So, Debased happened, a beautifully intense show….

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sw_biggoldleaf4Well that was a beautifully intense four or five days. Emma Harvey and I have been doing this Cultivate gallery thing for over five years now, we put on over 150 shows, evens and such, we’ve shown the art of well over a thousand artists, it has been almost defiant, it has been exciting, the art of sharing,  making things happen, taking over spaces and bring them to live. Last weekend we put on a Cultivate group show called Debased over at BSMT Space in Dalston, London N16.  There’s a great big article over on the Organ pages, a review packed with thought, word, image and to some extent frustration. I thought it was a very special show, intense, emotional, rewarding, very hard work…. Anyway, please do read about it and explore it all over on the Organ pages. There’s some images of the work I showed further down the page here, the art of the other artists we invited and the performances of Amy Kingsmill and Marnie Scarlet are over on the Organ pages along with the trumpet blowing and… and well thank you everyone, thanks to all who came, all who took part and all who followed the events on line and such. .

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Click on an image to enlarge or to run the slide show…

head over to the Organ page for the art of the others involved

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Fresh growth up on the white wall

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Up on the white wall today.  A piece can be found outside on the white wall on most days when I’m here working in the studio.  Today a canvas last shown in a show back in January came out in to the sunshine and evolved once more, it came out and new layers grew on it, fresh growth, new leaves on a canvas (120cm x 110cm)

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43 films, 43 43 second films, 43 second observations…

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sw_43film_sept4In this year of things in multiples of 43, a series of 43 second films made via the medium of mobile phone and the instant gratification that is Instagram is currently emerging. I’m a late adopter, don’t really do technology, mobile phones, I am enjoying the instant 43 seconds of observed documentation that the Instagram platform allows. The 43 Seconds are not for anything else other than the platform that is Instagram, you can view the nineteen that have been made so far here, the small pieces of 43 second observation are best viewed via mobile phone on that 7cm screen.  The sound of a gallery opening, 43 seconds on a London bus, walking through the people Ridley Road Market over in Dalston, London N16, a canal boat passing…43 second pieces, paintings, observations, as much about the sound as the visuals.

Meanwhile expect 43 £1 pieces painted on recycled cardboard picked up off the street at the Debased show this Thursday evening, if cardboard is thrown out then leaves and such are going to grow on it….  Follow the Instagram thing here, images of paintings and such are going up there daily now that I have finally adopted it…

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A gathering of some recent growth, fresh pieces, new layers, leaves, thorns, things growing…

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debased_sept2016A gathering of some recent growth, fresh pieces, new layers, leaves, thorns, things growing in found frames, some recent art drops, and such …

And so, next Thursday 22nd September, the Cultivate long weekend takeover over at BSMT Space (Dalston, London N16) starts, a show once again curated by myself and Emma Harvey, more mixing up of things

.  “This is about taking art and artists out of those comfortable little boxes that the London art scene appears to need, mixing things up, messing with the rules – a wallpaper printer (currently hanging in the V&A), alongside a street artist currently painting East London walls, a London dress-maker currently raging against London Fashion week, a contemporary painter currently exploring the view found through a circle, a performance artist freshly returned from her LA performance next to a pro-active artist still questioning the destruction of the mining communities”…Expect lots more information about the artists and the show to appear over on the Cultivate blog pages in the next few days as we lead in to the show

Click on an image to enlarge or run the slide show….

Someone bought a a new 32″ flatscreen television, meanwhile in the US Midwest…

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Some fresh leafy growth in an unwanted frame thrown out. If a frame is left on the street then leaves will grow like these ones have grown on this piece of red and white cardboard box that was once packaging for a new 32″ flatscreen television and was then thrown into a Hackney skip (next to the recycling skip) The piece is 75cm x60cm including the all important found battle-scared  frame that is very much part of the piece rather than just framing the piece 9and as with everything on the streets of London, aThisOne sticker turned up on it)

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I do like it when one of the artdrop pieces turns up half way around the globe. Can’t remember where in London I left this one, there has been a lot of them this year. “Street art from London, on our Midwest American back porch. No, really! You’re supposed to take it! artdrop” said the person who posted the photo of the piece on instagram earlier this week (thanks for posting, the photos on social media are part of it)

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ORGAN THING: Gob on you ’cause you talk about art…

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Over on the Organ pages I write about art, music, art shows, other painters, gigs, albums, we write about art, music, underculture.  A page goes up every day on the Organ website every single day, well almost, a thing of a day. Today’s Organ Thing of the Day was a bit of a reaction to a gallery who, instead of being pleased about a rather positive review written about a show, chose to moan about how the review hadn’t been written in the accepted academically correct art school manner. There are rules about these kind of things you know, we can’t have just anyone writing about art you know! For those of you who don’t tune in for a daily dose of Organ, I thought we’d repost the piece here…  And so here it is, today’s Organ thing of the day…..

ORGAN THING: Gob on you ’cause you talk about art…

#43ArtDrop, Hackney Wick, July 2016

Art excites me, sharing news of where the art is to be found seems like a rather positive exciting thing to do, talking about art, writing about art, it excites me, posting up words, photos that hint at things to be found on the actual gallery walls should you choose to go actually experience it for yourself, gt t othat gallery, art is exciting! Posting links to galleries where the shows are happening, writing about art, sharing art, writing bout artists, art is exciting, art excites me,.

displace_opening42Art excites me enough to want to write about it, to erect signposts pointing the way to the energy of a rewarding painter that excite me, to bands that really matter. Art excites me, a really good gig excites me, going to see an in-your-face band gets me excited. An exciting art show thrills me, a new painting up on a street wall excites me, a new album (or a these days a new track on a soundcloud page) excites me (okay, maybe not so much whe nit comes to a soundcloud post). Going to galleries excites me, almost addictive, when’s the next one? Art excites me, that’s why I do all this, this is why Organ has carried on (in one fractured form or another) for far (far) too long now.

Not for one tiny moment is the suggestion here that we should dumb art or the coverage of art down, to suggest that is to insult the art, the artist and most of all the audience.

What doesn’t excite me is academic bullshit and all the dancing around architecture that comes with the coverage art, the intellectual elitism and…. FURTHER READING

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Last Sunday we went to the dogs…..

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aaa_cultevolved_dogs2016v2We were invited, by the good people of All Dogs Matter, to take part in the Victoria Park Dog Show again this year and once again we had a great time.   We started working with the excellent All Dogs Matter charity at the 2015 Art Car Boot Fair.  The 2015 Art Car Boot Fair theme was dogs, something that has been taking up quite a slice of Emma Harvey’s life since she rescued a rather distressed dog.

We invited All Dogs Matter to join us at the 2015 Brick Lane Art Car Boot fair and in turn they invited us to come join in their 2015 dog show in Victoria Park, East London.  We had a brilliant day dog watching, playing dog biscuit roulette, painting dogs, selling art and raising funds for All Dogs Matter.

One year on and we’ve just done it all again. . “The dog show in the park yesterday was good in so many ways. Healthy to take art outside of the gallery comfort zone or beyond those actively going out to engage with art on the street or at an art event. The dog show was fun to be part of, it was fun to support but it was also about engaging, about meeting people who didn’t have art on their minds (hard to believe there are such people). True, street art engages outside of a gallery, but you don’t engage with the actual artist in terms of conversation unless you know him or her. Last Sunday was about being outside the comfort zone and about engaging conversations (it was also lots of fun with dogs and their people). Next we head for that Dalston Basement and a gallery space…”