I got to Loop just after the noon start of the RAW event and the 5 artists were already busy. Glenn Humphrey had lined up 5 square canvases and was ready to start painting. Members of ‘Frakture’ were strolling around the room with bells, whistles, chimes and more conventional instruments. Barbara Jones was taking photographs, Julie Swallow had tacked some press cuttings to the wall and had set out several notebooks and pencils. Meanwhile, Jason Thompson was operating a few video cameras and editing the results in a corner of the gallery.
After a while, the painting started to take shape, the band had sat down and were playing with more vigour, photographs were being printed on-site, more text was produced using anything from scrabble letters to alphabetti spaghetti and Jason emerged from his editing suite to film the action from different angles.
I took a break mid-afternoon and went for a walk. There was a wedding going on at St Nick’s with a full military brass band which I could hear from the Pier Head and I’m happy to report that I found Nemo in an office window. Things are getting weirder all the time.
I returned to find the floor littered with broken crockery, marbles, bowling balls and twigs all courtesy of the band. Thankfully, more members of the public were now calling in to watch the proceedings for a while. Everything stopped at 6pm, it took an hour to clear up and hang the paintings and photographs. I got so involved in all this I neglected to take any pictures of the final outcome but its impressive I assure you.
Inevitably, a few glasses of wine were consumed and we headed into town. Door staff at the Newz bar informed me I was ‘dressed too casual for tonight sir’. Too casual! At least I was covered up unlike the gang of girls in front of me who looked like they’d taken 1 small black dress and shared bits out between them. So we went to Garlands (via Rigbys) and paid twelve quid to listen to one long dance tune and get frisked on entry and charged two quid for a bottle of water. I was definitely dressed too casual for this place!
What a day!
The exhibition of the days events is on from Tuesday May 3rd to Saturday May 7th 11.00-16.00
Loop Gallery
More pictures…