Three arty things in August 2026

                                                  

Three arty things in August 2026

Now that the flurry of Open Studios is over, what else can we see and do? Here is a little selection.

Eyes On Summer Exhibition. Fitzroy Street.

The organisers say: "Opening night is Friday 7th August - 7pm - 10pm, and is free and open to all that can make it.

The exhibition, featuring 24 artists and over 100 individual artworks, will be open Saturday 8th until Sunday 16th of August - 10am - 6pm - 12-14 Fitzroy Street CB1 1EW (the former Argos space near the Grafton Centre)."

Will be intriguing to see how the old Grafton Centre space is shaping up as an art venue.

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Ten Good Years. Heong Gallery.

The organisers say: "Ten Good Years celebrates the gallery’s anniversary by paying homage to its inaugural exhibition Generatiob Painting 1955-65: British Art from the Collectino of Sir Alan Bowness. It also features works by new artists working in Britain today, incl. Lubaina Himid. Until 11 Oct. 2026. Free.

Image © Jo Underhill. Linked from https://structuraleye.co.uk/ten-good-years

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Frank Bowling: Seeking the Sublime. Fitzwilliam Museum.

The organisers say: "Experience the dynamic paint, vivid colour, and bold vision of contemporary British painter Frank Bowling. Celebrating a career lasting nearly seven decades, our exciting display brings together a lifetime of the artist’s work." Until 17 Jan. 2027. Free.

Image linked from https://fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/plan-your-visit/exhibitions/frank-bowling-seeking-the-sublime

© 2026

Three arty things in May 2024: Politics, giraffes and Cambridge's tiniest gallery

  

Three arty things in May 2024

Local Syrian artist Issam Kourbaj at Kettle's Yard and the Heong Gallery. Ends 26 May 2024. Mind-challenging, conceptual, political. 

Linked from Kettle's Yard.

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Giraffes. They call themselves a 'sculpture trail'. But are they really, though?  They are a charity event, and on the 19 June you can bid for them, and before that, donate money.  Every now and again, these  animals appear; a few years ago, it was cows, and I've seen dinosaurs in Norwich. The animals are manufactured by 'Wild in Art', 'leading producers of spectacular, mass-appeal public art events' (source). The sculptures are made of 'lightweight, fire resistant fibreglass', finished with a white primer and ready to paint by local artists (source). So each CB giraffe is an identical mass-produced 3-D object that is then individually painted by a raft of artists. So the art really consists in a painting trail, not a sculpture trail as such.  Although why can figures mass-produced by a company not be called 'sculpture'?  Food for thought.

In the meantime, there are some more or less jolly giraffes hanging around in expected and unexpected places but, I have to say, giraffes don't really have much local resonance as creatures. At least the cows of a few years back had local live counterparts.

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There's always something exciting or sweet or intriguing at the unusual and tiny Bird Box Gallery in St Thomas' Square.  In March it was Alistair Burgass's carved and painted sculpture. What will it be in May?

Source: Bird Box Instagram

© 2024

Issam Kourbaj at the Heong Gallery

 Issam Kourbaj's sad little ships

Today I saw many little ships in the Heong Gallery. Their hulls are made of bent and crushed bicycle wheelrims (Felgen, in German). Each holds a bunch of bunt matches: people. Refugees. Voyaging along the raised floor of the gallery towards the light of the window and the unbelievable green sward behind it with Barbara Hepworth's serene sculpture among the vegetation.

Issa Kourbaj is a long-time resident of Cambridge who makes art about Syria, war and displaced humans. The ships reminded me of the floating boats of Hew Locke's installation at the magnificent Entangled Pasts exhibition in London (Royal Academy). Boats that carry people who don't want to be carried. Boats that hold at the same time as they condemn.

 

Three things to see in London in April 2024

 

Three things to see in London in April 2024

The Time Is Always Now: Artists Reframe the Black Figure. National Portrait Gallery. Ends 19 May 2024.

Curated by Ekow Eshun, who curated the fabulos The Black Fantastic exhibition at the Hayward Gallery in 2023. I so look forward to this one.

Photo linked from NPG. © National Portrait Gallery, London.

Unravel. Ends 26 May 2024. The Barbican.

Really looking forward to this textile show. 

Photo linked from the Barbican.

Entangled Pasts, 1768-Now. Ends 28 April 2024. Royal Academy.

I saw this two weeks ago and it still resonates.  One of the most amazing shows the Royal Academy has ever put on. 

Photo linked from the RA.

The End.

What's on (Spring 2024)

 

April 2024: Three shows I want to see in Cambridge this month

 Tensions of belonging  Fitzwilliam Museum. Tues-Sun. (free) 

Local people collaborating in displays: sounds intriguing.

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The Goddess, the Deity and the Cyborg. The New Hall Women's Art Collection, Murray Edwards College. Mon-Sun 10-6. Free. Ends 8 Sept. 2024.

Remember the 1970s and goddess feminism? 

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The Cambridge Drawing Society at the AKA Contemporary Spring Group Exhibition.

 AKA Contemporary. 54a Cherry Hinton Road (formerly Eddie's Barber Shop). Wed-Sat 12

I still have not got around to visit this newcomer to the CB art scene.

© 3.4.2024

What's on (Spring 2023)

  

What art to see in Cambridge this month:  My picks

(March 2023 and beyond)

Islanders: The Making of the Mediterranean  Fitzwilliam Museum. Tues-Sun. (free) Ends 4 June 2023.

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Picturing the Invisible: Earthquake, Meltdown, Memory. Heong Gallery, Downing College. Wed-Sun 12-5 (free). Ends 23 April 2023.

Organised in memory of the Great East Japan earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster of 2011.

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Lucie Rie: The Adventure of Pottery. Kettle's Yard Gallery. Tues-Sun 11-5. Ends 25 June 2023. Free.

This one hits home hard for me as my mother before she got dementia was a fantastic potter and greatly inspired by Lucie Rie.

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Radium Dreams. The New Hall Women's Art Collection, Murray Edwards College. Mon-Sun 10-6. Free. Ends 3 Sept. 2023.

A collaboration of poet Sue Hubbard and artist Eileen Cooper RA, inspired by Nobel laureate Marie Curie.

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Cambridge Drawing Society: Spring Exhibition. Pitt Building, Trumpington Street. Free. 25 March - 1 April 2023. Sat-Sun 10-4.

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Bijou British Modern Exhibition and Spring Forward Group Show. AKA Contemporary. 54a Cherry Hinton Road (formerly Eddie's Barber Shop). Wed-Sat 12-15. 24 March - 22 April 2023.

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Plan ahead: June 2023

Cambridge School of Art, Fine Art Degree Show. 17/18 June 2023. 5pm. Anglia Ruskin University, Mackenzie Road entrance. Free.

 

Enjoy!

March 2023, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire

The three best shows of autumn 2021

 

What art to see in Cambridge this month:  My picks

(October 2021)

Sutapa Biswas at Kettle's Yard.  Wed-Sun 11-5. (free)

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Shahzia Sikander at Jesus College. Mon-Sun 10-6. (free)

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Magdalene Odundo at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Tues-Sat 10-5, Sun 12-5.  Online booking required (free).

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Bonus:

Gold of the Great Steppe at the Fitz. Online booking required (free).

Enjoy!

October 2021, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire

Five Arty Things in April: What's on in Cambridge

After a hiatus: the return of the 'What's On' post!

Here's my personal pick of five arty things to do in Cambridge in April:

1.  Hide and Seek: Looking for Children in the Past
MAA (Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology)

I love the MAA.  In 2013, it was shortlisted in the final top ten for the Art Fund Prize of Museum of the Year.  In December, one of their curators won an award to build a collection of contemporary art works from indigenous communities in India (we wait for this exhibition with excitement; it will open in 2017).  And it is all round a fabulous place.

I look forward to seeing this exhibition.  It is free.  Opening times on the poster below.

2.  Generation Painting: British art 1955-1965
Heong Gallery, Downing College (just past the Porter's Lodge, to the left as you enter from Regent St)

The newest addition to Cambridge's art scene, and the only truly modernist and contemporary art gallery in town right now (while Kettle's Yard remains closed for refurbishing).  The present exhibition is brilliant and includes a wonderful painting by David Hockney.  The architecture and the setting are also really worth experiencing.  

Opening times:
Wednesdays: 10 – 8 pm
Weekends and bank holidays: 10 - 6 pm
It is free.
Ends 22 May 2016.

Coming up next: Ai Wei Wei!  Quentin Blake!

Follow the gallery on twitter:  @heonggallery

Watch out for my blog post on the gallery; it will soon appear here:  
http://artincambridge.blogspot.com/2016/03/british-painting-at-new-heong-gallery.html

3. New Hall Art Collection: Feminism and Gender
Murray Edwards College (the college formerly known as New Hall, up on Castle Hill)

My favourite art collection in Cambridge so of course I will include it in my first What's On post in months.  I've blogged about this collection several times before.

It's free, it's amazing, and it's open nearly all the time.

Alexis Hunter, Fear of the Intellectual Wife, 1987; source:  NHAC

4.  Conflicted Seeds + Spirit
The new David Attenborough Building, New Museums Site (accessible via Downing Street and via Corn Exchange Street which is that weird street behind the Grand Arcade with entrances to the car park and to the cycle park)

An installation by the artist duo Heather Ackroyd and Dan Harvey.  I look forward to seeing this, and (bonus!) to sneaking a peak at the brand new David Attenborough Building which is the old Arup Building, refurbished by architect bureau Nicholas Hare.


Opening times:  Wed–Sun, 10am–5pm
Ends 17 April 2016.

Source:  © Ackroyd & Harvey

5.  Crawling with Life:  Flower Drawings at the Fitz

Watch out for my review of this exquisite exhibition; it'll be posted next week!

Fitzwilliam Museum; ends 8 May 2016.

Enjoy your April!

What's on in London art: April-May 2016

My three picks.  What I want to visit:

© VAM

1.  Botticelli Reimagined
Has Pre-Raphaelites, Nazarenes, Andy Warhol, Cindy Sherman, and, most importantly, 56 Botticelli pictures.  How wonderful!  A friend told me: don't tarry near the Nazarenes; go straight to the Botticellis; you'll need the energy.  That's what I plan to do:  make a beeline past the epigones, indulge in Botticelli, and sample the PRB et al. for dessert.

Victoria & Albert Museum.
Ends 3 July 2016.

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© RMG

2.  Samuel Pepys:  Plague, Fire, Revolution
I don't know what to expect but I've not been to the Greenwich museum in decades; I loved it when I was last there.  Several friends are enthusiastic about this exhibition so I am positively inclined.

National Maritime Museum, Greenwich.
Ends 28 March 2016.  Last chance!

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© Whitechapel Gallery

3.  Harun Farocki: Parallel I-IV

I saw some of Farocki's video installations in Berlin 2 years ago.  They are absolutely amazing.  Some years ago I saw Harun Farocki's brilliant video installation at the Documenta in Kassel in Germany.  You may at first be confused but it will grow on you and after a while, its power and meaning creeps up on you, and you will be mesmerised.  It's film; it's emotional; it's political; it's intelligent; it manipulates reality digitally; it looks at men's experiences in war and how soldiers are immersed in live and videogame violence and trauma.

Whitechapel Gallery.

Ends 15 May 2016.

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Plan ahead!

Georgia O'Keeffe at Tate Modern!  Starts 6 July 2016.

Mona Hatoum at Tate Modern!  Starts 4 May 2016.

Wifredo Lam (Cuba) at Tate Modern! Starts 14 Sept. 2016.

Beyond Caravaggio at the National Gallery!  Starts 12 Oct. 2016.

Turner Prize at Tate Britain!  Starts 27 Sept. 2016.

David Hockney, portraits and still-lifes at the Royal Academy!  Starts 2 July 2016.

Abstract Expressionism at the RA!  Starts 24 Sept. 2016.

Three London art shows in November

November 2015.  London exhibitions.  My top three picks:


•  Ai Wei Wei at the Royal Academy.
Ends 13 Dec 2015.

•  Artist & Empire at Tate Britain.
Starts 25 Nov.  Ends 10 April 2016.

George Stubbs, Cheetah, Stag and Two Indians, 1770-80, Manchester Art Gallery

•  Lee Miller: A Woman's War, at the Imperial War Museum.
Ends 24 April 2016.

© Lee Miller Archives

Enjoy!