Archive for the ‘Uncategorised’ Category

Three New Venue Commissions Unveiled

Faudet-Harrison, Cullinan Richards & Postgraduate Live Project
From October 2012

The Stanley Picker Gallery has reopened after refurbishments to celebrate its 15th birthday and pay tribute to arts patron Stanley Picker on the 30th anniversary of his death.

Funded by Kingston University and the Stanley Picker Trust, the refurbishments have significantly changed the venue, with a new Lobby area and Riverside Terrace providing visitors with space to meet, relax and learn more about our programme of exhibitions, projects and events.

As an integral part of the refurbishment project, three new commissions by artists, designers and students at the Faculty of Art, Design & Architecture, have been specially created for the venue, each directly inspired by the stunning Picker House on nearby Kingston Hill, originally designed in 1968 by architect Kenneth Wood for Stanley Picker to live amongst his exquisite collection of art and design objects.

Designers Jon Harrison and Jochem Faudet both teach Product Design at the Faculty of Art, Design & Architecture and work together in commercial practice outside Kingston University as Faudet-Harrison. Referencing the immaculate period detailing and design collection at the Picker House, their specially commissioned work for the Gallery Lobby area includes a contemporary dado-rail with bespoke fittings they call ‘parasites’ that Gallery staff and visitors can quickly adapt to suit their need. Resourcefully upgrading existing Gallery furniture and sourcing vintage pieces such as Frederick Scott’s Supporto Chair (c.1976), the duo have also created a suite of versatile yet elegant new furniture in powder-coated metal and laminated wood, including a reception desk, a split-circular table, and a stacking-stool named Stanley in tribute to the Gallery’s very own patron. The Lobby area is open to everyone and is already being used by our general visitors, staff and students to hold a variety of public events and social gatherings.

Suspended in a previously unoccupied void above the Gallery reception, like a deliberately poised remnant from the venue refurbishments, Vertical Realism Lamps x 5 (Stanley Picker Gallery) (2012) is a permanent commission by Cullinan Richards, the artist-duo who together run the MA Fine Art programme here at Kingston University’s Faculty of Art Design & Architecture. The sculpture’s apparently casual arrangement of hanging fluorescent bulbs and paint-dipped wooden off-cuts from the artists’ improvisational studio practice is highly reminiscent of the ornamentally exposed electric cables, bulbs and fittings on the chandelier by avant-garde Italian lighting designer Gino Sarfatti (1912-1984) that can be seen positioned central to the main living area at the Picker House on Kingston Hill.

In response to a brief to allow access to the Gallery’s Riverside Terrace via secure routes, Postgraduate Architecture Live Project students led by architect Andrew Budd have created a structure of sustainable Portuguese oak cork-block and mild sheet-steel. The project innovatively exploits two highly contrasting materials, combining the organic qualities of the sensual yet resilient cork with the hard linearity of the plate metal, both of which, in their own way over time, will subtly respond to the elements; the structure providing a gently evolving haven that effectively highlights the venue’s unique location on a small island in the Hogsmill River.

We are recruiting: Gallery Coordinator (part-time)

Stanley Picker Gallery is recruiting a new Gallery Coordinator (part-time) to work closely with the Gallery team and ensure the efficient coordination and implementation of diverse administrative, financial, participation and marketing activities, and to assist in delivering the Gallery’s programme of exhibitions and events. The job purpose includes: organising all day-to-day Gallery activities including Front-of-House duties and general venue maintenance; maintaining up-to-date budgets for all events, exhibitions and general Gallery activities; coordinating essential marketing activities including publicity and print, press liaison and listings; maintaining the Gallery database and coordinating regular mail-outs and email-outs; assisting with all aspects of developing, organising and implementing the Gallery’s programme of exhibitions and events; overseeing the implementation of a diverse range of participatory activities; coordinating and overseeing the work of all Gallery Volunteers and Gallery Assistants.

Deadline for applications: 28 August 2017.

For further details and to download the full job description please visit Kingston University Jobs.

Our partner venue Dorich House Museum is also recruiting. The Museum is currently looking for a Venue & Events Coordinator (part time). Please click here for further information and a full job description. Visit the Museum website to learn about their programme and activities.

 

The Gallery is currently closed for the summer and will re-open in September with a new solo exhibition:

Michael Marriott
You Say Volvo, I Say Potato
Launch: Wednesday 19 September 6-8.30pm All welcome

Enjoy the Summer!

Stanley Picker Fellow Oreet Ashery shortlisted for the Jarman Award 2017

 

Congratulations to Oreet Ashery whose Stanley Picker Fellowship commission Revisiting Genesis has been shortlisted for the 10th edition of the Jarman Award.

The Jury who selected this year’s shortlist are: Iwona Blazwick OBE, Director, Whitechapel Gallery; Catherine Bray, Editor, Random Acts, Channel 4; Shona Illingworth, Artist; Peter Taylor, Director, Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival; Tyrone Walker-Hebborn, Director, Genesis Cinema; Andrea Lissoni, Senior Curator, International Art (Film), Tate Modern and Film London Board Member.

The other artists shortlisted for 2017 are: Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Adham Faramawy, Melanie Manchot, Charlotte Prodger and Marianna Simnett.

This year’s Jarman Award Tour travels to England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, showcasing work by the six artists from 1 October 2017 to 19 November 2017 in 12 venues around the UK. The winner of the 2017 Film London Jarman Award is announced on 20 November 2017 at a celebratory event at the Whitechapel Gallery. The winner will receive prize money of £10,000. Channel 4 will also support the award by commissioning all the shortlisted artists to produce new films for their acclaimed Random Acts arts strand.

Oreet Ashery is an interdisciplinary visual artist with an unorthodox, multi-layered and eclectic practice spanning photography, moving image, mass-produced and unique artefacts, text, music, workshops and performance. Ashery’s work confronts ideological, social and gender constructions within the fabric of personal and broader contemporary realities.

Ashery’s recent large scale projects include: Passing Through Metal, a sonic performance commissioned by LPS, Malmo, 2017; web-series Revisiting Genesis, commissioned by Stanley Picker Gallery at Kingston University London and supported by the Wellcome Trust, 2016; The World is Flooding, a Tate Modern Turbine Hall performance re-enactment of Mayakovsky’s play ‘Mystery Bouffe’, 2014; and Party for Freedom, a moving-image album, concerts and performances commissioned by Artangel, 2013.

Cally Spooner

Cally Spooner (b. 1983) is an artist and writer born in London, where she is currently based. Her work consists of media installations, essays, novels and live performances such as radio broadcasts, plays and a musical, which grapple with the organisation and dispossession of that which lives. She often uses rehearsals, or the episodic form, as a means, and an end, in itself. Recent solo shows include New Museum, New York; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (2016); she has participated in numerous group exhibitions, including Aspen Art Museum, and REDCAT, Los Angeles (2015). Her essays/writing have appeared in Flash Art and Artforum; her book of scripts is published by SlimVolume (2016) and she is the author of the novel, Collapsing In Parts published by Mousse.

Over the course of her Fellowship research, Spooner will seek a cross-disciplinary exchange with Kingston University’s Schools of Humanities; Performance and Screen Studies; and the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy (CRMEP), to unpack the politics, ethics and economics of collaboration in the creative industries. Operating both practically and academically, her Fellowship will become groundwork for the formation of a more or less functional performance company. Through study-groups, networking, publishing and knowledge building, Spooner’s research activities will explore and test models of generative, collective production, alongside analysis of contemporary states of management and power; directorial presence, authorial absence, the trusting in (or harnessing of) the genius of one’s ‘cast’.

Obituary: Brian McCann Artist, Educator & Stanley Picker Fellow

A Passionate & Inspiring Individual
Stanley Picker Fellow 1983

It is with deep sadness that we hear of the passing of Stanley Picker Fellow Brian McCann on Monday 3 March 2014.  Our thoughts are with his family, close friends and colleagues.

Commissioned for the opening of the Stanley Picker Gallery in 1997, the artist’s bronze sculpture Recognition  (above), based upon the his own finger print, has been adorned with floral tributes from the staff he worked with and the students he taught here at the University. The artwork now stands in the Stanley Picker Gallery grounds as a fitting memorial to a passionate and inspiring individual.

Brian McCann studied at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art Dundee, graduating with a BA honours in Sculpture. He went on to post graduate study at the Royal College of Art in London where he received an MA in Sculpture. After completing a Stanley Picker Fellowship here at Kingston University he was awarded a two-year Prix de Rome Scholarship in Sculpture at the British School in Rome. Brian was the first Tate Gallery Liverpool Momart Fellow. He exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions, nationally and internationally. Brian McCann was Senior Lecturer in Fine Art at Kingston University, London and a regular visiting lecturer to the Royal Academy Schools and Royal College of Art Sculpture School in London.

Louis Nixon, Head of the School of Fine Art, paid tribute to him with the folowing:

“It is with great sadness that we receive the news of the death of Brian McCann.  After a serious illness Brian passed away at home with his family. Many who knew Brian will appreciate the void his passing will leave in both the Faculty and the School.  After more than 20 years of working in the School of Fine Art, his contribution to its development and success was enormous and he will be very greatly missed by all the staff and students who knew him and benefited so much from his considerable knowledge, companionship and good humour.

Brian was hugely respected and liked by everyone, and the commitment and courage he showed during the last few months of his life was exemplary. Brian continued to teach and make art until the very end. Last week his recent work was included in the exhibition  Figuring  at the Royal Society of British Sculptors and I’m sure this is how he would like to be remembered, as both a great artist and educator.”

 

Stanley Picker Gallery awarded increased support from Arts Council England

National Portfolio Funding 2015-18
Announced 1 July 2014

As part of Arts Council England’s newly announced National Portfolio, Stanley Picker Gallery is to receive a significant increase in its public funding over the three year period commencing April 2015.

The new investment of £80,000 per annum marks a 55% increase in Arts Council England’s support, and a major endorsement of the Stanley Picker Gallery’s programme of innovative new commissions across the fields of art and design. The Arts Council England uplift is to be matched by further funds from the Stanley Picker Trust with the aim of increasing the reach and engagement of the Gallery’s programme, whilst a new partnership with the Jerwood Charitable Foundation will support the development of an exciting new programme of digital co-commissions.

Stanley Picker Gallery Director David Falkner says of the news:

“We are thrilled that the Stanley Picker Gallery here at Kingston University has been given such huge vote of confidence from Arts Council England in challenging times, by increasing its support of the valuable work we do bringing cutting-edge arts practice to the outer edges of Greater London. We have worked hard for many years to support contemporary artists and designers, at crucial stages of their careers, to make ambitious new work that is first premiered here at the Gallery before going on to be seen by audiences far beyond Kingston. This increased funding will mark a major shift in our organisation, allowing us to be even more ambitious with our future programme both onsite, offsite and online, with the Stanley Picker Trust also generously increasing their support for the work we do, and as we initiate an exciting new collaboration with the Jerwood Charitable Foundation to further expand our work into the digital sphere.”

Originally shown at the venue in Kingston upon Thames, the Stanley Picker Gallery’s commissions have been seen by audiences nationally and internationally, the past year alone witnessing Stanley Picker Fellowship commissions by Turner Prize winner Elizabeth Price,  designer Marloes ten Bhömer and artist Andy Holden  presented to audiences at Whitechapel Gallery, Victoria & Albert Museum and Spike Island Bristol.  Current Fine Art Fellow Laura Oldfield Ford recently exhibited at Tate Britain in the highly acclaimed Ruin Lust, whilst Design Fellow Fabien Cappello is currently showing in Useful & Beautiful at the Geffrye Museum, London.

The Stanley Picker Gallery also receives dedicated funding from Kingston University itself to deliver an extensive programme of Participation activities with schools and other partner organisations in the local area, to engage local residents, children and young people in its broad programme of exhibitions and events.

 

Stanley Picker Fellowships 2016: New Appointments

Cally Spooner and Yuri Suzuki
Fine Art & Design

Stanley Picker Gallery is delighted to announce the appointments of artist Cally Spooner and designer Yuri Suzuki as Stanley Picker Fellows 2016, at Kingston University London.

Cally Spooner (b. 1983) is an artist and writer born in London, where she is currently based. Her work consists of media installations, essays, novels and live performances such as radio broadcasts, plays and a musical, which grapple with the organisation and dispossession of that which lives. She often uses rehearsals, or the episodic form, as a means, and an end, in itself. Recent solo shows include New Museum, New York; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (2016); she has participated in numerous group exhibitions, including Aspen Art Museum, and REDCAT, Los Angeles (2015). Her essays/writing have appeared in Flash Art and Artforum; her book of scripts is published by SlimVolume (2016) and she is the author of the novel, Collapsing In Parts published by Mousse.

Over the course of her Fellowship research, Spooner will seek a cross-disciplinary exchange with Kingston University’s Schools of Humanities; Performance and Screen Studies; and the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy (CRMEP), to unpack the politics, ethics and economics of collaboration in the creative industries. Operating both practically and academically, her Fellowship will become groundwork for the formation of a more or less functional performance company. Through study-groups, networking, publishing and knowledge building, Spooner’s research activities will explore and test  models  of generative, collective production,  alongside analysis of contemporary states of management and power; directorial presence, authorial absence, the trusting in (or harnessing of) the genius of one’s ‘cast’.

Yuri Suzuki (b. 1980) is a sound designer and electronic musician born in Tokyo and based in London. Suzuki’s projects explore the realm of sound, interaction and electronics through designed objects. Since 2013, he teaches at the Royal College of Art in London and works as an associate for Disney, New Radiophonic Workshop and Teenage Engineering. Suzuki is the founder of Yuri Suzuki Ltd (YS Lab) – an R&D consultancy working with companies including Google, Panasonic and Disney. His works OTOTO and Colour Chasers were acquired by MoMA in 2014.

Suzuki’s design practice raises questions around our relationship to sound, and how music and sound may affect people’s minds. He is interested in how contemporary products and infrastructures remain often under-developed in their sound features, while being highly refined in terms of visual design and technology. Suzuki will use his Stanley Picker Fellowship to work with Kingston University’s teaching staff and students to investigate the psychological and physical agency of sound and explore how more thoughtfully designed soundscapes could improve our daily lives. By staging a series of design experiments, workshops and interviews in collaboration with sound practitioners, including musician Matthew Herbert among others, Suzuki will seek to develop a number of designed products proposing new ways in which sound can inhabit the everyday.

AHRC Nomination & Kingston University Rose Awards

Dr Fiona Fisher & School of Architecture & Landscape
Autumn 2015

Kingston University Researcher and Dorich House Museum Curator, Dr Fiona Fisher has been shortlisted for a major Arts and Humanities Research Council prize for A Modernist in Suburbia,  made in collaboration with artist-filmmaker Gilly Booth of hijack, which  examines the work of architect Kenneth Wood and features the impeccable late-modernist house he designed for Stanley Picker in Kingston upon Thames in the late 1960s. Directed by filmmaker Gilly Booth, Dr Fisher wrote and researched the film which has been nominated for the Anniversary Award – Best AHRC/AHRB funded film since 1998. The film was publicly premiered at the Stanley Picker Gallery in 2012 as part of The Occupants: Contemporary Perspectives on the Picker House alongside works by artists Cullinan Richards, Matthew Darbyshire, Andy Holden, Elizabeth Price and Bridget Smith and writer/curator Tom Morton.

The AHRC’s Research in Film Awards mark their tenth anniversary and are designed to recognise the creative and innovative work being undertaken at the interface between research and film by world-leading researchers, practitioners and filmmakers. The winners will be announced on November 12 2015 at a special ceremony at the British Film Institute in London.

Kingston University’s School of Architecture & Landscape has received a nomination for the  Temple Gate  project by undergraduate students last summer led by tutors Takeshi Hayatsu and Simon Jones. The Stanley Picker Gallery collaborated with the students who designed and constructed a five metre tall Temple Gate in the grounds of the University’s Dorich House Museum. One of 38 projects nominated for the inaugural Rose Awards, launched to celebrate staff success. The Temple Gate project has been been nominated under the category Exceptional Contribution to the Community & Environment. Awards will be announced on 19 October 2015.