January Newsletter: Hello 2025!
A round-up of new writing, another new addition to the team, and more exciting developments in the Midlands!
Hello New Year! What fresh hellscape is this?
I don’t want to fixate too much on the coming global apocalypse (that’s what doomscrolling the Guardian at 1am is for), but it really does feel like anything at all could happen in 2025. I hope everyone’s doing ok.
That anything can happen means of course lots of wonderful things can happen too, and though it’s no coincidence that for a second month in a row our Substack long read touched on the precarity of art ecologies and the heedlessness of many top-down cultural policies, Jenny McNamara’s treatment of the subject as well as the response to her piece show that the world is still full of love and passion and people with a drive to do things and make life better for one another. For our part, here is a summary of some of the stuff we’ve been doing that we’re excited about…
Firstly, Jenny’s wonderful piece, 'My Experience as a Grassroots Artist Representative' - a personal account of her experience as part of an advisory group to the Project Board for the Newcastle Cultural and Creative Zone, highlighting the lived realities of those engaged in cultural production that are often disregarded within such large-scale creative schemes.
In the recent report by The University of Glasgow and DACS, it said artists earn on average £12,500 total, including any other part time jobs. We know that this is over *£11k* below the minimum wage, the minimum the government says we need to survive. The reality of earning this little means struggling to afford basic necessities and bills. It means not having savings, not being able to plan, stressing over where every next pound is coming from and working crazy amounts of hours a week. This is my experience and the experience of almost all the artists I know.
As suggested above, the piece forms the second part of a loose (and inadvertent) series with our last long read, 'The Final Performance' by Samra Mayanja, both writers reflecting on how the vagaries of official cultural policy can often exclude and damage creative communities, but also showing love for the DIY venues that have nurtured and supported them as artists.
Elsewhere, our expansion into the Midlands continues apace, with the first commissions for reviews and explorations of contemporary art activity in the region on the slate and due to be published from March onwards.
In related news, following last month’s exciting team announcements - Rachel Graves joining as Regional Editor for the East Midlands and Alex Niven joining our board of directors - we can also announce another fantastic addition this month:
Kevin Hunt joins us as our second Midlands Regional Editor, covering the West Midlands. Kevin is a visual artist, lecturer and writer originally from Liverpool, now working cross-regionally between the Midlands and the North West. Often incorporating the materials, forms and language that surrounded him during his formative teenage years growing up on a council estate, he makes sculpture from a queer and working-class perspective.
Also as part of the expansion plans, we are busy working on a brand new print publication showcasing emerging and established talent in the region. This too is due out in the spring, and we can’t wait to share more information as things develop - watch this space!
Finally, a round up of our reviews, features and interviews published since our last newsletter:
Published at the back end of December, writer mandla’s review of Tania Camra's performance As I Am Naturally at the Lowry reflects on 'a show about childhood experiences and healing the inner child'.
Also at the Lowry, Natalie Russett saw Local / National / International, 'the first of a new programming series… conceived by curator Zoe Watson... [that] aims to showcase Northern artists alongside artists from further afield.'
In Sheffield, Jessica Piette reviewed The Contemporary British Painting Prize exhibition at Persistence Works, Yorkshire Artspace. There she found evidence of the collective endeavour occurring in studios up and down the country, on a scale the writer believes helps make 'a future as an artist seem possible'.
Back in October, Chantal Oakes attended In Translation from In-Situ and Art of Small Talk, a day of talks and exhibitions at Nelson Library reflecting on the British Council-supported international group residency for artists and practitioners from UK and Pakistan.
Back in Manchester, Jack Nicholls reviewed Mikhail Karikis: Songs for the Storm to Come (which, incidentally, closes this weekend) at HOME . Here the writer found visions of 'an eaten-away Britain... cries of woe, and pain, and frustration', but also evidence of 'a community looking after one another'.
Finally, on Merseyside, writer Alexis Maxwell went to the one-day event With For About: When Words Fail, organised by Heart of Glass and hosted at Shakespeare North Playhouse, Prescot. For the writer, central to the day was the question: 'What happens when language proves insufficient?' - the fragmentary responses offering, for them, 'a collective mosaic reflecting the complexities and possibilities of socially engaged practice.'
That’s all for now. Look after each other out there.
Love and solidarity from the Corridor8 team x