Typical Girls

I've run a night called Typical Girls on-and-off since 2010-ish, playing women fronted music and organising gigs to showcase women in bands. I started it in Sheffield and I've been thinking about finally organising a Typical Girls night in Manchester for a while so I'm ridiculously excited. There are a few of us organising it this time and we've had an amazing response from other people wanting to get involved too. We'll have bands and a zine stall and other lovely things and will hopefully raise some money for Rape Crisis.

find us on facebook!

MMU FemLib society

The MMU FemLib society is starting to properly take shape, we've got some really exciting plans for the next couple of weeks and months. Currently thinking about visiting exhibitions, running workshops and outreach sessions as a society. Really exciting, especially since we're the only political society that exists within the Student Union!

logo I made this afternoon

our glorious flyers by myself and Hebe

Reclaim the Night

Will actually write things here later but for now here's a picture of our amazing banner from Reclaim the Night yesterday.

More Reclaim the Night things

I helped to organise a placard making workshop for Reclaim the Night with the beginnings of an MMU Feminist society yesterday. Here are some photos that Hebe took of things we came up with! 

We've started making a huge banner as well which should look marvellous. We also talked about creating a writing wall in the union where people could add their thoughts / experiences of sexual harassment and related issues.

Reclaim the Night Placards

I went to a banner/placard making workshop for Reclaim the Night tonight and now I feel super motivated / inspired / all that good stuff. I ended up making loads and getting super carried away, I'm going to make some more tomorrow with women from MMU as well.

one of my placards

Reclaim the Night  is a women-led march pushing for justice for rape survivors and denouncing all types of sexual violence and street harassment. I went to the 2012 Reclaim the Night which was really good but I'm trying to become more actively involved in it this year because it's a cause I feel incredibly passionate about.

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Taboo Exhibition

After the Manchester Art Gallery Zine Fair I decided to investigate the Taboo exhibition being held at 2022NQ by other Interactive Arts students. The premise of the exhibition was to explore the notions of 'taboo' within our culture and the pieces covered a diverse range of topics including  sexuality, mental health, feminism and dreams.

piece in centre by Saffina Bhatti

Although I missed some of the more performance based pieces by being at the Zine Fair, I thought they still retained their intrigue after their initial display and were interesting just as abandoned objects or displays. My favourite pieces were the two sculptural works, coincidentally both dealing with issues of feminism, by Saffina Bhatti and Emily Rusby respectively, and the illustrated narrative by Nat Dunning.

by Emily Rusby

There was also a mostly architectural illustration exhibition being held in the room next door which I really enjoyed. They were taken from practitioners from a variety of disciplines and were mostly by graduates from a number of different universities. My favourite piece on display in this room was the comic by Zac Gorman which had a gorgeous use of colour.

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Manchester Art Gallery Zine Fair

As part of their Thursday Lates season, the Manchester Art Gallery recently hosted a Zine Fair presenting work by a variety of different Manchester based artists and groups.

There was a good amount of people selling their art in a fairly diverse range of styles and it was great to see such a huge turnout. It's also exciting to see zines continue to rise in popularity and visibility and starting to become embraced by such prominent authorities as major galleries.

I ended up spending over my budget but I regret nothing! My favourite stalls were Project:BABE, John Allison, Joe List, Sugar Paper Zine, Young Explorer Zine amongst very many more. Here is a rubbish photo of some of the marvellous zines and comics and things that I bought.

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The First Cut

I recently visited Manchester Art Gallery to see their newest exhibition, The First Cut, a showcase of contemporary papercut  art. 

From the Manchester Art Gallery: 

"31 international artists who cut, sculpt and manipulate paper, transform this humble material into fantastical works of art for our stunning new exhibition.

Wonder at giant sculptures inspired by far away galaxies that spiral from the wall, explore a walk-through forest of paper trees and marvel at miniature worlds that explode from vintage staple boxes or emerge from the page of a book. 

Flocks of birds and butterflies cut from maps appear alongside artworks that feature dark fairytale imagery. Guns and grenades fashioned from paper currency and sinister silhouettes comment on social, political and economic issues."

Wuthering Heights by Su Blackwell

Map of my Entire Life by Rob Ryan, his largest single papercut to date

Wonder Forest by Manabu Hangai

Close up of a gorgeous piece which I forgot to record the title / artist for!

I really enjoyed the exhibition and one of my favourite parts was peering into glass boxes which contained tiny paper mountains. The large scale pieces worked really well in the space and gave a nice contrast and juxtaposition to the smaller pieces.

I also really enjoyed the Clore Interactive Gallery which I believe is a fairly recent addition to the Gallery. We spent most of our time lying in the giant kaleidoscope.

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Two Years at Sea

I saw Two Years at Sea at The Cornerhouse a few months ago but never got around to writing about it. It covers a year in the life of a reclusive man named Jake Williams who lives alone in the Cairngorms.

Shot entirely on vintage black and white, 16mm film, the film looks beautiful. Mostly dialogue free throughout the films entirety, often with whole scenes just with, for example, Jake very slowly drifting across a pond on a raft for eight minutes.

It focusses on the small intricacies of Jake's everyday existence within the lonely, vast physical landscape that he inhabits. Although stark and melancholic, the film is ultimately uplifting in giving a glimpse into a extraordinary life that would otherwise remain vastly unknown.

Site project beginnings

From The Lancashire Witches by  John Gilbert

I started thinking about what I'd like to produce / think about for the Site project by first thinking of things nI've been interested in recently, mainly mythology and basic astronomy. I first looked at some pieces of English folklore to see if there were any I felt I could relate to a space around university. I then decided I'd like to be a bit more specific and looked to see if there was any old myths relating to Manchester but I only managed to find a list of old Lancashire folklore. There were a number of interesting stories such as the trials of the Samlesbury witches and mythical creatures such as the 'Gytrash' (ghostly black dog said to haunt quiet roads in Northern England and mentioned in Jane Eyre). None of these really clicked or made me want to look into them further though. Currently thinking of coming up with my own myths to relate to this project, currently thinking of using either a bench or a tree in All Saints Park but I'll see how things progress as I do some more research.

Dance Yrself Fitter Artwork

Here's the poster and flyer that I designed for mine and my boyfriend's clubnight at The Star and Garter in Manchester, featuring Siouxsie Sioux and Lizzy Mercier Descloux! I used the same cut n' paste trad fanzine style that I used on my Typical Girls posters because it's super fun and fairly quick to do and I really love the aesthetic that you get with it. The first night went really well and I've already started organising the next one!

Underachievers Hooded Fang Poster

My most recent poster commission was an updated version of a poster for Manchester clubnight Underachievers Please Try Harder advertising their Hooded Fang gig at The Castle in Manchester's Northern Quarter. 

While I'm on the subject of Hooded Fang, I absolutely lovelovelove this single and the amazing animation that goes with it!

Sadly I didn't actually get to go to this gig as I was at the clubnight that me and my boyfriend organise, artwork for which will be in the next post!

Font Bag

Was asked by a bar called The Font to design a two colour tote bag that they could give out on the streetz of Manchester over freshers week, this is what I came up with. Font is super lovely and are amazing at supporting emerging artists and illustrators (as well as having the best cheap cocktails in the entire world ever).

Standard Fare / Tigercats / The Birthday Kiss

Another gig poster for Underachievers Please Try Harder.

Hello From Manchester

I've been wanting to do either a Sheffield or a Manchester postcard for a few months now but had never got round to it until tonight. Going to put this in the end of year exhibition tomorrow I think since the last project was loosely based around Manchester. 
I guess it's a good piece of work to round off my first year of university with too. It's been majorly up and down (like I guess most peoples' first years are) but overall I've loved it and I totally adore Manchester as a place to live.

(Buildings L-R!: Cornerhouse, Manchester Wheel, Chinatown arch, town hall, Manchester Art Gallery, Salford Lads' Club, Frank Sidebottom graffiti in the Northern Quarter, Palace Theatre, Manchester Museum, Craft and Design Centre)

Vapid Kitten Extravaganza

While we were exploring the Zine Fair yesterday we also contributed to Vapid Kitten's wonderful 'Zine in a Day' project, which aimed to produce a fanzine in the time the Zine Fair was open for, this time with the theme of 'Collaboration'. They set themselves a pretty tight deadline, to get all submission ready by the end of the Fair at 5pm, but they totally pulled it off.

"Feminist duo Vapid Kitten invite visitors to contribute creatively to a special edition of the fanzine Vapid Kitten... [will be] aiming to include a big mishmash of experiences, words, drawings, collage and poems ...and would like to get as many people involved as possible."

And here's the finished zine!

Manchester Fanzine Convention 2012

Yesterday afternooon myself and the lovely Hebe went to check out Manchester Fanzine Convention, I'd been wanting to go for the last couple of years so I was super excited! It was at Victoria Baths near Rusholme, a beautiful old disused swimming pool.

As well as the stalls selling all kinds of artists' books, fanzines, screeprints, crafts, etc, there was also an exhibition called 'Shape & Situate: Posters of Inspirational European Women' which was incredible.

I also managed to catch a bit of Salford Zine Library's film 'Self Publishers of the World Take Over' (chapter called 'Freedom of Self Publishing' below!) while Hebe did a linocutting workshop.

Wonderful!

Thanks Sandbar!

Oh look I'm this Friday's Featured Artist on the Sandbar website! Sandbar is a lovely little pub really near my flat, they hold life drawing afternoons and film screenings and other such wonderful things, I'd definitely recommend it.

Flying Machines

Spent an afternoon drawing planes at the Museum of Science and Industry.

Party Hard

Poster for a new Manchester ~pArTy~ clubnight called Party Hard at The Star and Garter (one of the loveiest pubs in Manchester).