Tuesday afternoon our group went on an expedition to art galleries around Nottingham, which ended up being an expedition to Lakeside Arts and the Djagonaly Gallery as all the other were either closed, as they don't have any exhibition or because they only open weekends.
Ok... so, here are my thoughts on the exhibitions:
1. Gallery Art Group Summer Show - it is a showcase of young artists interpretations of a past exhibition at Lakeside, Thinking Room a graphic novel by Carol Adlam. I consider the room to be small, but the space was very well used! When entering the room the first that I noticed was something that looked like a map covering the whole wall and half of the space was left to appreciate it. While on the other half contained a more compact exhibition, showing sketches of different times of the day, from pencil to watercolour, sketchbooks with thoughts and process. It felt like the wall with the map was kind of like the cover/Intro and turning around there's the content, which I appreciate cause it gave me time, space and coherence to process all the information. As for the work it self I really appreciate theses young artists demonstrating a process and some kind of abstraction that showed imagination running loose.
2. From Rags to Witches: the grim tale of children's stories - this one has general information on about children's tales from the 16th century information at the centre, and around the room it contains some of the earliest surviving written versions of fairy tales. It was displayed on a coherent arrangement, but the content itself involved a lot of reading and for me an exhibition talking about children's fairy tales would have been nice to have more drawings than words, as I believe catches any audience attention better.
3. Rana Begum: Space Light Colour - from all exhibitions we visited, Rana Begum's was my favourite! It is divided by three rooms essentially, the first one is quite wide containing peaces on the walls, but not an exaggerated amount, one per wall. Which was enough for an introduction to her work. The second one was my favourite!! An installation of mesh, that reminded me of a forest, and as I walked into it the space felt cosier. The third Room was divided by two spaces one with small scale models of some of the artist large interventions, and other with more of her beautiful work. In general I loved the whole journey throughout her work and the fact that to get out I had to go back from where I came, giving more time to appreciate the art.
4. Steffie Richards - shows of paintings of nature that for the artist encapsulate the original sensation on moments of self-awareness. It is all in one room and the space allows a great appreciation of it, but all artwork is restrained by ropes, to keep distance. When the artist talks about his work is about sensations and self-awareness, but doesn't let the audience gets closer to it, is it actually getting the message through?
5. Collection of Archaeological Artefacts - right at the entrance there is a stand with artefacts that can be touched, together with a questionnaire. It is nice that there are somethings you can touch, since all of the exhibition is behind glass, but, to me a questionnaire feels like an invasion of space/obligation! I want to look around without any obligations, so the fact it was optional was great, I could always choose to have one afterwards.
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