cybrum

RBSA Backstage Pass

cybrum — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 09:35:31 +0000

The Royal Birmingham Society of Artists (RBSA) is hosting a Wikipedia Backstage Pass event on Sunday 4th November. We are all familiar with the concept of Wikipedia, the encyclopedia which can be edited by anybody. This ability for institutions to contribute to their own entries, the bredth and depth of topics covered, combined with the inclusion of media (pictures, video and sound) make the site a powerful tool and this event will explore how cultural institutions, in this case the gallery, can utilise this huge potential.

The Backstage Pass event will see a small group (numbers are limited to 8 in this case) of gallery staff and both new and experiencied Wikipedians take a tour of the RBSA’s permanent collections and collaborate to add to and improve the gallerys Wikipedia entries. It will provide a crash course in editing Wikipedia and adding media content.

If you’d be interested in attending please contact the gallery on 0121 236 4353

A few Halloween events

cybrum — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 13:31:33 +0000

As you might expect this evening sees a few Halloween-themed events in Birmingham.

At the Town Hall there’s traditionally a silent film from the horror genre with live organ accompaniment by Nigel Ogden. This year it is Der Golem (1915), described as “a crucial work in the development of the horror movie”.

Classic 1973 horror The Wicker Man is screening at Stirchley pub The British Oak, part of the Stirchley Happenings.

For an alternative to horror films there’s a spoken-word event at Six Eight Kafé. ‘All Hallow’s Read’ from Pigeon Park Press is an evening of open-mic fiction and poetry.

For something completely unrelated to Halloween ‘The Best of BE Festival’ is a touring triple-bill of short theatre pieces, selected from the BE Festival which took place in Birmingham earlier this year. This evening it will be performed at The Public in West Bromwich.

Artist talk today at Edible Eastside

cybrum — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 08:05:00 +0000

Today at Edible Eastside, Karen McLean in conversation.

“TROVE & mac birmingham’s ALLOTMENT Project and Edible Eastside present:

Post Colonial-Now Karen Mc Lean

Talk: Sat 18th August 2012 1 – 4pm with Charlie Levine, Cathy Wade & Karen Mc Lean. Lunch served at 1pm, talk begins at 2pm.”

Edible Eastside,122 Fazeley Street, Digebth, Birmingham, B5 5RS

Hedge Enquiry

Links for 17th August

cybrum — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 09:53:00 +0000

After our earlier post about volunteering we’ve learnt of two more opportunities; Espirito Brum and Irish in Birmingham are celebrating Brazilian and Irish culture respectively.

After successfully taking The Flyover Show to South Africa earlier this year Soweto Kinch brings it back to it’s Hockley roots.

Also tomorrow Six Summer Saturdays continues with NoFit State Circus, If Only I Could… and The Caravan Show.

Today see the deadlines for the Eye Candy visual art commissions & inkygoodness‘ beer mat illustration. The deadline for Open West Midlands is tomorrow.

Opportunities for artists and creatives

cybrum — Thu, 16 Aug 2012 10:05:00 +0000

Eye Candy, a Festival of Visual Pop Culture, will be taking place in Birmingham on 11-14th October this year. Fused has several new public art commissions available to illustrators, artists and designers, and typographers for prominent locations in Southside. The deadline is Friday 17th August.

Also part of Eye Candy is a commission for artists from new café Le Truc, deadline also 17th August.

Recent visual arts graduates from across the West Midlands are invited to show their work at a high profile multi-site exhibition. In addition 5 bursaries are being offered. Organised by BM&AG with the Barber Institute and Grand Union, applications for both the exhibition and bursaries are open. The deadline for submissions is 5pm, Friday 14 September and more information can be found here.

From Birmingham Arts, Craft and Vintage comes a Success Workshop: PR, or how to obtain free publicity on Saturday 18th August.

Creative Shift are a company based at the Birmingham Hippodrome who specialise in offering training and consultancy to creative businesses. They have just announced the dates of their new half- and full-day skill building courses.

Birmingham Zine Festival is taking place in October and they are looking for zines and comics for their reading table, particularly ones suitable for children and teens, music zines, and from the LGBTQ community.

Last week we wrote about the Three Week Window Festival. The deadline for ideas is Tuesday 21st August.

Our Monstrous Bastard Child is an intensive two week workshop of performance, intervention and collaboration. The workshops will be led by celebrated theatre maker Mark Storor and Birmingham-based Friction Arts.

Contemporary circus theatre company NoFit State will be in Birmingham on Saturday 18th offering workshops as part of Six Summer Saturdays.

As part of the Nottingham Castle Open 2012 Broadway will select a Midlands artist working in film or video to receive a £1000 prize and be included in the exhibition. More details here.

The deadline for the Salon Art Prize is approaching. Any submissions must be received by Saturday 25th August. For more information contact info@salonartprize.com

Six Summer Saturdays – 11th August

cybrum — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 08:27:20 +0000

Six Summer Saturdays

Birmingham Hippodrome’s season of street theatre and performance continues tomorrow with 6 acts popping up in a variety of locations around the city centre. The Reds (Natural Theatre Company) will be roaming around, The Princess & The Maharaja (Nutkhut) will perform on New Street, while Turbo Jonez (Reckless Invention, @turbojonez) will be on High Street.

You can find The Whale (Talking Birds) at Brindleyplace, Hinterland (Mercurial Dance) outside the Hippodrome, and Sink Dancing (Lucid Incident) in the Mailbox underpass.

You can find out more about Six Summer Saturdays at their hub on the ground floor of the Mailbox, where you can also find an exhibition of photography from The Voyage. And if you have an iPhone or iPad there’s an augmented reality app called Zoe’s Magic Camera.

Crisis Skylight, Breakin’ Out, Brindleyplace films, Sandwell Arts Festival

cybrum — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 09:48:00 +0000

Crisis Skylight Birmingham

Crisis Skylight is the education scheme of the homelessness charity Crisis. Working in hostels & community spaces it engages with the homeless using arts classes & creative courses. The results of some of this work is currently being exhibited at St. Martin’s Church.

Running from the 4th to the 30th August the exhibition includes photography, sculpture, painting & drawing.

Breakin’ Out

Described as a “celebration of urban culture” Breakin’ Out is taking place at mac on Wednesdays throughout August. Using the hashtag #NextGen it’s trying to discover the “Next Generation of Bboys, Bgirls, Rappers, MCs, DJs, Street Artists + Film-makers”.

There’s a mixture of workshops for ages 13 to 19 (street art & graffiti, Streetdance/Breakin’, making music tracks or music videos), events (music & spoken word, Love to Jam) and pop-up performances. Follow them on Twitter and Facebook

Brindleyplace outdoor films

The programme for the first Brindleyplace film festival has been announced. For 2 weeks from Monday 13th of August there will be a daily free screening of some classic movies and family films starting at 6 on weekday evenings, with two films shown at 11 and 2 on Saturday and Sundays.

The full programme can be found at Brindleyplace films and includes Back to the Future, Mamma Mia!, Ghostbusters, Kung Fu Panda, Back to the Future Part II, Grease, Happy Feet, Ice Age, Shrek, and E.T: The Extra-Terrestrial.

Sandwell Arts Festival

Between the 6th and 18th August the third Sandwell Arts Festival has a focus on participation. It takes place throughout Oldbury, Smethwick, Wednesbury and West Bromwich with a wide variety of activities across the borough. The climax of the festival will be a procession through West Bromwich high street on Saturday 18th August.

The festival organisers include Multistory, Black Country Touring, The Public, Sandwell Third Age Arts and Sandwell Primary Care Trust.

Bodies… in Motion

cybrum — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 10:25:37 +0000

A collaboration between Ort. art and community cafe and the Disability Support Group, “Bodies… in Motion” is a project for women who consider themselves disabled.

8 workshops exploring body image and sexuality will culminate with a group exhibition at Ort. in Balsall Heath from the 19th September until the 2nd October. The project is only possible because of a successful crowdfunding campaign to cover the costs of the workshops. Although the target has just been reached there are still two days left to support the project at the Wefund page.

Introducing a new Created in Birmingham team

cybrum — Thu, 02 Aug 2012 09:26:57 +0000

You may have noticed the site has been quiet for a few weeks. Chris, who’s done a fantastic job running Created in Birmingham for a number of years, is taking a backseat and handing over to a new team of six. We’ll introduce ourselves over the coming weeks over on the About page, but we are looking forward to continuing to promote, discuss and be a part of Birmingham’s vibrant creative community.

You won’t notice any major changes to the site as we carry on letting you discover what’s going on in the city, and we’ll bring a fresh approach to reporting on the creative industries. This site exists for it’s readers so if there’s anything you’d like to see or anything you’d like us to cover please get in touch. The email address is createdinbirmingham@gmail.com

Craig, Daniel, Kassie, Kerry, Lexie & Mark