  The University (University of Salford Art Collection and University of Salford School of Arts, Media, & Creative Technology) will then select one project to be further developed for showcasing at the Beyond Conference Day 0 event in November 2025

The successful project will receive funding of up to £5k (from University of Salford Art Collection) to cover artists time and production costs, as well as access to facilities and technical support from the University of Salford School of Arts, Media, & Creative Technology.  

The artwork (an edition or element of) developed for Beyond Day 0 will then be acquired by University of Salford Art Collection.  

The remaining participants will have the opportunity to share their work in progress as part of wider fringe events at Beyond and everyone will receive a free ticket to the BEYOND Conference.

Find out all the latest information, including how to apply, at The Lowry website here.
Deadline: 11th August 2025

Yue lives and works in Shanghai and internationally. Her video and photography practice takes the ‘everyday’ and the ‘beauty of insignificance’ as its focus, using readily available tools – such as her mobile phone camera – and minimal editing techniques to make deceptively simple works. She captures daily routines – from city life to natural scenery – seeking to offer both quiet moments of reflection, and to challenge tradition notions of what we consider beautiful, valuable or important.

C0018 was made on a short residency in Liverpool in April 2018, part of exhibition This is Shanghai curated by University of Salford Art Collection, Open Eye Gallery, and Liverpool City Council, which celebrated the twin cities. Although it was her first visit to the city, it felt strangely familiar to her – the Pier Head waterfront reminiscent of the Bund in Shanghai. Whilst adapting to being far from home, she found comfort and familiarity in the rhythm of the waves on the shore.

Yue has held exhibitions and residencies internationally, including the Power Station of Art Museum, Shanghai (2022) Salamanca Arts Centre, Tasmania, Australia (2020).

Photographs on this page courtesy of Sam Parker, UoS Art Collection Team Assistant

Bridget Riley is a British painter and printmaker known for being a leading figure in the ‘op art’ movement in the 1960s – a practice that uses geometrical forms, patterns and shapes to create optical illusions or effects.

She began her practice painting figurative and landscape work, before moving into neo-impressionism and pointillism. These approaches prioritised elements of light, colour and form, often applying complementary or contrasting colours next to each other to test out the subsequent visual effects.

Riley’s op-art work pushed these practices to new limits – inducing a variety of bodily sensations in viewers from dizziness to falling or floating. In this way, they serve to remind us of the physical act of looking.

Many of her works are inspired by the shifting reflections of sunlight on water. She grew up in a disused watermill turned family home, surrounded by rivers, canals and ponds ‘shining, sparkling, glittering, moving, flowing’ – as well as spending time living in Cornwall, exploring the changing qualities of the sea and sky.

Riley has exhibited extensively internationally, and her works are held in numerous public collections including the Arts Council Collection, London and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

The images above are close-up shots of Riley’s work.

Photographs on this page courtesy of Sam Parker, UoS Art Collection Team Assistant

Jessica El Mal is a British-Moroccan artist and curator, with a particular interest in ecology, globalisation, and migration. Her work addresses global structures of power through critical research, multidisciplinary project and collaborative approaches.

‘Spring Rain 09.12.22‘ draws contrast between the perception of rain in Manchester – where the regular wet weather is often a cause of annoyance – and Morocco – which experiences an annual drought, worsened each year by climate change.

Whilst undertaking a roof-top cyanotype printing workshop (a type of printmaking using sunlight) in Morocco, the session was interrupted by unexpected rainfall, signalling the end of the dry season. Far from a cause for frustration – as the papers became splashed with rain – the rainfall was a welcome sign, and the prints became a visual record of the raindrops.

Jessica has exhibited work in the UK and Europe including Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool, Manchester Museum, and MAMA Rotterdam. The Spring Rain cyanotypes were originally commissioned for the collaborative touring project Hybrid Futures in 2022-24, and were jointly acquired by the University of Salford Art Collection, Grundy Gallery, Blackpool, and Touchstones, Rochdale.

Photographs on this page courtesy of Sam Parker, UoS Art Collection Team Assistant

Christiane Baumgartner is best known for her monumental woodcuts based on her own films and video stills, exploring themes of time, place and memory. These works are selected from a set of four prints presented by the Contemporary Art Society in 2023.

Many of Baumgartner’s prints take the form of sequences of images illustrating the same scene, captured moments apart. ‘Prometheus I-III‘ capture different views of the setting sun at the horizon. Whereas ‘Nordlicht 6.08pm‘ is from a group of works that recorded the sun setting through a wooded landscape, over a period of 9 minutes. The fleeting moments of light are slowed down and captured in the time and labour-intensive process of woodcut printing.

“Translating a still image into a woodcut makes the work a powerful instrument demanding an emotional, retinal and physical response. Through my selection and transformation of a single frame, I create a unique woodcut that brings experience and weight to an otherwise unexperienced moment.”

Baumgartner lives and works in Leipzig, Germany. She has exhibited extensively internationally, and her works are held in over fifty public collections including the British Museum, London and the Museum of Modern Art, New York. She is represented in the UK by Cristea Roberts Gallery, London.

Photographs on this page courtesy of Sam Parker, UoS Art Collection Team Assistant

Turner is a photographic practitioner based in the North West of England, who uses photography to explore and contemplate the relationship between the land and the individual. In an ongoing practice, he uses books and prints to gather ideas into bodies of work that are simultaneously concerned with existential ideas and personal interactions.

‘Float like a feather, sink like a stone’ explores the Chew Valley, a landscape to the East of Manchester where the Pennines rise.

This body of work weaves through the land, observing natural forms, ecological intervention, and post-industrial structures, considering the transitional aesthetics of the English countryside. 

Turner has exhibited across the UK, including at the Brunswick, Leeds, Paradise Works, Salford, and the London Metropolitan School of Art. He is currently Photographic Technical Demonstrator at the University of Salford.

The images above are install shots of Turner’s silver gelatine fibre-based prints.

The images above are close-up shots of Turner’s hand-bound book.

Photographs on this page courtesy of Sam Parker, UoS Art Collection Team Assistant

Mishka Henner is interested in making art that ‘challenges conventional perspectives and encourages viewers to reconsider their relationship with the world, technology, and the consequences of human activities’. He produces books, film, photographic and sculptural works, often repurposing imagery sourced online.

Selfie offers a different kind of self-portrait, using a highly reflective surface that acts like a black mirror. The camera has zoomed out far beyond the Earth’s atmosphere, allowing the viewer to simultaneously ‘see themselves, the world, and everything they’ve ever known, all in one frame’.

The work is inspired by a quote from Apollo 8 Astronaut Jim Lovell, seeing Earth on the first manned orbit around the moon in December 1968: “At one point I sighted the earth with my thumb – and my thumb from that distance fit over the entire planet. I realised how insignificant we all are if everything I’d ever known is behind my thumb.”

Henner was born in Brussels, Belgium and lives and works in Greater Manchester. He has exhibited widely in the UK and internationally, and from 2023-2024 was artist in residence at the University of Salford’s Energy House 2.0 research facility, in partnership with the Art Collection, Open Eye Gallery, and Castlefield Gallery.

The image above is an install shot from the exhibition.

Photographs on this page courtesy of Sam Parker, UoS Art Collection Team Assistant

In May 2025 our Artist in Residence at the University of Salford Acoustic Labs, Hayley Suviste, presented a 3-part installation as part of Sounds From The Other City. Artist Lizzie King shares her experience of From The River’s Mouth below.

A growing amount of rivers have been granted the legal status of personhood, a legal right to flow, a way for rivers to be protected and a way for them to be honoured.  In her installation “From the River’s Mouth’ Hayley Suviste gives the audience a unique way to connect with the River Irwell meeting it at its Salford stretch.  The Irwell is a life source that runs 63 km. Many sound artists have previously explored rivers through their horizontal journey, however Suviste gives us the opportunity to experience the Irwell through a series of vertical interactions.  As the work progresses down the layers of the Irwell we encounter the perspectives of past, present, and future. 

‘From the River’s Mouth,’ makes use of three sonically distinct rooms to explore three different parts of the Irwell’s being and of its timeline. 

The Anechoic Chamber

We, the audience, are guided into a dark room lit with one blue light and a bouncy floor, the anechoic chamber.  Silence. You feel yourself swaying with the movement of other people until everyone goes still. 

Shhhhhhhuuuusssssshhhhhhhhhh swoooooooorrrllll

It feels like being in the centre of rushing whirlpool, the sounds move around you gushing and gurgling.   Distant sounds of ducks pitter in the background. The gushing dissipates into trickles, a pleasant tonal sound appears feeling like it is coming from a distance.  The river’s life dances around the audience.  The gurgling and murmurs transport me under the water, I want to sit and drink it in.  It lulls the audience bringing a tranquility and a feeling that is almost tactile of having met the Irwell. As I am wishing to drift off with the river 4 minutes is up, the door opens, the sounds stop, we leave for the next room.

The Listening Room

The next room we sit in is the listening room.  Filled with sofas, bean bags, and 124 speakers, we take a comfortable seat.  Projected onto a large screen in front are two videos side by side.  One shows us the most vivid blue colours running in the water and the other the pungent orange of the sediment from the bank.  We are introduced to a series of fixed frame videos showing different scenes from the river bank. The sound of the river is different this time we are alongside it, hearing noises all around us as if we were sat by the Irwell itself. We see and hear the geese who inhabit this stretch alongside the vivid colours and textures which really are worth celebrating.  This time the Irwell bables and tinkles it has a gentler quality now that we are aside it rather than inside it, a loop of synthesised melodies accompany the waters flow.  Two different angles of a red balloon caught on branches.   The sound of Reggie being called in the distance, a runaway dog.  It is an experience that we are more familiar with but one that our attention may not often focus on.  A woman singing a folk song drifts in from the left, again we are lulled as tonal loops intermingle with the river’s tinkling.  Until the film comes to an end I like other audience members are reluctant to get up from our seats.

The Reverberation Chamber

We step over and into the next darkened room, the reverberation room, where we sit in a semi-circle.  Facing us is a bowl which is lit up from three different angles projecting the water onto the floor in petal like sections.  The rush of a full river gulps in towards us in deep bass tones.  These rumblings make the water dance creating cymatic patterns which are projected in segments onto the floor dancing and swirling around.  They are completely captivating as the sounds again surround us from different points in the room; it is reminiscent of walking along the river and standing under the bridge watching the water’s reflections bounce and flitter on the concrete structure above.  A clarinet echoes the folk song from the previous room and we hear the familiar sounds that played in the last room start to trickle out.   Though deep and bassy in a room that reverberates, the sound feels light and free. The whirling and twirling of the water’s reflections leave us captivated till the final moment.

Hayley Suviste has been resident at the University of Salford Acoustic laboratory carrying out a commission to look at the environment.  Suviste a composer and sound artist has placed the audience in a series of situations which leave you questioning your own relationship to the river.  Many of these left the audience in a sense of calm or entrancement, do we spend this same time at the River Irwell?  As this series looks at a sense of passing of time in the rivers life it also questions what the river’s life should look like and what part do our lives play in that? 

This performance took place multiple times on 4th May, 2025 as part of Sounds of the City Festival.  In the midst of a pulsating, hectic, jubilant atmosphere there was this pocket of quiet, of calm, and of contemplation.  In the midst of a party Suviste opened up a type of gulf in which we were able to connect with who we are and who the River Irwell is.

Another artist friend of ours Fiona Sinéad Brehony has written about their own experience of Suviste’s From The River’s Mouth – which you can also read below:

Darren Almond
Fullmoon @ Fukushima Bay (2006)
Digital Photography

Almond’s practice spans installation, film, sculpture and photography, considering themes of memory, sense of place, and the passing of time. His ongoing ‘Full Moon’ series captures the unique light and atmosphere during full moon lunar phases.

This image appears to be shot in the daylight, however this image along with many of Almond’s images are taken at night. Almond’s shutter stays open for 15 minutes or more to create imagery like this.

Seeking out striking and often remote geographical landscapes, from the Arctic Circle to the Nile (this image taken in Fukushima, Japan) the artist generates images using an exposure time of 15 minutes or more, creating a ghostly, ethereal effect. Almond’s work is ‘intentionally concerned with memory and chance, with mobilizing light and time, and, in the choice of locations – zones outside the urban, untouched by artificial lighting – continuing the legacy of Romantic painting’.

Almond was born in Wigan in 1971 and lives and works in London. He was nominated for the Turner Prize in 2005 and has exhibited at Tate Britain and the Berlin, Moscow and Venice art biennales. His work is in the collections of Tate, MOMA, and the Metropolitan Museum, New York. He is represented by White Cube.

The image above is an install shot from the exhibition.

Photographs on this page courtesy of Sam Parker, UoS Art Collection Team Assistant