L-INK at the Laing & Hatton Galleries

…if you are 16-21 years old, interested in the arts, are curious about what goes on inside a gallery, or just want to meet new people. You should be energetic, enthusiastic, positive, friendly and willing to commit to one afternoon a month.

The History of L-INK

In the past, L-INK have worked with artists to create works in response to paintings in the gallery, they have exhibited works in Newcastle and in London, they have worked with artists, curators and different teams in the gallery, they have visited galleries in different cities. This year L-ink have been creating their manifesto, creating art works and organising the Late Shows event.

L-INK work with the gallery in different ways: Sometimes they work on specific projects, such as the Late Shows, at other times, the Laing supports L-INK with self-led projects. This can involve workshops, discussions about their own work, meeting and finding out about the roles of Laing gallery staff.

L-INK is a reciprocal programme; after the project has finished each year, the Laing asks that L-INK become volunteers for the summer programme of events and activities. This is an excellent opportunity to gain real experience working within the gallery and the Learning team can offer participants references for employment and education where appropriate. This is a great opportunity for students who are interested in the arts to learn new skills and put something extra on their CV.

L-INK 2018-19: Double Digits: Link is 10!

L-INK’s tenth anniversary has been an opportunity to reflect upon past projects as well as taking forward ideas the group have been working on as part of their own manifesto. L-INK 2018-9 have considerd and celebrated artists, artworks and art-stories and have, investigated and reinterpreted artworks, met with practising artists and curators and worked collaboratively to create their own artworks, events and developed curatorial skills inspired by the both the Laing and Hatton’s collections and exhibition programme.

 

L-INK explore large-scale drawing

Exhibition Inspiration: Exploding Collage

Exploding Collage explored how avant-garde artists of the early twentieth century expanded the notion of collage into immersive, often ephemeral, formats. The exhibition comprised presentations by contemporary artists whose work examines, celebrates or reinstates such avant-garde figures, with an emphasis on those whose radical practice has led to their contribution being less well-recognised in canonical histories of the medium.

Exploding Collage was on display at the Hatton until January 2019

Exploding Collage featured an architectural commission by Julia Heslop & Ed Wainright called Gathering. As part of a programme of interventions for Gathering,  L-INK, unpacked a suitcase of their own artworks and personal objects, each of which have connections to the theme of ‘bravery’. 

This act is inspired by the life and work of Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven (also known as ‘the Baroness’) who, as well as being an artist, poet and performer in her own right, is credited with being the first female American Dadaist, and was once arrested for wearing mens clothing, The public were invited to move, change, create, destroy or interact with the contents of the case. (An act of bravery in itself!).

L-INK 2019 are: Lucie Robson, Sara Hassan, Andrew Parr, James Barker, Jack Bray, Naomi Harrison, Charlotte Simpson & Holly Mae Robinson.

Gathering Intervention: https://hattongallery.org.uk/g...

Dada Experiments...

During 2018, L-INK identified key areas which their projects should address:

• Self development through art & social skills

• Working creatively through making, talking and thinking about art in all its forms

• Engaging with communities through exhibitions, workshops and fundraising

• Making art more accessible through connecting with communities and other young people

The Laing Art Gallery

The gallery was founded in 1901, funded by Alexander Laing, a Newcastle businessman who had made his money from his wine and spirit shop and beer bottling business. Alexander Laing didn’t leave any paintings or other art to the Gallery. He said that he was confident “…that by the liberality of the inhabitants [of Newcastle] it would soon be supplied with pictures and statuary for the encouragement and development of British Art”.

The gallery today is home to an internationally important collection of art, focusing on British oil paintings, watercolours, ceramics, silver and glassware.

The Hatton Gallery & the Merz Barn Wall

The Hatton Gallery is part of Newcastle University’s Fine Art Department, but just like the Laing, is managed by Tyne & Wear Archives & Muesums. (TWAM). The Hatton’s roots are based in Fine Art teaching, but over the past hundred years (or so), its role has gradually changed.

The Hatton is also home to Kurt Schwitter’s Merz Barn Wall The Merz Barn Wall is part of a construction created by German artist Kurt Schwitters in a Lake District barn in 1947-8. The Elterwater Merz Barn was based on the idea of collage, in which found items are incorporated into an art work. Schwitters applied a rough layer of decorator’s plaster and paint over these found objects, giving the three dimensional collage an abstract quality. Asked what it meant, he replied ‘all it is, is form and colour, just form and colour’. The barn was designed as a permanent structure, somewhere Schwitters could exhibit existing work. When he died in January 1948 it was left unfinished. In 1965, after lengthy discussions about the barn’s future, the Wall was given to Newcastle University who undertook its removal, restoration and and preservation

Sign me up!

Please contact zoe.allen@twmuseums.org.uk to book a place on the taster day or if you would like more information. Download L-INK Application Form