Highlights at Spike Island
Posted on: 16 May 2017Spike Island is one of Bristol’s most popular attractions for anything artistic. Whether it is the production or presentation there is something for everyone at this art nirvana. Spike Island offers a year round, high quality programme of exhibitions and events to promote it's vision of positioning art centrally in society.
The centre collaborates with a wide community of artists and designers, local and regional partners, international institutions, museums and universities to foster a dynamic and vibrant environment for all. Check out some of the best events happening at Spike Island in the upcoming weeks.
Andrea Luka Zimmerman - Common Ground - 8 April to 18 June
The work of Andrea Luka Zimmerman explores the impact of globalisation, power structures, militarism and denied histories. Common Ground, Zimmerman’s first UK solo exhibition, celebrates strategies of social and cultural resistance and proposes new ways of living together in the face of a threatened idea of the ‘common good'.
Giles Round - They bow. Curtain. No applause. - 8 April to 18 June 2017
Giles Round works across disciplines and engages with a variety of materials, processes and collaborators to address the relationship between art, design and functionality. His work is populated with citation and appropriation and, over the last decade, he has built an extensive catalogue of references to early and late modernist manifestations with a particular focus on the design object.
Writer's Talk: Tim Dee - Thursday 18 May
As part of their writing residency at the Whitchurch and Hengrove Community Orchard, Ellen Wilkinson and Holly Corfield Carr (members of Spike Associates) invite acclaimed writer and radio producer Tim Dee to combine field recordings with readings and discussion to give voice to our local landscapes.
Baby Art Hour - For babies and toddlers up to 5 years old - Friday 19 May
Led by artist Éilis Kirby, these monthly sessions in Spike Island Café are for under fives and their carers. Come play with colour, shape, texture and learn easy ways to create, using simple methods and materials.
Discussion: Common Wealth - Andrea Luka Zimmerman - Saturday 20 May
This afternoon open discussion about housing and redevelopment addresses how these issues affect people in and around Bristol today. Andrea Luka Zimmerman invites guest campaigners, activists and others who are involved in related projects or research to take part.
Novel Writers - Luke Kennard The Transition - Thursday 25 May
Set in an unnamed city in the very near future, poet Luke Kennard’s The Transition revolves around a financially insolvent young couple who are given the chance to redesign their life by moving in with an older couple who will act as their ‘mentors’ in a life-improvement scheme called ‘The Transition’.
Behind the Scenes Studio Visits - Amy Gough and Benjamin Jones, Graduate Fellows - Saturday 27 May
Each year Spike Island offers fellowships to promising graduates. Benjamin Jones from Bath Spa University and Amy Gough from University of the West of England discuss the artwork they have made so far.
Talk: Charlie Fox, This Young Monster - Tuesday 30 May 2017
London-based writer Charlie Fox introduces his book This Young Monster, a hallucinatory celebration of artists who raise hell, transform their bodies, anger their elders and show their audience dark, disturbing things. What does it mean to be a freak? Why might we be wise to think of the present as a time of monstrosity? And how does the concept of the monster irradiate our thinking about queerness, disability, children and adolescents?
Discussion: Art and Its Materials - Led by Katrina Mitcheson, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, UWE. - Thursday 1 June 2017
The second of four events exploring the relationship between art, aesthetics and contemporary materialism. This session focuses on how visual art can be used to help understand, and theorise the self. Join Katrina Mitcheson to question the adequacy of a narrative understanding of the self that draws on the paradigm of the novel, and how the materiality of visual art can help us explore the corporeality of the self.
As you can see there is a huge amount to see at Spike Island over the next few weeks. Make sure you get booked in and see some of the best art and most intellectual discussions the city has to offer.
For more information please visit the Spike Island website at - spikeisland.org.uk. You can also connect with Spike Island through Facebook and Twitter.
Article by:
Matt, originally from Belfast, has only lived in Bristol for a year now and is studying Media & Journalism at UWE. He wants to concentrate his writing and media skills in Bristol's culinary culture, delving into what fine feasts the city has to offer and where the best places to go for food really are. Along with an aspiration to interview some of the influential people shaping Bristol and some who are simply passing through, Matt really is trying to make Bristol his new home! For any other info check out his Facebook or Twitter.
