The Drawing Exchanges Festival
24 April – 04 May 2009
Spike Island, Gallery 2 & other venues
Kayle Brandon and Lady Lucy present: The Drawing Exchanges Festival with Alice Forward, Anna Lucas, Andrew Mania, Aaron Sewards, Aviv Kruglansk & Vahida Ramujkic, Brian Dawn Chalkley, Emma Bush & Pete Harrison, Goodiepal, Heath Bunting, Laura Oldfield Ford, Lady Stubbs, Marcia Farquhar, Patricia Jordan and Rebecca Swindell Daniel Rush.
Artists Kayle Brandon (Bristol) and Lady Lucy (London) have been collaborating for three years on ‘The Drawing Exchange’, a social platform for drawing-led events. The Drawing Exchange sets up situations where the amateur and the expert, the drawn and the drawer, a night out down the pub and a traditional drawing class, merge and loose their distinction. Exchanges take place in public locations with each event having its own subject and series of experimental drawing exercises. The events encourage both individual and collective activity with drawings swapped and exchanged at the end of each session.
This on-going project has expanded in 2009 to become The Drawing Exchanges Festival which will manifest from 24 April – 04 May as a series of events across arts institutions – Spike Island, Animate Projects with Picture This, Arnolfini, Museum, Station, the Cube cinema and public spaces – Leigh Woods, Clifton Suspension Bridge, Renatos, Stokes Croft and more.
Anyone may participate: none of the events require any specific drawing ability nor are they conventional drawing lessons. Instead The Drawing Exchanges Festival manifests as celebratory, wayward, imaginative, challenging and experimental drawing experiences.
To date Kayle Brandon and Lady Lucy have invited eighteen artists from an eclectic range of arts practices to respond to The Drawing Exchange format. Examples of Exchanges confirmed to date include: Network artist and Irationalist Heath Bunting presents his project Day Planner; Goodiepal, the infamous electronic musician, hacker and philosopher from the Faroe Islands will invite you to collaborate on a ‘school book’ composition project to make music channeling non human life forms.; Patricia Jordan will work with a still life from her own personal taxidermy collection; Andrew Mania invites you to a Drawing Feast; Laura Oldfield Ford will take you on an Urban Drift; Vahida Ramujkic and Aviv Kruglanski will embroiderer on the streets of Stokes Croft.
The Drawing Exchanges Festival will end with The Grand Finale Drawing Exchange where all drawings produced will be viewed and then swapped, bought or bartered. This free event with live music will take place at Spike Island, Gallery 2 on Monday 04 May as part of the annual Spike Island Open Studios (Fri May 01- Mon 04). Spike Island is the main hub and sponsor for The Drawing Exchanges Festival.
For information on previous past Drawing Exchange Events and future plans please see:
http://www.irational.org/drawing_exchange and
http://www.myspace.com/drawingexchange
Full Programme to be posted on-line by end of March.
To find out more about The Drawing Exchanges Festival, please e-mail: drawing_exchange@irational.org
Spike Island http://www.spikeisland.org.uk