Adults Archives - Void Derry | Contemporary Art Derry

Garden Like an Artist, a workshop and presentation with Pamela Whitaker

Saturday 30th August, 11am – Midday, Void Art Centre

To attend please register here.

Join Void’s researcher in residence, Pamela Whitaker, for the final event as part of her residency with us! Garden Like an Artist is a call to cultivate nature like an artist both at home and within your locality. The presentation will feature artists who garden with living art materials. It will explore topics such as the de-colonisation of gardening, gardening out loud, climate change gardening and gardening without a rule book.

The presentation will be followed by a visit to a streetscape garden created by Pamela along the Quays and there will be an opportunity to receive some seeds for autumn planting. Everyone is welcome to share their stories of gardening as creatives making nature happen.

This is a free event and open to all. To attend please register here.

For more information please contact: hello@derryvoid.com

Pamela Whitaker

Pamela is an art therapy lecturer at the Belfast School of Art. She is also an artist researcher with the Creative Ireland Urban Food Sanctuary project in County Louth. She supports people to garden as artists making nature at home and in their localities.

Pamela’s Void residency proposal encourages the cultivation of home gardens, gardening in neighbourhoods and public homeplaces (such as parks) as artistic endeavours. She is keen to work with local people on these topics and also explore climate change gardening, companion gardening, and the art of home gardening. Pamela invites members of the public to contact her to discuss the project further at p.whitaker@ulster.ac.uk.

Her research residency aligns with Void’s civic engagement ambitions as well as Ulster University’s People, Place and Partnership strategy to promote the co-production of knowledge and projects to enhance civic life. The art of gardening encourages positive mental health and can be a vital act of making that creates both nature and pride of place. Pamela plans to link the research residency to learning and teaching at Belfast School of Art and to co-design opportunities for public engagement at Void Art Centre and within local neighbourhoods. The overall goal of the residency is supporting people to enhance their surroundings with the art of gardening that provides a resource for environmental activism and artistry.

Man with long white hair stands with his arms raised above his head. He in in a large room with blue walls and a colourful image on the wall behind him. There are vitrines on the ground with dark objects inside.

Silver Tongued Deviance

Silver Tongued Deviance is an open mic platform event hosted by spoken word artist Frank Rafferty at Void Art Centre.

During these sessions, spoken word performers/singers/(acoustic) musicians are invited to come along and perform; they may choose any pieces of work from their repertoire, they can create something new which connects to themes in Void’s current exhibition, or they can perform something else entirely which simply resonates with them.

The viewing public are invited to simply attend and enjoy! There is no requirement to perform at these events. If you wish to take part, just come along, no need to book in advance.

Refreshments are also provided; visitors are invited to enjoy a glass of wine, a beer, or some tea or coffee.

Silver Tongued Deviance is a collaboration with Frank Rafferty.

White wall with small placard in black and white of a protest and the corner of a large map in white, brown and blue

Eco-Protest Placard workshop with Mikhail Karikis and FUSE Arts

We’re excited to be working with FUSE Arts and artist Mikhail Karikis on a two-part workshop that further develops a work-in-progress featured in Mikhail’s exhibition ‘Acoustics of Resistance’. The work-in-progress and workshop looks into the impact of climate change on rising sea levels and how this will change our geographical surroundings.

In the workshop, we are going to work with the look and materials we often encounter in environmental protests here and globally. We will build on the idea of high visibility and stand-out forms that placards have in large-scale gatherings. Together, we will consider life related to the local river and sea, learning about water pollution specific to the area, as well as examining maps forecasting the transformation of the UK and Ireland as we reach 2050. We will then add to Mikhail’s exhibition, by making additional placards which will be added to the installation.

We will mark the end of the workshop with a short parade of placards on the Quay beside river Foyle.

ℹ️ If you have any access needs, please let us know by emailing cecelia@derryvoid.com.

The workshops and new work that we will create are supported by the Henry Moore Foundation.

~~~

Acoustics of Resistance is a multi-media project by Mikhail Karikis comprising of works that collectively tune into the sonorities of socio-political change and ecology. It rejoices in the transformative and healing powers of listening and sound-making while declaring that changing the course of climate change is in our hands and lies on humans learning the language of nature.

Please note that this is a two-part workshop, taking place on Wednesday 19th February 2025, 9.30am-2pm, and Monday 24th February, 9.30am-2pm. You must be available for both these dates and times to take part.

Void Art Centre is kindly supported by the Arts Council of Northern Ireland, Derry City and Strabane District Council, Future Screens NI, Garfield Weston Foundation, Halifax Foundation for Northern Ireland, the Henry Moore Foundation, Northbound Brewery and Ulster University.

Images: Acoustics of Resistance by Mikhail Karikis at Void Art Centre, 2024. By Simon Mills.

Woman standing in front of white wall with blue circular graphic behind. She looks down at something she is reading from and a woman is visible sitting looking towards her, her back visible to the viewer

Silver Tongued Deviance

Join us for Silver Tongued Deviance, an open mic platform event hosted by spoken word artist Frank Rafferty at Void Art Centre.

The viewing public are invited to simply attend and enjoy! There is no requirement to perform at these events. If you wish to take part, just come along, no need to book in advance.

Refreshments are also provided; visitors are invited to enjoy a glass of wine, a beer, or some tea or coffee.

Silver Tongued Deviance is a collaboration with Frank Rafferty.

Table with tartlets arranged on a plate and purple, green, red and yellow ingredients adorning them.

Living Table with Désirée Coral | Void Art Centre and Síolta Chroí

A project inviting people to share and discuss food, creating space for discussion, learning, cooking, eating and growing.

Living Table is a project that invites people to share and discuss food, creating opportunities for discussion, learning, cooking, eating, and growing through shared meals.

Living Table is inspired by the life that grows around a table: from the life of insects that pollinate crops to the cultural and political life made manifest in recipes, traditions, and dinner table habits, from microorganisms to human migration and looking at our ancestor’s heritage, the soil that we are, water, seeds, and more.

This workshop will be led by Désirée Coral, an Ecuadorian artist who received her Doctoral degree from Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design at the University of Dundee in Scotland in 2024, and her MFA degree from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2018.

Désirée was the Glasgow Seed Library’s 2022 first artist and researcher in residence at the Centre for Contemporary Arts (CCA), Glasgow. She was a resident at the Arts Cabinet as part of a research and publication consortium that included various academic European institutions in 2021.

From 2023-2024, she was granted an Artist-in-Residency for one year, where she developed the project Living Table at Forgan Arts Centre. She has recently exhibited at Tignous Centre pour les Arts, Montreuil, Paris. CCA Glasgow, Green Gallery Botanical Garden’s UOD. She has previously presented work at MOCAD Museum of Contemporary Arts Detroit, The Sullivan Galleries Chicago, Mana Contemporary Chicago, CAC Centro de Arte Contemporáneo de Quito, Museo Camilo Egas Quito, Alliance Française Quito, Exprimento Limon, Madrid among other national and international venues and collaborations.

Void Art Centre is kindly supported by the Arts Council of Northern Ireland, Derry City and Strabane District Council, Fluxus Art Projects, Foundation Foundation, Future Screens NI, Garfield Weston Foundation, Halifax Foundation for Northern Ireland, the Henry Moore Foundation, Northbound Brewery and Ulster University.

People sitting around a table with readings in their hands

Reading Group with V’cenza Cirefice

🌱 Reading Group: on extractivism and possible alternatives with V’cenza Cirefice

📅 Wednesday 18 September 2024, 5.30pm – 7.30pm

🗺️ Online via Zoom

Our reading groups are back 👋 Join us for an online reading group with V’cenza Cirefice, an artist, activist and academic who explores resistance to extracticisim within her work.

V’cenza will share a group of readings that explore the concept of extractivism, extractive logics and possible alternatives. We’ll approach this through a decolonial, post-extractivist and feminist perspective, and take a look at how extractivism plays out in the context of Ireland.

🔗 To register to join the reading group, check out the link in our bio above or at derryvoid.com/whats-on.

V’cenza Cirefice Biography

V’cenza Cirefice is an artist, activist and academic exploring resistance to extractivism. She is doing her PhD with communities in the Sperrins resisting gold mining and organises with CAIM (Communities Against the Injustice of Mining) an all island network of grassroots communities in Ireland. She’s also part of Making Relatives a collective of Water Protectors in Ireland and Turtle Island.

This reading group responds to themes in Void Art Centre’s current project Nyctalopia by Adrián Balseca, and is supported by Henry Moore Foundation and Arts Council Northern Ireland.

Image: A reading group with Yujin Lee as part of Void Art Centre’s symposium ‘To Feel Again’ in May 2024

Acknowledgements

Sculpture workshop with Rachael Campbell-Palmer

Facilitated by artist Rachael Campbell-Palmer this workshop will demonstrate how to cast a small object from a silicone mould using stone finish Jesmonite AC730 in charcoal.

The session will provide opportunity to gain hands-on experience in how to mix and pour Jesmonite, a micro-cement and an acrylic polymer liquid, that, when mixed, form a strong and versatile material.

Participants will engage directly with the materials, to cast their own charcoal composite artefact selected from a range of silicone moulds designed by the artist. Moulds are created from natural and synthetic objects collected from the shore and abandoned railway lines of the Lecale peninsula.

During the session there will also be opportunity to hear more about Rachael’s art practice, alongside a range of mould making and casting techniques, and properties of the different materials involved.

Each participant will come away with their own cast object. All materials will be provided and no previous experience is required.

About Rachael Campbell-Palmer

Rachael Campbell-Palmer’s practice addresses seriality and architecture. She works with concrete, plaster, Jesmonite and resin; materials that in production and exhibition, she situates between the industrial and the hand-crafted. Using traditional casting processes, the work explores the slippages of material surface, considering associations between physical space and cognitive experience, drawing connections between materiality, weight, the urban landscape, environmental and structural design.

Rachael graduated from the University of Ulster with an MFA in 2007 and is based in Belfast. In 2014 she completed a two-year directorship with Platform Arts studio collective and gallery.

Selected solo and group exhibitions include Propagate Catalyst Arts Belfast (2022), Irish Modernisms CCA, Derry (2021); Edgelands Framewerk, Belfast (2017); TULCA: The Headless City, Galway (2016) Methods for Egress QSS Gallery, Belfast (2016); Periodical Review #5 NCAD Gallery, Dublin (2015), Reassemble for Purpose Platform Arts, Belfast, (2015). Bath House Field Notes, Templemore Baths, Belfast (Dec 2015) TERRA FIRMA PS2, Belfast (2014). Debris (2022) a commission of hand cast sculptures for Uphold Art Belfast.

Rachael has also designed and delivered casting workshops for Flax Art Studios and the Ulster Folk Museum as part of their annual programmes.

Acknowledgements

Sound Workshop with Anne Marie Deacy

Void Art Centre are excited to welcome artist Anne Marie Deacy to Derry city for a weekend-long Sound Workshop on Saturday 31 August and Sunday 1 September, 12.30pm – 4.30pm

🔊

This workshop will act as an introduction to sound art, listening methodologies, field recording, sound walking and collective sound mapping as a response to themes mirrored in Void’s current exhibition Nyctalopia, by Adrián Balseca.

Using hearing as our sense and the theme of alternate perspectives, participants will work with sound to create a collective piece exploring other ways for us to connect with and navigate our surroundings using sound as a portal and a catalyst, fostering deeper understanding and other ways of perceiving the places and spaces we occupy. In addition, if you have a small object or crystal that resonates with you, bring it along as we will also touch on the sonic properties of objects.

This workshop requires no previous experience, it will be held in an informal, safe and open setting with breaks, reading resources and a sharing table for its duration.

The workshop also aims to be all inclusive, however considering it will be based on sound it will not be suitable for those with auditory sensitivity.

As weather is unpredictable please dress for the elements.

🔊

A detailed outline of the weekend can be found below:

▪️Day one:
• Introduction to sound art and field recording practice.
• An overview of different microphones used in recording, including the hidden, discreet and/or heightened or overlooked aspects of our sonic environment.
• Listening exercises and shared sounding.
• The first of two sound walks.
• Mapping results with pen and paper and a shared dialogue informing the work.

▪️Day two:
• Listening exercises, shared experiences and collective decisions based on the previous days insights, revelations and dreams.
• Introduction to basic recording techniques.
• Participants supplied with recorder and mic that suits them best.
• The second sound walk using recording devices – help will always be on hand.
• A sharing of recordings and collective decisions on final map & piece.
• Listening session and sonic reflections.

🔊

Anne Marie Deacy biography:

Anne Marie Deacy is an Irish sound artist whose focus lies in the creation of work that explores natural & man-made systems, and our connections with nature, rituals, the land and the cosmos. Her practice is informed by field recording and also grounded in extensive research on the philosophies of vibration, the resonance of materiality, information transfer and cultural shifts. She explores the fluidity of memory, time, place and space, with an ear to the future, while utilising listening as a form of activism ( ref: Pauline Oliveros) and sound as a catalyst for change in times of crisis and disconnect.

Anne Marie’s work is elaborated through collaborative and interactive forms and is articulated through sculpture, installation, transmission art, sonic publication, collective participatory actions, composition and performance.

Anne Marie has showcased work and held residencies both nationally and internationally. She has been kindly supported by The National Sculpture Factory, The Arts Council of Ireland, Creative Ireland, Galway County Council, European Union & the Goethe-Institut Culture Moves Europe Fund.

🔊

The workshop is supported by Henry Moore Foundation, who are kindly funding the public programme associated with our current exhibition Nyctalopia with Adrián Balseca.

Life Drawing with Cara Donaghey and Caoimhe Stones

📆 Thursday 15 August 2024, 7-8.30pm

Life Drawing at Void Art Centre is back! This upcoming session will respond to our current project with artist Adrián Balseca, Nyctalopia, and will be led by artist Cara Donaghey and our new life drawing model Caoimhe Stones 👥 Alongside the drawing, there will be a special soundtrack themed to Nyctalopia.

Standing easels, boards, newsprint and art materials for drawing are all provided by Void Art Centre, and you’re also welcome to bring your own materials or sketchpad too.

👐 No previous experience is required and everyone is warmly welcome.

Tickets are £8 per person, and a link to register can be founsd above 🔗.

Acknowledgements

Silver Tongued Deviance

Silver Tongued Deviance is an open mic platform event hosted by spoken word artist Frank Rafferty at Void Art Centre in partnership with Gasyard Development Trust (Bluebell Arts). Join us on Thursday 29 August from 7-9pm.

The viewing public are invited to simply attend and enjoy! There is no requirement to perform at these events. The viewing public are invited to simply attend and enjoy! There is no requirement to perform at these events. If you wish to take part, just come along, no need to book in advance.

Refreshments are also provided; visitors are invited to enjoy a glass of wine, a beer, or some tea or coffee.

Acknowledgement

Silver Tongued Deviance is a collaboration with Gasyard Development Trust (Bluebell Arts).

Spooky Halloween willow lantern making workshops!

Spooky Halloween willow lantern making workshops!

Part of Derry Halloween festival 2023

Saturday 28th October

Bookable slots 10-11am, 11:30-12:30am, 2-3pm and 3:30-4:30pm

Awaken the Walled City and make your own spooky Halloween Willow Lantern to take with you to the Halloween parade and/or decorate your home with, on Saturday 28th October at Void Art Centre with Sinead Crumlish!

Throughout the day there will be four bookable workshops at Void Art Centre which are suitable for anyone aged 8+. Children aged 8-14 must be accompanied by and have the support of their parent/guardian during these workshops (one ticket is enough for a parent and child – tickets are sold per participant). Young people between the ages of 14 and 16, can attend this workshop alone but a permission form must be filled out by a parent/guardian upon arrival/ahead of the workshop and emergency contact details should be left at the front desk. This workshop is also suitable for individual adults.

Bookable slots include: 10-11am, 11:30-12:30am, 2-3pm and 3:30-4:30pm. Each workshop will have limited spaces.

Tickets cost £3 per participant.

Please note, you are only required to book 1 ticket per participant. If you are supporting your child, you do not need to book a ticket for yourself. You only need to book an additional ticket if you plan to engage in the workshop on a personal level aswell.

Image credits: Canva

Print + Protein

Print + Protein

Thursday 19 October, 6-8pm

Print + Protein is a peer-led philosophy reading group at Void Art Centre organised by Aphra Hill which relates to the themes addressed in Void’s current exhibitionary project, using diverse theory to expand alternative understandings of contemporary art. It takes its name from the essay Virtual Bodies and Flickering Signifiers by Katherine Hayles which explores immaterial media and the affinity between books and bodies.

The next session will take place on Thursday 19th October from 6-8pm. During this session, the group will discuss selected excerpts from The Orpheus Double Bind: What Can Writing Save? by Turkish writer and cultural critic Nurdan Gürbilek. The Orpheus Double Bind is the English translation of “Orpheus Çıkmazı,” – a chapter in the book Sessizin Payı (The Share of the Silent, Metis Yayınları, 2015) by the literary critic Nurdan Gürbilek. This book was published as part of bewitched, bewildered, bothered, Banu Cennetoğlu’s artistic intervention for Asia Art Archive’s exhibition Portals, Stories, and Other Journeys, curated by Michelle Wong and on view at Tai Kwun Contemporary from 23 April to 1 August 2021. Framed as a question, the text uses the myth of Orpheus along with other instances from literature to interrogate what is at stake in employing artistic practice as testimonial. This chapter explores the insufficiency of language in times of crisis, echoed by Cennetoğlu’s installation at Void, right?, as the bouquets of gold letter balloons slowly deflate.

Print + Protein is free to attend and open to the public but booking via Eventbrite is required. A copy of the text will be provided to attendees in advance of the event. Participants are not required to have their thoughts pre-prepared but it is encouraged to read the text or the selected excerpts before the session if possible. Participants of any background or level of experience are welcome to join. Refreshments are provided.

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Aphra Hill is a writer, researcher and recent graduate of Visual Culture at NCAD.