Floorplan for Barne Barton Loves art, Tamar View

Floorplan, Barne Barton Loves Art, Tamar View

Barne Barton Loves Art event documentation

Main Exhibition hall:

Where It All Started, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Siobhan Fedden

School Drawings, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Siobhan Fedden

Tony Whitehead Station, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Siobhan Fedden

Tony Whitehead station, Barne Barton Loves Art,
Photography by Gem Ward

Bonkers Bunting Station,
Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Siobhan Fedden

Video & Fashion Show:

Video, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Siobhan Fedden

Bonkers Bunting Fashion Show, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Siobhan Fedden

Bonkers Bunting Fashion Show, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Siobhan Fedden

Photobooth and Stiltskin Entertainment:

Photobooth – Williams Danby, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Siobhan Fedden

Photobooth – Williams Danby, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Gem Ward

Stiltskin Entertainment, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Gem Ward

Stiltskin Entertainment, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Gem Ward

Stiltskin Entertainment, Barne Barton Loves Art, Photography by Gem Ward

Reflection of Barne Barton Loves Art

Jem, Reiss and I decided to reflect on the exhibition collaboratively.

What worked…

– Having a small curatorial team of 3 meant that we were able to discuss and make decisions effectively, which would have been difficult if the whole group had been involved with this process. We were able to delegate tasks between the 3 of us in order for things to run smoothly and by having regular meetings and discussions between us.
– Although the nature of the community arts based exhibition/event was not something we had previously been exposed to, we found that we thrived on working in this area and managed to create an appropriate, well received event for the community of Barne Barton.
– Curating the work in the given space was extremely challenging, though we feel that we adapted the curating of the work to the setting and place. The result was an accessible, varied exhibition with a professional finish in terms of its curation.
– We were pleased with the work that we selected for the event as it provided a variety of art forms, including various participatory, interactive elements. The nature of the event and audience worked well with participatory works and was received well by the audience.
– Our time management worked very effectively in the run up to the event. As well as organising and curating the exhibition, we also planned for the follow up exhibition at PCA and had flyers designed and printed ready to distribute at the event. This meant that we could promote the archival show and raised the profile of the follow up exhibition. We made decisions on what we wanted to include in the archival show e.g. Photobooth images which gave an incentive to the audience to attend and view their images.

What could have been better…

– Communication from Kim and Gem on elements to include in exhibition – we weren’t given the relevant information and clear indications of what would be included in the exhibition from the offset.
– Large quantities of repetitive emails were sent back and to between BBROOTS and the curatorial team – this made things very confusing at times
– Lack of support from the rest of group for certain elements of projects e.g. Tony Whitehead ran several sound walks which were supposed to be attended by members of the group but after people expressed initial interest no one actually attended
– Website deadlines not met by web designer, this meant that Siobhan and Ellie were very rushed to get the website populated in time for the event.
– Filming and documentation of event was poor. We had delegated someone to film the setup and document the event, these plans fell through at the event which meant that the curatorial team had to juggle this task with various other duties during the exhibition.
– The number of external agencies that turned up unannounced meant that we had to negotiate space for them at the last minute. We had not been told that they needed space and this affected the curating of the event.
– Lack of interest from school – needed more encouragement from community to attend as not as many pupils and families came over to the event after school hours finished.
– difficulties in coordinating the group – people had their own roles within certain elements of the event this meant they went ahead and made decisions without conferring with us as the curatorial team when we had made plans for the overall event.

Install

We arrived on the morning of Thursday 13th February to set up the exhibition, knowing also that this would all need to be taken down before 8pm on the evening of the 13th as well. Upon arrival most of our other peers hadn’t seen the space yet still set up from a previous social function the group were quite shocked, we worked as a team to move all the chairs to the sides and out of the way in the Main Exhibition room. Reiss, Tess and I then discussed with the group our floor plan and this was accessible for the team. Luke helped us move all the tabled in from the building across the road before we brought out the foam boards to pin our images to using consistent clear pins. At first we had been pretty sceptical of these but they worked very well for the event due to us not being able to pin into the walls and when sat on tables these allowed viewing of the images at the correct height. It was very helpful for us to have such a large team of peers as this allowed us to delegate roles with specific instructions on tasks, this ensured that the exhibition would continue to look professional and consistent. This use of communication was also important in the de-install of the exhibition as it allowed us to de-install quickly and effectively whilst still ensuring the safety and consideration of the work that we were handling.

Barne Barton Loves Art install, Photography by Gem Ward

Barne Barton Loves Art install, Photography by Gem Ward

Barne Barton Loves Art install, Photography by Gem Ward

Negotiating

Throughout the set up of the event Tess, Reiss and I had to do a wide amount of negotiating this ranged from delegating tasks to our peers (on the set up of the exhibition) to movement in our original floor plan. The main negotiation we incurred was due to the event previously being in a collaboration with ‘Have Your Say’. From the curatorial teams previous meetings with Take A Part, Pat Patel and Debbie Burton, we had the understanding there would only be three external agencies needed to have a station within the exhibition, we had organised this accordingly. However only 30 minutes before the opening of the event, we had at least 3 more agencies turn up that were believed to have had a table at the last events, and were not advised that this was going to be different that then therefore demanding a station. This caused issues as we then had to bring in more tables and boards for these companies to put out their merchandise.

This then meant we had to move the Kitt Hill Commission into the Dance floor room, which then caused issues when the Bonkers Bunting Fashion show was supposed to happen as we then had to move her station. The same process was used for the film screenings as these were being playing within the dance floor room before the fashion show however this was a much smoother process as we had already anticipated this.

Although we managed to fit everyone into the space, these aspects did affect the overall look of the exhibition, as our floor plan was no longer much use, due to us having to cram in more external agencies. This did affect the way that the exhibition was then curated as the artwork was no longer a focal point as the merchandise stations blocked most of this off. We also felt that these stations then dominated peoples experience of viewing the photographs as external agencies flyers were places all around the space we had curated. This meant that we had to encourage the community to look at the work for the full experience and understanding of the development of community arts in Barne Barton to be realised. Overall, due to the circumstances I do feel that Reiss, Tess and I handled this very well, and the exhibition was still deemed a success by the community.

 

Plymouth Herald publicity.

Alongside other publicity, the curatorial team also sent the press release and the information about the community arts in Barne Barton to The Herald, the local newspaper in Plymouth. Thankfully The Herald published an informative article about the project, this helped to raise awareness of community arts projects within Plymouth. To view the article please click the following link: http://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/Barne-Barton-gets-loved-history-art-project/story-20536032-detail/story.html

Posters

Alongside our Flyers for the Barne Barton Loves Art event we also produces a couple of A3 Posters in the same format and used these on an A-frame outside of the Community Complex, this helped to draw people into the event.

Barne Barton Loves Art, Tamar View Community Complex exhibition poster A3

Take A Part publicity

Gem and Kim from Take A Part also used the press release to talk about the BBROOTS projects with Barne Barton on their official website, click the following link to view this webpage: http://www.effordtakeapart.org.uk/barne-barton-loves-art/.

Liaising

Initially Tess, Reiss and I were in charge of management but after our meeting on the 10th January, Gem and Kim thought it better for us to continue to manage and curate the events, as we had been in charge of liaising with both other interns, Gem and Kim (TakeAPart) and other external agencies to ensure every element of the event were successfully completed.

The curatorial team spent a large amount of time liaising with both Gem and Kim from TakeAPart and external agencies through email, to discuss various issues. This included transport, printing, refreshments, logos etc.
We also created a Facebook group so that we were able to delegate tasks and keep on top of their progression with other interns for the project. We found as a group that using Google drive was the easier way to share documents between us. these methods of interaction allowed us to keep ourselves and everyone involved updated on the progression of the event. We felt as a group it was important to ensure everyone knew their roles for the day of set up to ensure that the event install ran smoothly. These roles were as follows:

Reiss, Tess and Jem – Curatorial Team and Set Up
Siobhan and Ellie – Website Station and Photography
Kath and Tiff – Bonkers Bunting & Fashion Show
Maddy – Filming Event
William – Photobooth Supervision

 

Flyers

The curatorial team spent time discussing with Take A Part and the external agencies involved in the Barne Barton Loves Art exhibition, discussing how we wanted the flyer to look and how we could then distribute these flyers to the community and city center alongside social media. it was organised that the flyers would need to be done early in order for them to be distributed within Barne Barton and placed into the children’s book bags within the Riverside School in hope to reach a wide audience and engage the community in the event.

After further negotiation with Kim and Gem on the content and information that would need to be present on the flyer such as relevant logo’s and elements of the exhibition. I then worked on designing a flyer which would work alongside the flyer that Kath had previously created for the Bonkers bunting. We discussed that we felt that text and themes should be consistent throughout the continuation of the marketing within the project. After completing the flyer I first discussed it with the rest of the curatorial team before sending it to Kim and gem for further approval, it was at this point that Kim and Gem mentioned that it could be with being a little more family friendly. In order to achieve this I emphasized the children’s entertainment and other aspects to draw in the community and allow them to engage with the arts. This was very different to how we initially thought it would look but we knew that that format would work with the archival show and not so much for the exhibition at Tamar View. After this realisation we amended the Flyer and emailed it both to Pat Patel for his social media and to Take a Part, after final approval it was ready for printing.

 

Barne Barton Loves Art, Tamar View Community Complex exhibition flyer