It is a pretty well known fact that cities outside London are often overlooked when it comes to the arts. Cambridge is more famous for the dominance of the university than contemporary art and artists used to get bored and look elsewhere to exhibit, more recently however, the city is starting to have a new buzz about it and exciting creative ideas are cropping up across the city in all manner of ways.
In the second fastest growing city in the country, the artist led scene in Cambridge is also thriving and ideas are going from strength to strength, showing that recessionary times are not going to stop dedicated creatives who are taking up a DIY attitude and making things happen themselves with dynamic results.
In the last two years new art spaces have emerged in Cambridge: Aid and Abet, was opened in 2009 by three artists who had worked together at Wysing arts centre just outside Cambridge. Cj Mahony, Sarah Evans and David Kefford realised the need for a not for profit space in Cambridge city centre. The large, lofty warehouse near the station has an exciting changing programme of exhibitions and events. Artists and curators are invited from across the country to make each show diverse and to promote a collaborative approach to making art. Aid and Abet also run an associate programme for a small selected group of artists who meet regularly to help run the space, to discuss art and to critique each other’s work. Aid and abet recently collaborated with local contemporary art gallery Kettle’s Yard for a residency where they took over the gallery alongside Norwich artist led space, Outpost.
Another interesting initiative started by artists in Cambridge is the Changing spaces project. The project temporarily takes over empty shops around the city and artists use the shops for quirky performative cafes, pop up shops, exhibitions and performances. Earlier this year Syrian artist Issam Kourbaj had a solo show at the space on Kings street with all proceeds going to the Syrian Crisis appeal.
Changing Spaces recently collaborated with Cambridge University students to curate a show that involved university students, practicing artists across the city and guest artists from London and France. The show started with an opening night of poetry readings, interactive digital projections and drawing. The public were invited to respond to the idea of space and to create drawings on the easels that were placed around the shop, over the course of the night these drawings were added to the exhibition. Life drawing sessions were held in the back of the gallery and live music was performed throughout the space.
Cambridge School of Art graduate Robert Good started a public art project in 2012 called Text and Context. He invited artists to propose temporary site specific public art work for Cambridge that related to language. The selected artists were from the Uk and across the world and worked in a range of different media and styles, making for an interesting first year for this project. A particularly exciting work was Sue Shepherd’s large neon ‘You are here’ sculpture that was positioned close to the reality checkpoint on Parker’s piece making reference to this strange anomaly in Cambridge city centre, a lamp post with these words inexplicably inscribed on it.
This project is continuing this year under a new name, Art:Language:Location and will take place in October across the city. The project has grown to involve over forty artists this year and is joining up with the Cambridge Festival of Ideas to combine a series of talks and performances in addition to the site specific work.
Artists in Cambridge are beginning to be inspired more and more by the scientific and technology sector in Cambridge. Artist Marina Valez recently organised an art residency about sustainability in Cambridge. The residency in collaboration with the Global Sustainability Institute attracted artists from across the world. The two phase residency consisted of an an immersive research period, facilitated by scholars working in the field of art and sustainability which was followed by an exhibition of work produced by this research.
Community workshop spaces and studios that have recently opened in Cambridge such as the Makespace help to support the arts in this city. It is exciting to see such energy in Cambridge and hopefully the artist led scene here will continue to grow, the future certainly looks promising.
Cambridge's artist led scene
3/6/2013
It is a pretty well known fact that cities outside London are often overlooked when it comes to the arts. Cambridge is more famous for the dominance of the university than contemporary art and artists used to get bored and look elsewhere to exhibit, more recently however, the city is starting to have a new buzz about it and exciting creative ideas are cropping up across the city in all manner of ways.
In the second fastest growing city in the country, the artist led scene in Cambridge is also thriving and ideas are going from strength to strength, showing that recessionary times are not going to stop dedicated creatives who are taking up a DIY attitude and making things happen themselves with dynamic results.
In the last two years new art spaces have emerged in Cambridge: Aid and Abet, was opened in 2009 by three artists who had worked together at Wysing arts centre just outside Cambridge. Cj Mahony, Sarah Evans and David Kefford realised the need for a not for profit space in Cambridge city centre. The large, lofty warehouse near the station has an exciting changing programme of exhibitions and events. Artists and curators are invited from across the country to make each show diverse and to promote a collaborative approach to making art. Aid and Abet also run an associate programme for a small selected group of artists who meet regularly to help run the space, to discuss art and to critique each other’s work. Aid and abet recently collaborated with local contemporary art gallery Kettle’s Yard for a residency where they took over the gallery alongside Norwich artist led space, Outpost.
Another interesting initiative started by artists in Cambridge is the Changing spaces project. The project temporarily takes over empty shops around the city and artists use the shops for quirky performative cafes, pop up shops, exhibitions and performances. Earlier this year Syrian artist Issam Kourbaj had a solo show at the space on Kings street with all proceeds going to the Syrian Crisis appeal.
Changing Spaces recently collaborated with Cambridge University students to curate a show that involved university students, practicing artists across the city and guest artists from London and France. The show started with an opening night of poetry readings, interactive digital projections and drawing. The public were invited to respond to the idea of space and to create drawings on the easels that were placed around the shop, over the course of the night these drawings were added to the exhibition. Life drawing sessions were held in the back of the gallery and live music was performed throughout the space.
Cambridge School of Art graduate Robert Good started a public art project in 2012 called Text and Context. He invited artists to propose temporary site specific public art work for Cambridge that related to language. The selected artists were from the Uk and across the world and worked in a range of different media and styles, making for an interesting first year for this project. A particularly exciting work was Sue Shepherd’s large neon ‘You are here’ sculpture that was positioned close to the reality checkpoint on Parker’s piece making reference to this strange anomaly in Cambridge city centre, a lamp post with these words inexplicably inscribed on it.
This project is continuing this year under a new name, Art:Language:Location and will take place in October across the city. The project has grown to involve over forty artists this year and is joining up with the Cambridge Festival of Ideas to combine a series of talks and performances in addition to the site specific work.
Artists in Cambridge are beginning to be inspired more and more by the scientific and technology sector in Cambridge. Artist Marina Valez recently organised an art residency about sustainability in Cambridge. The residency in collaboration with the Global Sustainability Institute attracted artists from across the world. The two phase residency consisted of an an immersive research period, facilitated by scholars working in the field of art and sustainability which was followed by an exhibition of work produced by this research.
Community workshop spaces and studios that have recently opened in Cambridge such as the Makespace help to support the arts in this city. It is exciting to see such energy in Cambridge and hopefully the artist led scene here will continue to grow, the future certainly looks promising.