belper well dressings 2013

yet again there were many magnificent wells on display in the river gardens.  it was noted that the exceptional heat had effected some of the wells, however this did not stop the enjoyment of viewing those wells on show.







here is a selection of my favourites

setting up the trail day 4 ... .... .... questions, questions questions.

the recurring questions in today's installation endeavours were to do with has the teasing out the whose work is where got to a point of saturation?    the answers were as subjective as viewing the artworks themselves.  

we're working on the notion that until the trail goes live on july 8th the "who is where" is effectively unknown, except for downloading the trail guide in which you can read all about why the works are the artist's favourites.  i must also remember that we have that special preview event at the north mill on sunday when the artist will be available to chat about his work. i'll have more news about that tomorrow.

just tangettally for a moment our friends moon bullet are at the geogre and dragon on saturday. their style and delivery is a beautiful evolving thing. when we first saw them it was a punk ska thing. i see now that it's a funky punk thing. if you're free saturday night they are well worth a look. the beer is good at the pub too.

for lunch today i visited the river gardens. once again i had the joy of seeing the water level much lower than in previous visits. in some respect i prefer the look of the water course lower than higher.  what are your thoughts ?

belper news and the bbc #belperarttrail

there is soo much exciting stuff to write about today i'm a bit too excited to know where to start.









so as the song goes, time to start at the very beginning and in true big bang style will so swerve the opportunity to talk about the collection of gas that exploded and millions of years later we find ourselves with running water, electricity and a means of publicating words to a world wide web...


when we launched the call out back in october we had very little idea of what works would be submitted. we certainly didn't expect a work that would so well resonate with strutt's north mill.  we also couldn't forsee the evolution of staff at the mill so it is really pleasing that we've managed to once again include the basement of the north mill in the art trail.

so keeping with our sub-theme of discovering while on the trail, we're please to announce that on sunday 7th july we have a special event at 1pm till 3pm at strutt's north mill where artist tim shore will be available to chat with about his work installed in the basement of the mill.

this story is featured in the belper news

and is listed as something to do on the bbc website things to do. 

#belperarttrail provisional venue list

will be a list of the venues that makes up the trail.  we're rather keen for the trail to have an element of discovery so we'll be publishing the list soon.












so what else can i add at this time?  that the trail will be slightly bigger than last time...


that the trail will have at least two new venues...

and for now i'll leave it at that ....

more soon !

about ... 

 the journey of favourites...

2013  belper art trail ...

discovery day belper

sunday 28 october. it was cold and ulitmately wet, but that doesn't matter right now.

the celebrations were centred on the belper river gardens where various activities informative stalls and folk friendzy entertained.

with some friends we took in the wool based activities in the north mill. i sat down next to a lady i'd never met before and within moments i was making a pom pom and having a really lovely chat with her.  

folk friendzy's second performance of the day was in the river gardens near the swiss tea rooms.  braving the rain we strode out into the gardens to discover the troupe in the bandstand. despite the rain they were still going to perform.

something then quite unexpected happened. a lady in a green top arrived and we were hastily introduced to her and she started into a monologue about her dad and the east mill.  i think the lady is an actress from belper, possibly last seen in belper at the short play festival.

her piece began as a quite lovely account of things to do with the mill and working there.

as it progressed it twisted and turned and became about contemporary community and use of cars.   i noted that the piece was telling us that people don't form into community so often now as it had been in the past.  something that i thought was a little misplaced with folk friendzy as an audience as they effortlessly promote community. the performance continued and finished.

we then watched the girls adapt their dances to the band stand.  the rain poured down and under cover i watched the dance out develop a special atmosphere from seeing something that hadn't been intended to happen. well done to all involved.