A Little Bit of Art - Gallery in Iliffe Yard open Saturdays from 10am - 3pm

There are a number of artists studios in Iliffe Yard, just off Crampton Street in SE17.  One of them, A Little Bit of Art, is opening (alongside GAS Art Agency) on Saturday mornings, beginning tomorrow, Saturday 8th October 2011, from 10am - 3pm.  I presume they'll continue to open on Saturdays as long as there is interest.

A Little Bit of Art specialises in affordable printed artworks and you can go and visit them at 20A Iliffe Yard, SE17 3QA.

Kennington and Vauxhall are stuffed full of galleries and artists, and you can't beat visiting the places in which beautiful things are created.  Do drop in to the Electric Elephant Cafe, a tiny alternativey-feel venue that serves great coffee.  We visited ages ago, and chatted happily with the staff.  Iliffe and Crampton Streets both have a strong community spirit.  And whilst you're there, and if it's open (2pm-6pm on Saturdays), consider dropping in to 56a Crampton Street, where there's an anarchist cafe and library.

City & Guilds London Art School to support Japan and Tsunami Relief Fund

The City & Guilds of London Art School on Kennington Park Road (just off Cleaver Square) are to host an art event (Art / Unity / Hope) to raise funds for the Japan Earthquake and Tsunami Relief Fund.  It will be held on 14th April from 5-8pm with the sale of art to begin at 6pm. 

It's organised by Takayuki Hara, a graduate and tutor of the college.  Artists have been invited to donate works, and they will all be for sale at £50 each.

It has its own Art / Unity / Hope Facebook page, if you want more info.

See poster for further details:

"Reclaimed" Art Exhibition: David Taborn exhibits at Lassco

Last time I visited Lassco/Brunswick House (the big house in the middle of the Vauxhall gyratory), I reported that they'd opened a new cafe.  Lassco is an antique salvage company where you can browse through any number of old artefacts (everything from old prints to refurbished bath tubs). One of the great joys of the cafe is the option to buy all of the furniture on display!  If you weren't tempted by my review, you might be tempted by the knowledge that those who run the cafe belong to the Di Lieto family, who run a very good delicatessen in the nearby Bonnington Square.

In the meantime, Lasso applied for a musical and alcohol licence.  I've no idea whether it was approved, but the venue has started hosting local events and is gaining in popularity... The first ever art exhibition to feature in the space is "Reclaimed", a sprawling show of over 30 wall-panels and watercolours by David Taborn, which will fill every room of Brunswick House.  This is a very exciting development because it builds on the foundation of a strong arts community in SE11 (there are 5 art galleries in our tiny postcode). 

At Reclaimed, the wall-pieces will contain 3D elements as the frames of each exhibit create a membrane allowing two worlds to suck or seep into each other.  View intriguing works such as a musical typewriter set in a mirror, snooker balls pouring through a 2-dimensional harp, melting Wagner records and a swatch of Freud's sofa.  The ingredients of David's weird and intriguging works are objects and materials 'that have had a former life'.

David Taborn is a NESTA Fellow and has exhibited in the UK, New York, Brazil, Belgium and Germany. His work is in collections including the Courtauld Institute, Djanogly Art Gallery, Government Art Collection and NESTA (National Endowment for Science, Technology & the Arts).

Exhibition: 2-21 December, Lassco, Brunswick House, Vauxhall
Open: Monday to Saturday 10am-5pm, Sunday 11am-5pm
Late openings: Thursday 9th December and Thursday 16th December 2010 to 9pm

Info and images also available on Lassco website.

Part-ownership of a spaceship, going carbon negative and recycling on Lambeth housing estates

The consensus is that prices are rising once again in London, such that owning a property is beyond the reach of many citizens.  Help, however, is at hand in the form of a part-ownership eco-spaceship.  Head over to the Beaconsfield Gallery (22 Newport Street, SE11) where an installation, exploring the contradictions and difficulties of building a utopia, will be constructed in the form of  a Spaceship Earth eco-structure.  You can buy a slice at a rather reasonable £1 per share, but it's unclear exactly what you'll get for your money!  

The Beaconsfield spaceship project is collaborative, and the artists require donations of works relating to utopias.  In addition, you can take a picture of yourself outside your house with lots of unwanted goods, and email it to the organisers.  There is a whole host of free workshops on offer, but participants are encouraged to bring something (or offer a service) in exchange for attendance.

Events which still have to take place are as follows (info lifted from the Spaceship Earth project on the Beaconsfield website).  I'm wondering about attending the vegan chocolate one on Sunday!

Thursday 1 July 6-8 pm
Creative Writing Workshop with Sarah Butler
Saturday 3 July 2-4 pm
Immigration Law for Sale? with Barry O’Leary and Tim Barnden
Sunday 4 July 2-4 pm
Raw Chocolate Demo with Laura Coxeter
Tuesday 6 - Thursday 8 July 11-5 pm
Eco-Build: Rammed Earth with Mark Pavey and friends
Friday 9 - Sunday 11 July 11-5 pm
Eco-Build: Living Roof with Mark Pavey and friends


On a related note, there is an interesting project that seems to be taking place within SE11 at the Bowling Green Street pub (yup, the one that was meant to be turned into housing, but got turned down by Lambeth Council).  Some of the people currently based(?) there are advocating the possibility of living a carbon negative lifestyle, in which communities learn to be self-sufficient.  The group advocate the change of planning laws to enable the building of Eco-villages (I'm unclear about how this would work in densely populated Lambeth) and also put forward some ideas about how to improve the quality of soil (and thus increase its capacity for food growth) through a method called Biochar.  I'm afraid it's all rather unwieldy to go into here, but they have a GrowUp website that provides further info.  Apparently, they're willing to explain it all in the form of an exhibition, where films and music will illustrate what they're talking about, and it's on every Thursday.   Might be worth checking their website first as it looks a little adhoc.

Finally, on a more practical note, Lambeth Council are embarking on a bid to the London Waste and Recycling Foundation.  They need some ideas and proposals for various projects to run locally.  If successful, I think they'd be allotted some money to encourage additional recycling on Lambeth council housing estates.  I believe we discussed this matter here about a year ago, when one commentator wrote insightfully that he thought residents on local estates would be encouraged to recycle more effectively were better signage provided on the recycling bins.  I wonder whether, with many residents not having English as a first language, some investment should go into providing literature in a number of different languages.  Unfortunately... the one type of project that this particular bid does not support is that which relates to communications, "this includes doorstepping, leafleting, community outreach, literature", which leaves the Council requesting proposals for:


* Small-scale composting
* New or improved bin chambers
* Dropped kerbs that will enable the recycling provision to be increased or improved
* Incentive schemes
* Chute conversions (to recycling, where there are two chutes side by side)


Do readers have any ideas along these lines for local estates in the area?  Do you live on or have friends who live on local estates that might benefit from these types of changes?  I'm not entirely sure how I've come to be consulted on such matters, but I'm really impressed by Lambeth Council's recycling commitment, so I think it's well worth giving them input where possible.

Kennington hero arrests drug dealer, US Embassy info. and art/photography (general update)

The top story this morning concerns a local chap, Charlie Skinner, who contacted the police to inform them about a local drug dealer who'd moved in next door.  Instead of keeping a log, as the police advised, he bravely(?) posed as a drug dealer, entered the flat next door, fought of two of the drug dealers' "henchmen" and performed a citizens' arrest, putting the drug-dealer in a headlock until the police arrived.  Unsurprisingly, police found crystal meth (a popular drug in Vauxhall) in the flat  (This all took place on March 13th, so it perhaps has escaped Daily Mail coverage on account of the impending court case.)  The drug dealer was jailed for six years on Monday.  Various Tweeters have been asking "where" in Kennington this took place.  My best guess is that it was somewhere close to Kennington Park, but I'd rather not say more on account of the family's safety.  I really can't decide whether the chap in question was very brave, or somewhat mad, but he achieved the desired effect somewhat more quickly than the "keep a log" suggestions from the police.  Only, umm, don't try this at home, unless you're a "south London boy" who can "look after yourself" or you might y'know, be stabbed or shot or something!  There's an additional report in The Evening Standard.

The US State department showed off plans for their embassy in Battersea to a crowd of US architects late last week.  There's an excellent article about it here.  What hasn't been noted prior to now is that the State Department were tasked with finding the "smallest site, that met our needs, that we could afford."  Shows that they must really love the idea of being based in Vauxhall, eh? :)  Apparently, the building is designed to show off the three American virtues of transparency, openness and equality, except that, erm, it has to be utterly impenetrable.  Difficult to do, unless you're allowed to build your own moat, I suppose!  What's not clear, when they speak about "public realm" and the park outside the building is whether they mean "Vauxhall public" or "the American public that happen to work inside the building".  I like the idea of a new park over there, but not sure I want to be relaxing with friends under the watchful eye of the machine-gun toting police.

If you're interested in art, there's an exhibition by Lisa Yuskavage in the Greengrassi/Corvi Mori art gallery (1a Kempsford Road, SE11) which feature slightly odd images of the female form/psyche with a better review here.  Additionally, the Camera Club in Bowden Street are digging Politicians from the 1970s out of their archives (7th June - 25th June).  More info about the exhibition is on the Kennington Association blog.