Creating Balance Project from London to Winchester
For the past year I have busy working on The Creating Balance Project. The project follows on from the Creative Portsmouth book again promoting the city but this time collaborating with Anglepoise® and 20 creative practitioners in Portsmouth.
This is a collaboration between business, education and the creative community in Portsmouth. The University of Portsmouth worked with Anglepoise® and community group Strong Island. The exhibition was launched in London as part of the London Design Festival. The exhibition consisted of 10 final photos taken by the photographers, all ten of the collaboration films made by BSC Television and Broadcast students Massimo Marzullo and Jonas Jakunas and the different modified and customised lamps. The project was selected to be part of the Icon Design Trail 2013 by Icon Magazine. The launch night was busy with not only the people involved in the project but also the general public from London and Portsmouth. Photographer Russell Squires had a lot of fun engaging with shoppers on Carnaby Street with a giant Anglepoise® lamp with a camera flash hidden in it. The exhibition was very successful at Speakeasy and over the 3 week period over 17,000 people viewed it. Very positive feedback and an invite to go back again next year with another project . .
Further details on the website at http://www.creatingbalanceproject.co.uk
The exhibition was featured soon after the opening in different places including the highly respected and independent Creative Boom website and it was even featured on the front page of the Financial Times supplement as the header image for their article of the London Design Festival highlights.
As part of the London Design Festival programme Creating Balance was invited to speak at the Victoria and Albert Museum. The talk focused on how the project as a whole could work as a template for future projects that focus on collaboration between artists and organisations in different sectors. Presenters at the talk included Simon Terry from Anglepoise®, Claire Sambrook and student Jack Daly from The University of Portsmouth, Paul Gonella from Strong Island and one of the other participants photographer Rob Luckins.
The exhibition opened last week in Pitfield Pop-Up, Winchester and will be there until December 7th. It will then open in aspex, Portsmouth on 10th January until 16th February 2014.
Links:
http://us1.campaign-archive2.com/?u=a639a1f500b416ec1eaf7f1e3&id=8373bee50b&e=b836cd7d4b
http://coffeesmiths.co.uk/2013/08/creating-balance/
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/6c7cff18-0f33-11e3-ae66-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2gUuuF6Z4
http://www.cottoncandyweddings.co.uk/exhibitions/london-design-festival-exhibition/
http://creativeboom.co.uk/inspiration/anglepoise-lamp-project-shines-spotlight-on-city-creativity/
http://www.carnaby.co.uk/news/news_item.cfm?id=385
http://www.port.ac.uk/uopnews/2013/09/13/anglepoise-lamp-project-shines-spotlight-on-city-creativity/
http://www.aspex.org.uk/blog/creating-balance-coming-here-in-2014/
http://www.strong-island.co.uk/2013/09/17/the-creating-balance-london-exhibition-opening-night/
http://www.sadietierney.co.uk/blog/?p=748
http://www.vam.ac.uk/whatson/event/2723/the-creating-balance-project-a-template-for-local-creative-co-4075/
http://www.archiproducts.com/en/news/34744/the-creating-balance-project-showcase-at-london-design-festival.html
http://ilovedust.com/blog/anglepoise-creating-balance
http://www.londondesignfestival.com/events/creating-balance-project
https://www.facebook.com/events/531721943566571/
http://furniture-magazine.com/furnitureindustrynews.asp?newsid=6651&heading=Anglepoise+at+London+Design+Festival+
https://www.anglepoise.com/blog/2013/11/the-creating-balance-exhibition-opened-today-at-pitfield-popup-in-winchester
https://www.anglepoise.com/blog/2013/09/the-bigfriendlygiants-hit-carnaby-street
https://www.anglepoise.com/blog/2013/09/the-creating-balance-project
The Future Positive – Creative Portsmouth Book
A wonderful group of curators at The Future Positive will be giving away a free copy of the book in the next few days.
Please add them on Twitter to be in with a chance.
“Future Positive was born out of love for people doing creative and innovative things. At the heart of each of our projects are creative individuals who went against the tide of conformity and followed their instinct to try something different. We want to explore creative projects, businesses and entrepreneurs who have gone their own ways, and discover how – and why – they did it. At a time when taking risks is not common practice, there are lessons to be learnt from all our subjects. We want to showcase some of the most ambitious and innovative ideas out there, and hope they will inspire others to start their own projects. ” The Future Positive team
Free copy of Creative Portsmouth at Southsea Coffee
You can now pick up a copy of the Creative Portsmouth book for free at Southsea Coffee.
Southsea Coffee has recently opened and is one of the best coffee places to open for a while in the city. They know and care so much about their coffee.
Strong Island
Visit Strong Island to keep up to date with all that is happening in Creative Portsmouth.
Beautiful Portsmouth website
Beautiful Portsmouth – A collaboration between Deer Park Alpha and Claire Sambrook at The University of Portsmouth. A website to showcase work by local photographers that feature the city in their work.
http://www.beautiful-portsmouth.co.uk/
Iconic Creative Portsmouth Souvenirs
Following on from the Creative Portsmouth book Deer Park Alpha and The University of Portsmouth are making Iconic Portsmouth Souvenirs to be made into necklaces and charm bracelets. These ‘Made in Portsmouth’ souvenirs will be sold in shops around Portsmouth.
These are currently under development and will be launched soon.
More books now in aspex, Gunwharf
This morning I dropped off some more book at aspex in Gunwharf, Portsmouth. Thanks again for all of the support.
Blackwell’s Bookshop Portsmouth
More copies of the book have now been placed in Blackwell’s Academic Bookshop, Cambridge Road, Portsmouth. They have also been supplied with some limited edition screen prints of the poster for sale.
Copies of the book have been selling well. Limited numbers left. Get them while you can.
BBC Politics Show & Digital Arts Magazine
More PR for the book this week. I was interviewed about Creative Portsmouth by BBC South for the Politics Show to be shown on BBC 1 12 noon Sunday 15th May. They also filmed at aspex, Flo & Stan’s and Southsea Gallery on Albert Road and The Round Tower, Old Portsmouth.
Read the BBC Hampshire news story here – http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-13399125
The book was also featured in June’s edition of Digital Arts magazine which came out this week.
It is great to see the book getting such attention and also great for the creatives featured and the city. Thanks again for the support of The University of Portsmouth, I Love Dust and Portsmouth City Council.
Creative Portsmouth Book in Frankfurt
My good friend J Haeske took his copy of the book back home to Frankfurt, Germany and sent in some pics. So good to see the book out and about. Send in more images of your book. Where do you keep yours?
Creative Portsmouth 