A Lecture upon the Shadow

Liverpool's Open Eye Gallery, Mann Island

Reviewed by Denis Joe December 2012

A Lecture upon the Shadow is an exhibition that looks at the work of six artists: three from the North West region and three from Singapore. The works have already been exhibited at the ShanghART H-Space in Shanghai, with the exception of David Jacques’ piece, which the authorities took exception to (more of that later).

Mad for IT: Manchester listings and reviews online

Reviewed by Simon Belt December 2012

I moved to Manchester when it was a buzzing place, in the early 1980's when being Northern meant doing it for yourself, and the likes of The Fall had put it on the cultural map as proper independent. To find out where to go, what to see and what to do, meant asking for recommendations from those with their finger on the pulse.

Ed Glinert (now of Manchester Walks), Andy Spinoza (now of PR Agency SKV), and Chris Paul (now a Labour councillor for Withington) were a few of those people with their finger on the pulse and helped pull together a mixed bag of hippies, aspiring journalists, and above all doers to produce the City Life magazine, that established a strong reputation across the city and beyond. Some of the cultural landmarks from those heady days may still be around, but alongside the broader demise of radical politics around the millennium, culture has become safer, packaged and generally stripped of its independent spirit.

Here I take a look at what's filling the space vacated by the demise of City Life.

Clare Allan: Burnt Wood and Paper

at The Portico Library, Moseley Street

Reviewed by Simon Belt November 2012

I first saw Clare Allan's fabulous drawings earlier this year at the opening exhibition of the Spring Bank Arts Centre in her native New Mills, Derbyshire. Clare's talent for drawing what she feels rather than literally sees, expresses warmth and grit, grandeur yet grounding, so that her subject's personality talks to us more than her technique.

From Nags to Riches: An Evening with Fred Done

To be reviewed by Simon Belt March 2013

The format was that of a single speaker, Fred Done, with a professorial anchor to provide some focus and structure if and when required, but essentially leaving Fred to talk about his business life. Thankfully, Fred is quite a self-effacing character so tends to focus on the people or events around him rather than himself which tends to make for a more interesting presentation most of the time. This was definitely a very interesting presentation because of who Fred is and the changes in business he elaborated.