Here's one Liverpool sculpture I haven't seen yet. It was unveiled about 18 months ago but had to be taken down almost immediately as it moved around too much in high winds. Its due to go on show again soon, a trip out to Speke is called for - or maybe two trips; a daylight one and a night-time one.

Spanning the dual carriageway, the Mersey Wave is 200ft long and 100ft high - the same size as seven double-decker buses. It is 30ft taller than the famous Angel of the North at Gateshead, and at night its blue lights are visible up to a mile away.
Daily Post article

This gallery on the 1st floor of 31 Mathew St is closing down this Saturday April 2nd. The website www.lennonart.co.uk will be upgraded to focus on online sales of their John Lennon prints and Beatles photographs and artwork by the likes of Robert Whitaker, Klaus Voormann and Astrid Kirchherr. The gallery has been there for 6 years but not many locals seem to know about it but its popular with tourists and many 'celebrity' fans have called in.
The manager Melissa Storey tells me they hope to still hold occasional exhibitions at local venues including their usual presence at the Adelphi during the Mathew St festival at end of August.
So do try and call in and see it before it goes, you'll need more than pocket money to buy a print but there is a bargain desk at the back.

A new experience for me I think. Last night Alex Corina's latest work 'The Three Graces' was 'unveiled' in the downstairs bistro at 60 Hope St. I've been to loads of openings and viewings but not an unveiling and it wasn't actually veiled so we pretended we couldn't see it while Joe Riley the Echo arts critic made his speech.
This is quite a substantial collection of Alex's work managed by the local art agency Dot-art, mostly mixed media, originals and prints including his famous Mona Lennon and other reworkings of old familiar images.

Now, of course, the buildings on the waterfront are referred to as the 3 graces but the original graces or 'Charites' were daughters of Zeus, goddesses of charm, beauty, nature, human creativity and fertility. They were great lovers of beauty and gave humans talents in the arts, closely associated with the Muses.
Alex's version is taken from various sources, we have a Canaletto sky, the Albert Dock and our '3 graces' in the background and in the foreground are 3 of the 4 female figures from Albert Moore's 'A Summer Night' which is in the Walker. Its well put together and quite amusing. You can, of course, see more on his website and dot-art's website but the best place to view for the next three months is 60 Hope St. The works are for sale and seem resonably priced to me.
Links: Alex Corina dot-art 60 Hope St. Daily Post Review

Must admit I didn't get this version of the Google logo at first. Apparently its Van Gogh's birthday today, so thanks to Google for pointing that out.
Regular googlers like me will know that there are frequent changes to the logo for 'special' days. You can see a whole collection of them on the google site http://www.google.com/holidaylogos.html

During Liverpool Biennial 2004, Liverpool Hope University hosted a Big Draw event. People were invited to draw a credit-card size picture onto large sheets of paper on the walls of the Cornerstone gallery. They received over 900 pictures and the college will receive a runner-up award from the Drawing Inspiration Awards next month.
Update: Oops, no it wasn't at the cornerstone, they had another big draw event called 'Evolve'. The credit-card thing was somewhere on the main campus.

This is a review of Liverpool artist Gaynor Evelyn Sweeney's recent London performance which I'm posting here in its entirety.

Review of Live Performance and Exhibition of Gaynor Evelyn Sweeney

340 Old Street Gallery, Shoreditch, London

Article written in conjunction with: Tony Knox and Gaynor Evelyn Sweeney

Photographer: Tony Knox

© Gaynor Evelyn Sweeney 2005

In Easter week a series of performances transpired at 340 Street Gallery, Shoreditch. London, by the artist Gaynor Evelyn Sweeney. This was part of the Voyeur exhibition curated by Terry Duffy and an adaptation of the artists ‘Temple Series’.

A crowd formed outside the gallery window, where the general public could observe the performance. Traffic on the main thorough fare of Old Street slowed down and some even reversed to view the strange and surreal exposé.

The performance was combined with an exhibition of photographs from the previous performance in the Liverpool Biennial 2004, including projected footage of the artist in film titled, ‘Anointed by Medici, Paris’.

The performance opened with the artist entering the space of 340 Old Street Gallery dressed in a medical coat and a crown of thorns. The gallery has large windows on either side and passers-by can observe.

The artist held over her face a ream of paper showing a printed reproduced image of her features. Each sheet is cascaded and as the next layer removed the face becomes one of her eyes and her pubic and genitals. When the last sheet remains she drops this to the floor. She takes from her pocket a razor and holds this between her teeth. She unbuttons the medical coat to reveal further printed reproductions of her breasts and genitals across the related body parts. These are then torn from her body and disrobes to place the medical coat on the floor in front of her.

She removes the razor from her teeth and in front of the engrossed audience of the general public, she then ritualistically shaves the pubic hair from her genitals. After all the hair has been shaved completely from the pubis and labia, she puts on a pair of ballet shoes and laces these up her lower legs. She stands on full block point and raises her arms extended to form the crucifixion to become she-Christ. She stands in this position for some time. Her pose compositional, statuesque, almost art and artefact. She lowers herself down and removes the ballet shoes. Dresses in the medical coat and departs the scene. The audience outside are absorbed, titillated and enthralled by the actions they witness.

Here the viewer becomes the voyeur, obliged to observe the act of something within standards of normality and usually hidden. The sentience of the flesh and self divination in terms of body modification has set the individual as the deity, no longer depending on any spiritual mysticism, but to render it to the self. The process of re-portraying our bodies in post-modern society is one where the ritual is imbued by the underlining absolute exposé. The explicit body in contemporary society has been attributed a sentience in the flesh of divine reverence.

Gaynor Evelyn Sweeney has done other performances and live interventions in places such as the Louvre (Paris), the MOMA (New York), the Tate Modern (London) and other large institutions to address the canon and politics of the body and flesh. She has had her art exhibited and performed in other international festivals and biennials. A founding member of the Whores of Babylon Arts Collective and TransVoyeur (an Anglo American Cultural Exchange Programme), she has formed creative relationships regional and global with the objective of research and development in the contemporary arts and culture.

Her next upcoming show is in Manchester and soon to be followed by another London. For further information, please contact the artist at gaynorsweeney@hotmail.com.

Critics Choice at FACT ends on Sunday April 3rd so you only have this week to see about 30 hours worth of art related film/video in the galleries.
See Charlton Heston as Michaelangelo
Gilbert & George shout at each other
Tracey Emin's dreadful film 'Top Spot'
Sarah Morris's five excellent 'painterly' films
Short videos of Sarah Lucas eating a sausage, Yoko Ono having her clothing cut to pieces and Mark Wallinger talking backwards.
And much more.
Try and avoid Mike Kelley & Paul McCarthy doing disgusting things but do have a go at Xu Bing's Square Word Calligraphy.

Liverpool Academy of Arts has a couple of open exhibitions coming up:
'Sea Liverpool 2005' Art related to Liverpool and its involvement with the sea. June 14th - July 15th. Works to be handed in June 1st -3rd.
'Come Together 2005' The famous annual Beatles art exhibition, August 15th - September 2nd. Works to be handed in August 4th/5th.
Full details from the Academy, 36 Seel St.

Computer Arts magazine (my favourite!) are calling for entries to their Graduate Showcase 2005. This is for digital art students graduating this year.

The 4 finalists for The Gulbenkian Prize - Museum of the Year 2005 have been announced. None are anywhere near the Merseyside area but all look interesting. Think I'll avoid the Great Yarmouth Time & Tide museum though...
'It tells the story of Great Yarmouth and celebrates its maritime and fishing heritage, bringing to life its herring curing industry and the lives of the people who worked there. '
Ah, the smell of rotting fish.

www.tate.org.uk/britain/turnerprize
You can nominate an artist for the shortlist for the Turner Prize 2005.
Perhaps I'll nominate Banksy, he keeps his real identity secret, he'd have to attend the award ceremony in disguise.

A Wooster Exclusive: Banksy Hits New York's Most Famous Museums (All of them)
The Wooster Collective is an art website that I quite enjoy and for those that don't know, Banksy is a street artist. You can see some of his work on derelict buildings in Liverpool, he usually uses stencils. A lot of his work is amusing as well as technically very good.
But for this New York thing he visited the 4 main museums and stuck framed pictures to walls and sent the photographic evidence to Wooster.
As for street art, I'm happy to see it on those ugly bits of plywood that are nailed over empty buildings but hate to see it in other places. Imagine if everyone who thought they could paint covered the three graces or William Brown St. (or my beautiful red-brick grade II-listed apartment block) with their efforts. Nightmare.
Check out Banksy's website.

From the Daily Post
The Government last night pledged an extra £5m towards Liverpool's Capital of Culture celebrations.
The announcement comes in the same month that both Tony Blair and his culture secretary, Tessa Jowell, said the city would get no further backing towards 2008.
The U-turn, announced by the Arts Council England, North West, virtually doubles the Government cash Liverpool is to receive.

Thats nice.

Richard Wentworth - Review by Jo Raven
Currently on display at Tate Liverpool is the work of the renowned British Sculptor Richard Wentworth, who emerged as a key figure during the 1980’s. This exhibition includes work spanning the past 30 years of his production, as well as pieces commissioned especially for the Tate.

The everyday object dominates his portfolio of work, approached from a playful and humorous standpoint. By altering the context of everyday objects, Wentworth succeeds in subverting and disrupting our perception. The normal purpose or associations of particular ready-made components become transformed, through their juxtaposition with other objects or the unexpected way in which they are used. This causes the viewer to re-evaluate the rudimentary meanings of not only the chosen objects but also reshapes the way we think about sculpture and works of art.

On the whole the exhibition held my attention and succeeded, as suggested by the artist, in challenging my perception from the start. The opening pieces included a sprung steel construction City where I spent some time trying to figure out how an object merely appears to skim the wall, with no visible means of attachment. Then straight into a maze of tensile barriers, more at home in your local post office than an art gallery, although much more tricky to manoeuvre with the central goal being a large straw bale.

Moving on a pattern begins to emerge with Wentworth’s continual use of particular objects. His fascination with books becomes apparent, taking on various different forms. They are filled with an assortment of materials from sweet wrappers, to tape measures and watches, or suspended impressively from the ceiling in his installation, False Ceiling. Chairs balanced with round weights are another key concern, and feature regularly throughout the exhibition. Ceramic plates also dominate two of the biggest compositions. His well-known Spread, a circle six metres in diameter containing a mish-mash of plates and Brac, a decidedly overdressed grand piano covered in broken pieces unmistakably glued back together with black epoxy resin.

For me the most outstanding room contained 30 years of Wentworth’s photographic encounters, images portraying what he perceives as his ‘background noise.’ Every picture shows a snapshot of a minute occurrence. Just some of the millions of tiny gestures which constitute everyday life, details of the world which we overlook and which regularly pass us by – a chocolate bar stopping an alarm bell ringing, an ashtray propping up a table leg. “The things I take photographs of are hard to describe because they’re not just as simple as a picture of something unusual used to keep a door open. I am interested in the broad language but I am also interested in the small event.”

What I also enjoyed about this exhibition was the interaction the viewer had with the pieces. They were not cordoned off, allowing you to move more freely around the space. The placement of art works staggered across the floor, suspended from ceilings and spanning the depth of the walls, allowed you to fully engage with the display. The labels contributed to this sense of participation, their placement leaving you free to decipher which title belonged to each artwork.

I especially liked the works you could almost miss, the walking stick hanging precariously over the doorway, or the oval lump of granite randomly placed next to a paper bag protruding from behind a pillar. While a little repetitive in places, the exhibition showed good cross-section of Wentworth’s work, and its playful and light-hearted approach making it well worth a visit.
Jo Raven MA
Tate Link

We have another blogger on the team. Jo Raven is originally from London but we'll forgive her as she has made Liverpool her home after studying here for her degree in Law and History of Art and her MA (Visual Art in the City). Jo has written an excellent review of the Wentworth Tate exhibition which will be posted later. Which reminds me I must take another look, I saw it on the opening evening but it deserves further inspection. It ends on Apr 24th.

The already running International Modern Art display at Tate Liverpool is set to run through 2008 after a sponsorship deal with law firm DLA Piper: "Christoph Grunenberg, Director of Tate Liverpool, said: "The DLA Piper Series is the first European Capital of Culture sponsorship for Tate Liverpool, we are delighted to receive such a significant level of support from DLA Piper [...] As we move towards 2008 it is vital that the private sector supports the city's cultural infrastructure to make the European Capital of Culture a success.
The partnership with DLA Piper enables Tate Liverpool to increase substantially the ambition and diversity of its exhibition and education programmes during this exciting period, benefiting the city of Liverpool and all who live and work in the area, as well as the tourism economy."

In the Williamson Tunnels in Smithdown Lane there's an exhibition of artwork by pupils of St Hilda's C of E High School and residents from the Riverside Housing Association. It was organised and commissioned by students on the Community Arts Management Programme at LCAD (Liverpool Centre for Arts Development). The story of the tunnels is quite fascinating, you can read about it on the website. The artwork is inspired by the tunnels and its history and the use of 'found' objects.
Pictured here are 'Williamson's Boot' by Hoda Asadollahi and 'Unlocking Memories' by Kayleigh Aston. Other art inside the tunnels by Amy Dunbavin, Chloe Brennan, Amanda Bridson, Parisa Asadollahi and Hannah Jane Williams.
Ends April 3rd. There is an Entrance fee for the tunnels.

I haven't been to see this yet but probably will before it ends on April 3rd. Its a restrospective of Liverpool artist Frank Green, over 100 paintings at the Williamson gallery in Birkenhead.
Daily Post article

Sean Hawkridge, Performance Artist: An Interview

The first time I came across Sean Hawkridge’s work was at his recent solo exhibition at the Cornerstone Gallery, where visitors were given paper aeroplanes to make with instructions, and a magician was enlisted to entertain with card tricks.

Sean first came to Liverpool from his home town of Cardiff to study at John Moores University, where he graduated in Fine Art last year. Intrigued by his ‘interactive’ approach to art, I decided to find out more about the artist and his work.

Kaye: You first came to Liverpool to study Art, what was your first project?

Sean: ‘I started out by making sculptures, which were about fragility. I made a table out of sugar cubes and a dolls house out of matches, which damaged easily, but became frustrated by what I felt was a lack of communication between the pieces and the viewer. Therefore interaction with the audience became a fundamental concept’

Kaye: How did you develop this new direction within your practice?

Sean: ‘I wanted to explore ideas about communication and engagement, and my next project was about reactions to generosity and value structures. I found a car parked on double yellow lines on a street where some traffic wardens were working, and secretly filmed it. After a while, the car was given a ticket – and before the driver returned, I placed a cheque in the penalty notice packet to pay for the ticket, with the recipient name left blank, to be filled in by the driver. I watched the car until the driver returned. When he found the cheque, he emailed me a picture of it from his mobile and later that week, the cheque was cashed’.

Sean: ‘The next project was based on a game of poker. A pack of cards was split exactly in two and dealt to two players, myself and my neighbour Tom. We put the cards in envelopes addressed to 52 galleries in the UK and Europe found in the back of ‘Art monthly’, and to the name of the opposite player with ‘return to sender’ addresses on the back, so that on arrival they would be rejected and returned. When a sufficient number of cards had been sent back, we played a game of poker. Against impossible odds, having received only eight cards back in the post, I won the game with a flush of spades!’

Kaye: In your exhibition, you chose to display your work as a series of video stills. How is this a significant factor of your work?

Sean: ‘All the stills are from video films made of my projects, there is no special emphasis on their final presentation within an exhibition space. The work itself work is about the process, not the final product or display – its all about Velcro! I like to use playful ways to challenge how people use galleries, such as the paper aeroplanes with instructions. I try to appeal to the audience at different levels, so the person who receives the parking ticket, or the recipients of the playing cards are as much a part of the ‘exhibition experience’ as the visitors themselves’

Kaye: So what inspires your work?

Sean: ‘I take my ideas from day to day life within a city, making observations on the street, conversations with strangers – people and places I find in Liverpool!’

Kaye: You mention the local community - how does this play a part in your future projects?

Sean: ‘I am strongly driven by the community of art locally, and in the shaping of the city culturally. I want to contribute to the locality through my art by continuing to explore the possibilities of how others respond to it, and to fulfil my responsibility as an artist in creating moments that reflect daily life.’

The Cornerstone was Sean’s first solo show, and he has also exhibited as part of the Liverpool Biennial. He currently has a Fellowship at the Static Gallery, and has recently taken over management of Arena Gallery. I personally look forward to seeing more of Sean’s capricious performances, and hope he will be hiding round a corner with his cheque book next time I park on double yellows!

Kaye Kent MA

I only had time for a short rest after returning from St Helens before going out to South Bohemia. Which is actually a gallery in a former shop in Smithdown Rd. There's a lot of paintings by various artists here but for the next two weeks the front section is given over to an exhibition by the Faery and Fantasy artist Michelle Campbell. The originals are painted in watercolour and gouache but are not for sale, these are all top quality prints and cards (and T shirts even). Michelle is now well established in the fantasy art world and is planning on doing more book illustrations. I like the dragons the best.

I had a nice day out in St Helens today. 5athegallery opened in 2003 just a short distance from St Helens Central station on the way into the town centre. The ground floor is quite a small area crammed with artwork, jewellery, sculpures but upstairs is a much larger room which is hosting the latest exhibition 'COAST'. The works are by North West artists and the theme is a link to Liverpool's Year of the Sea 2005. There's plenty to see and a mix of styles e.g. Photography from Steve Deer, Patrick Ferguson and others, large oils by Ian McKay and Colin Callow and Bernard Atherton's watercolours and loads more. Its a really nice space. I had a good chat and a coffee with the Manager Jess Bowstead before moving on to the Rainford gallery which is not in Rainford but is above St Helens central library. Unfortunately it was between shows, I see that on the 21st the Mark Makers are exhibiting here, I reviewed their exhibition in Runcorn back in January, I wonder if its the same stuff. So I went to see what was on at the Citadel Arts Centre - nothing, its closed for refurbishment. So I ended up at the World of Glass which was great fun, I watched a demonstration of glass blowing of a small vase. I'll probably see the finished product again in one of the art & crafts shops I visit.

Yes, Bury is not exactly in the Liverpool area but Phil Davenport has co-curated this and sent me the details so I'm happy to pass them on. Some of you will remember the apples that appeared around the Walker during the Biennial. That was Phil's 'Heart Shape Pornography' which was part of the Ritual Bodies exhibition. This Bob Cobbing chap sounds interesting and now the fair Spring weathers here a day trip to Bury doesn't seem such a gloomy prospect....

A retrospective of Bob Cobbing - the remarkable word/visual/sound poet - will open at Bury Art Gallery(in desperate need of a proper website) on March 19th and run for six weeks.

Bob Cobbing was one of the great adventurers of 20th century British poetry. He was an extraordinary poet, a hugely encouraging and influential publisher, a charismatic performer who was performing up until days before his death at the age of 82 in 2002. This exhibition spans a lifetime of creative activity, gathering classic works and previously unknown pieces gathered from his personal archive.

Cobbing used photocopiers, duplicators, computers, sound, paint, dance and words to construct poetry. Many of the works here are simultaneously poems, artworks and scores for performance. Although a prolific wordsmith, he is famed for photocopy works that explode the conventions of reading, even the very idea of words.

His early artworks are reminiscent of 1950s Abstract Expressionists like Jackson Pollock. He hit controversy early on - something that would be a feature of his life - when Mrs Thatcher tried to have one of his artworks removed from an exhibition - because she thought it looked like sperm.

Cobbing came to prominence in the 1960s as a concrete poet along with his peers Ian Hamilton Finlay, John Furnival, Dom Sylvester Houedard and others. Later, he fused painterly influences and words to create complex layers and wordfields which in turn fed into dance or music improvisation.

As well as a poet, Cobbing was a publisher. His small press Writers Forum had a list of over 1000 titles by the time of his death. He published many noted experimenters (Cage, Ginsberg, dsh, et al) but also gave numerous unknowns their publishing debut. Writers Forum list reads like a history of alternative poetry.

He also was actively involved in the Poetry Society in the 1960s and 1970s, where he championed the experimental and the 'other'.

Cobbing combined the shamanic performance qualities of Beat poets like Ginsberg with the radical playfulness of Fluxus. He is a touchstone of 1960s adventurism; this exhibition is to celebrate his life's work and memory.

The Bob Cobbing exhibition has been co-curated by poet Philip Davenport and artist Jennifer Cobbing, Bob's widow. A soundtrack of Cobbing performances has been compiled for the exhibition by musician/writer David Toop.

Well, last night actually. 'Tonight We Are Golden' was shown as part of the Seen programme at FACT. 'Seen' is a regular screening event, usually Wednesdays, featuring strange and beautiful film and video from around the world. I especially wanted to see this show as it was curated by Michelle Cotton from S1 Artspace in Sheffield. It's a 90 minute programme of 14 films selected from the 6 programmes that made up the first season of S1 film shows under the title of S1/salon.
Michelle introduced the programme but unfortunatley had to leave half way through to travel back to Sheffield. Often there's a Question & Answer session at the end of Seen events and I was hoping to learn more, not so much about the films, but about the S1 Artspace project.
It was a good selection of films, some dark, some weird and some funny. Full details on the S1 website where you can also check back later in the year (early Autumn) for details of calls for submissions for the next season, subject to funding.

Next week's Seen is Andy Warhol's Bike Boy, selected by Mark Lawson. That should be popular, its Important, Significant and Quintissential. But is it good? I'll have to go see and judge for myself.

Well, every little bit helps.

BBC News item

Here's a sneak preview of some of the artwork in the Anglican Cathedral for tonight's performance by the BBC Philharmonic. It was created by Dorrie Halliday and pupils she has been working with at a local school (I think its in Newton-le-Willows but I don't have full details).
Hopefully Dorrie will post the full story on her own website at some point.

Its Brain Injuries Awareness Week this week. 'Making Sense - The Hidden Face of Brain Injury' opened at the Conservation Centre on Saturday. Its a collaborative arts project with the Brain Injury Centre, Liverpool and TAG (The Artists Group) based in the Bridewell Studios in Liverpool.
On the mezzanine floor there are about a dozen canvases of uniform size (about 80cm sq. I guess) with acrylic paintings. The one pictured here, 'Buena Vista 2' grabbed my attention.
On the upper floor there's some more acrylics, some 3D figurative models a very nice collection of smaller mono-type prints, a slide show and coloured photographic prints. I read in the (free) colour brochure that the photographs were shot on black & white film with the colours being applied later to the enlarged prints using chemical effects with toners and dyes - interesting!
The TAG artists, Steve Rooney and Sue Williams worked with the Brain Injuries Rehab Unit and NHS Carers to run over 30 workshops with up to 30 participants.
'Making Sense aims to promote understanding about the nature of brain injury and the plight of those affected'
Well, for me anyway, its mission accomplished and I enjoyed the artwork too of course. Finishes on May 15th.
Artists/Participants: Gillian Caryl, Michael Cheeseman, Ron Cheevers, Eddie Clayton, Philip Brunston, Ashley Deam, Vivienne Disley, Ed Doyle, Mark Dunne, Tony Furlong, Bernie Gardner, Tony Houghton, Brian Jones, Billy McDonald, John McGregor, Mark McInerney, Ken McKevitt, Alan Mackay, Joe Martin, Dave Morrey, Michelle Murphy, John Nichols, Colin Parr, Ray Parry, Bernard Peers, Joe Prendergast, George Scully, Paul Sealeaf, Jenny Stringman.
Laura Davis has written a good feature on this in the Daily Post

Strange title for this exhibition at Urban Coffee in Smithdown Rd. There is a statement on the wall but I neglected to digest it, I was in too much of a hurry to digest my coffee and flapjack. If I'd made it to the viewing last Friday I'd know all about it and I could have told you if the bust of Boudicca shown in the photo here is entirely made of felt. Its certainly partly felt as is quite a bit of Penny Gill's artwork, some of it sculpted, some framed and some as long wall hangings.
Anyway, the title obviously refers to Queen Boudicca (didn't we used to call her Boadicea or some such?) and women being strong, even in the kitchen hence the kitchen related paintings - not felt this time, some oil(?) on canvas.
Other artists on display: Rosamund Smears, Jazamin Sinclair and Lis Edgar.
Thanks to the L.Issue curator Lis Edgar for the photograph of Penny Gill at the private viewing with her bust of Boudicca and some of her paintings.
Update:
I forgot to mention the cabinet full off handmade pottery by Alejandra Castro.
And I now have a copy of Penny's statement re the title...
'Its a commonplace tale; one of injustice, exploitation, greed and brutality. The Celtic Queen Boudicca took a ferocious revenge against the Roman Empire in A.D.60. And if time travel were possible she would be most welcome to sanctuary in my kitchen...
During the 1960s Judy Chicago commissioned other artists to create a formal dinner party table, with named place settings to honour women of spirit throughout history. illustrious and overwhelming company.
So I've selected to entertain one woman. whose spirit of resistance and courage I respect. I'd like to think Boudicca could take off her crown, lay aside her battle axe and put her feet up with a cup of tea laced with whisky...'

Of course, I'm only doing this in the hope that one day I might earn a living as a Professional Blogger. The latest vacancy is at CMT (Country Music TV! What a dreadful idea) where you can earn $100k to blog about The Dukes Of Hazzard! Actually you have to do a bit more than write the blog, you have to watch the program every weekday on CMT and deal with fan mail etc.
I would apply of course but I'd have to move to the USA and there'd be no-one here to run artinliverpool. Shame.

Doesn't open until May 21st but looking forward to this one.
Advance notice - glamorous celebrity photos at the Walker
"Terry O’Neill: Celebrity is a glamorous photography exhibition consisting of forty-three sumptuous portraits of the most famous faces from the last four decades.
The exhibition, curated by the National Portrait Gallery and shown for the first time outside London, reflects O’Neill’s long and varied career. The photographs include musicians, models, royalty and an abundance of Hollywood stars new and old."

BBC News Item
"Liverpool's residents are set to receive free theatre, music and arts tickets worth more than £250,000 on Monday.
More than 30,000 2-for-1 tickets - valid at eight cultural centres - will be enclosed in council tax letters. "
Oo, for once I can't wait to get my council tax bill. It will be interesting to see how many of these offers are taken up and how much (if anything) its costing the council. If the council are covering the cost I think maybe the money would be better spent supporting the small independent galleries who are struggling to find the money to pay their local taxes and rents.

Running this website and blog is like being self-employed. Although artinliverpool doesn't generate any income (quite the opposite) I hate to miss a days input. A few days of inactivity and the number of hits plummets and us bloggers are hooked on hits!
I've been ill for a few days and missed a couple of things including the viewing at Urban Coffee on Friday, I must visit ther