Markeaton Street Gallery at the University of Derby, Markeaton Street site opens five unique exhibitions on Friday 17 March from 6pm-8pm.
Alongisde the exhibitions there will be a performance by Gemma Marmalade at 6.30pm followed by speeches.
Complimentary refreshments are provided on arrival plus subsidised food and drink trucks for guests.
Featured Exhibitions:
How love lives in two places is a multi- and trans-disciplinary exhibition of over thirty artists describing the experimental boundaries of both photography and place. With a title extracted from the poetry of Clark County’s Poet Laureate, Angela M. Brommel, How love lives in two places is a visual dialogue between Derby, UK and Las Vegas, Nevada, USA. Students and faculty of the University of Derby School of Arts have worked together with their counterparts at Nevada State College Office for the Arts, alongside friendships made with seminal and emerging artists residing and working in the Las Vegas Valley. The partnership fostered between both institutions is supported by the generous patronage of James Stanford and Lynn Morris. Curated by Gemma Marmalade and Elisha-Mai Gascoigne.
UKraine Lives, by Philip M Harris, examines the personal impact on Ukrainians who fled their homeland for the United Kingdom. All Ukraine refugees have left their homes, loved ones, and their country behind with immense sense of uncertainty and uncertainty for its future. They have arrived in the UK having to learn a new language, find work, schools for children, care for family members, deal with the trials of English of bureaucracy, and get to know a new culture. They miss their homeland with such an acute sense of loss. The exhibition will include portraits of Ukrainians with fragments of their stories that tell of their experiences.
Hymn for Ukraine: Siren Song by Philip M Harris is a restaging of large-scale cine/sound installation staged in March 2022 as a sonic vigil to state support and solidarity with Ukraine and Ukrainians in the face of the catastrophic invasion by Russian forces. The installation employs multiple 16mm film projectors, electric guitars, and amplifiers. Each guitar is tuned to a chord from the Ukrainian National Anthem. Long loops of cine film are threaded between the strings of each guitar, playing each chord as the projectors constantly cycled the loops of film. The film footage is of Ukrainians singing their anthem, alongside images of blossom filling the venue with visual metaphors for hope, resilience, and rebirth accompanying the chords of their National Anthem.
We are Nothing Without Stories presents a selection of just some of the visual research being undertaken in the School of Arts at the University of Derby. The scope is broad, with highly diverse and innovative applications of photographic media, whilst each body of work presents a refined and intense creative focus on vital themes within the wider world. What is consistent among the work is that the narratives of living are explored with this wonderfully flexible and mutable thing we call photography. Curated by Philip M Harris.
FORMAT OPEN Call featuring work from selected artists Ngadi Smart, Claudia Amatruda, Yzza Slaoui, Maryam Wahid, Phillipa Klaiber & Michael Swann, Crystal Bennes, Philippe Braquenier & David De Beyter, M’hammed Kilito and Sheung Yiu.
FREE entry. All welcome.
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