Danny Lane - Colour Eclipse

Each laminated coloured disk weighs a whopping 180kg and are encased in clear architectural glass, giving it a weightless illusion as if floating despite its weight. The glass is compressed as Lane uses the eloquent yet strong form of glass to create this pair of artwork. The art pieces is part of Broadgate Art Trail.

 

Jim Dine - Venus

These bronze sculptures affixed to the walls of 155 Bishopsgate were inspired by Venus de Milo which is common in the works of Dine. They represent beauty and romance, but the works employ a rough edge reminiscent of archaeological artefacts in light of the handiwork showing the underlying emotion. The sculptures form as part of the Broadgate Art Trail.

Somerset House - Venturing Beyond Residency: Antwan Horfée and Russell Maurice

Somerset House lay host to two artists Antwan Horfée and Russell Maurice for the Venturing Beyond exhibition as part of Utopia 2016. From 13 to 20 April, both artists took residency in the Courtyard Rooms of Somerset House to create live works themed on the exhibition and exploring "comic abstractions".

The pieces will run alongside the main exhibition until 2 May 2016.

#utopia2016 #venturingbeyond

Somerset House - Venturing Beyond: Graffiti and the Everyday Utopias of the Street

The Venturing Beyond exhibition is produced and curated by A(by)P with Somerset House, and is part of the Utopia 2016: A Year of Imagination and Possibility. The exhibition provides a platform for the artists to explore in taking a "risk for something more". The artworks grow to address the visuals of going beyond the norm of what is depicted in society. The exhibition explores the experimentation of art in forcing down any barriers leading to different possibilities. 17 artists took part in this exhibition with some of them below:

Husmitnavn (L - R) Busy Doing Nothing, Watching Out. Roll Up

Husmitnavn (L - R) The Shadow, Escapism

Revok - _5.A_Magenta_

Lucas Dillon (L - R) The Blind Leading the Blinds, Expecting to Leave, Organic Shrapnel (I), The Sound of Confusion, The Eternal Drunk (Throwing Beans), The Baboonaries of Us

Antwan Horfée - Blur 1, 2 and 3

Mishap Hollenbeck (L - R) Uberraschunseffekte I, No News (1,2 and 3), Reformation I, II, III

Saeio (L - R) - Oil 1, 2 and 3

Saeio - Lacquer/Ink 1

 #VenturingBeyond #Utopia2016

Broadgate Art Trail

The Broadgate Art Trail are a collection of artworks from the vaults of Broadgate that form a route in and around the Broadgate area. The artworks are all available for view with some “hidden gems” (the ones indoors) require authorisation from the Broadgate team for photographic purposes or through the Broadgate Art Trail tour which is done during the Open House weekend.

1. Rush Hour - George Segal

2. Finsbury Avenue Lit Floor - SOM and Maurice Brill Lighting Design
It is seen in the dark so best to venture to it in the dark night to see the full effects of the 100,000 energy efficient LED lights as they strike up 10 different displays. Each display lasts as long as it takes for someone to cross the square. The installation won the International Association of Lighting Designers’ Award of Excellence in 2004.

3. Bellerophon Taming Pegasus - Jacques Lipchitz

4. Fulcrum - Richard Serra
Like Marmite, the Fulcrum is an installation that people will either love or either hate. There are 5 sheets of Cor-Ten steel used to provide an illusion that they support and slightly overlap each other. There are three entrances which encourages passerby to enter and look up through the 55 feet high structure as they see the opening giving a view of the sky.

5. Leaping Hare on Crescent and Bell (1988) - Barry Flanagan
The hare is a recurring theme in Flanagan’s works and often take on different human forms such as dancing or juggling. This artwork shows the Hare as it leaps high above the air rising above a crescent moon and a huge bell underneath. This is part of a series of talking statues.

6. Alchemy - Lincoln Seligman

7.  Venus - Jim Dine

8. Mechanics Institute - William Tillyer
This abstract painting of landscape brings out the different colours of architecture, coloud, sky and foliage. Tillyer was inspired by artists coming forward to Broadgate to create this piece to compare the solidarity of architecture to the fluidity of nature.

9. Eye-I - Bruce McLean
This steel sculpture paints a abstract face as she gives a wink and blows a kiss with her blond hair to the side. She performs against a backdrop the hustle and bustle of City workers, architectural buildings and the sky. 

10. Colour Eclipse - Danny Lane

11. Ceramic Sculpture - Joan Grady Artigas
The artwork reflects the scenic beauty of the water-like features of the sky as it surrounds the red, black and white base represented as rocks reflecting the buildings of Broadgate. Reminiscent of Catalan, the ceramics were painted by hand and placed together making a structure several stories high collectively.

12. Broadgate Venus - Fernando Botero
The Broadgate Venus is the much loved sculpture of Exchange Square with a lot of passer-by taking snaps with the large and curvaceous nude sculpture. She provides romance in the air as she reclines and gazes across the square and Liverpool Street Station.

13. Water Feature - SOM and Stephen Cox
This Japanese inspired water feature can be found in the piazza of Exchange Square where anyone can enjoy a sit down next to and admire the visual beauty and the trickles of running water as it cascades down wondrously. 

15. For George’s Sake - Marta Rogoyska
Striking, bold and colourful, this piece adds a pop burst against the grey-stoned walls. Originally, the 8-metre artwork was created for a nursery of a country house, which the artwork plays on the fun and playfulness to release the child in all of us.

16. The Broad Family - Xavier Coberó
Corberó’s installation The Broad Family sparks off different forms of human emotion in juxtapositions such as togetherness and separation to innocence and experience. From afar, it may appear that they are huge lug of rocks put together but on closer inspection they can form individual figures and an object. In the installation, you can make out the father, mother, child (with shoes poking out), a dog and a ball. There is space between each figure showing that giving space to each other is at times very welcoming.

 

17. Ganapathi & Devin - Stephen Cox
Standing in their own distinct space, yet linked together, are two pieces Ganapathi and Devi. They were named after Hindi elephant god Ganesha and Hindu Goddess Devi. The pieces hark back to periods of history and ancient civilisation. 

 

#BroadgateArtTrail

Skip Garden

Skip Garden is an award-winning project run by Global Generation, a charity providing opportunities for young people to create a sustainable future. It gives a set of invaluable skills for young people building upon gardening skills and even a business acumen. It is partly funded by the Big Lottery and the materials are provided by The King’s Cross Partnership, BAM Nuttall, Carillion and Kier.

Initially, Skip Garden was positioned in different spots in King’s Cross and has now just above Lewis Cubitt Park and the King’s Cross Pond. It used to be garden plots built into skips and has expanded by the local community. Some of the structures on site were created by students of the Bartlett School of Architecture in collaboration with Global Generation.

The garden was built collaboratively between children as young as 7 years to businesses, local families, teenagers, students, architects and engineers in helping build and providing resources to bring it together. Recycled materials were used to build the garden with most of the materials found from the construction sites at King’s Cross.

The plot grows fruits and vegetables such as apples trees and pumpkins. The garden is for the most part self-sustaining employing such practices as aerobic and worm composting, fertilising with comfrey juice, companion and rotational planting, rain water harvesting and bee-hive maintenances. The produce from the garden are harvested and used to create delicious food at the Skip Garden Kitchen.

Earthbag Coolstore - the structure made from recycled timber was created by Aleesandro Conning-Rowland of Bartland School of Architecture. The structure is layered with recycled coffee sacks from a local coffee rostery and each one is filled with earth. A cooling effect is provided from the evaporation of the moisture of the bags and helpfully collects rainwater to keep the plants within the structure hydrated. Ventilation is added in through the designed stacks that give the structure the maximum area to absorb the sun keeping the produce fresh.

100 Hands Wall is created by Christophe Dembinski and features a walled space made entirely from earth, showcasing the sustainable ways we can adopt in construction.

Rain Loos by Carrie Coningsby uses reclaimed railway sleepers and boarding are stacked against each other to create two cubicles. Water is collected from the rain water streamed into a membrane covering a steel beam, which is collected into the cisterns of the toilet.

Glass House is created by Rachael Taylor used for a growing space and hosts Twilight Gardening sessions. The skirtings of the Glass House is made from low-tech curtain wall made from recycled sash windows. These are held up with scaffold board wall that leans against a shipping container.

The Chicken Coup is created by Valerie Vyvial which completes the link to the closed system of the ecological cycle of the garden by bringing in a structure to house three chickens. At the centre of the structure houses a 2.4m long silver birch tree from Hampstead Heath. The structure is built with bamboo put into place with steel fixing cast.

The Grey Water Dining, created by Yangyan Liu, utilised a small reed bed system at the back of the kitchen, which cleanse the waste water from the kitchen ready for watering. This design provides a wetland dining area. Pedal pumps are used to lift the filtered water through a water storage tank which is then used for gravity-led irrigation.

The Welcome Shelter is created by Charlie Redman. It is situated by the Skip Garden kitchen and due to its mechanism, it can provide shelter through changeable cover.

#SkipGarden

A+: 100 years of visual communication by women at Central Saint Martins

The A+ exhibition at the Central Saint Martin's is a striking exhibition with over 50 female students and staff from the institute. The exhibition highlights in bold form, the disparency between the rate of women entering the graphic profession following their studies and aims to bring to the forefront of the contribution they bring to the partition. The pieces are gathered from a century of works done by women dating back to the 20th century. Starting on 23 February, the exhibition will be running on to 23 March 2016.