The Cultural Triangle Evaluation of our community engagement project www.falmouthartgallery.com Facebook /FalmouthArtGallery Twitter @FalmouthArtGall #CulturalTriangle All images © Falmouth Art Gallery Contents Page Introduction The Cultural Triangle 1 Exhibitions 3 Artist of the First Falmouth Art Gallery Porthmeor Past and Present Commissions Commissions and Acquisitions 9 Community Engagement Baby Jam Sensory workshops 14 Family Workshops 15 Winnie’s Wanderings 17 Formal Learning 21 Other Workshops 23 The Cultural Traingle Visiting artists 25 (Clockwise from top: Working with older people 27 St Ives, Falmouth, Newlyn) Volunteers 29 Acknowledgements 31 The Cultural Triangle Introduction Falmouth Art Gallery is run by Falmouth Town Council which cares for a highly eclectic collection of 1,700 artworks many of which celebrate Cornwall’s rich artistic heritage. The collection is used to inspire community engagement for audiences of all ages and abilities. The Cultural Triangle project follows on from the hugely successful John Singer Sargent community heritage project (2009-12) which not only secured an important artwork for Falmouth Art Gallery’s Collection but also set out an infrastructure and strategy to ‘celebrate Falmouth’s rich artistic heritage’ through an ambitious new marketing campaign then titled ‘Cornwall’s Creative Triangle’. This project failed to get backing from Cornwall Council but it was felt that the heritage impact was compelling. The clue to the project is in the name Cultural Triangle and the intention to elevate Falmouth’s artistic heritage to a level on a par with that of Newlyn and St Ives. The project focused on art produced since about 1880 by artists practicing in this geographical triangulation and included a year-long programme of exhibitions which began in February 2014 with Artists of the First Falmouth Art Gallery and ended in January 2015 with Porthmeor Past and Present. These exhibitions provided the impetus for new commissions and a wide range of workshops, performances, and volunteer opportunities which continued till the end of March 2015. In this fourteen month period the gallery had 50,686 visitors with 12,154 experiencing some form of enhanced engagement made possible by Heritage Lottery funding. 2 Exhibitions The Cultural Triangle project was launched with the exhibition Artists of the First Falmouth Art Gallery (8th February-19th April 2014) which attracted 7,571 visitors. This exhibition celebrated the opening of the first Falmouth Art Gallery on Grove Place in 1894 and featured works by many of the artists both Falmouth based and Newlyn School who exhibited there in the twenty years leading up to the WW1. The exhibition required many hours of painstaking research by our team of volunteers which included combing Artists of the First Falmouth Art Gallery. through microfiche back-copies of local The project terminated with the newspapers for reviews of the exhibitions exhibition Porthmeor Past and Present (29th held at Grove Place. Thus we discovered who November 2014-21 January 2015) curated by exhibited in 1894 and in many cases what. the architect M J Long who was responsible We traced works at Penlee House for the recent award winning, HLF funded Museum and Gallery, Royal Cornwall Museum, conservation project for Porthmeor Studios. Alfred East Gallery in Kettering, Rupert We worked with the Walker Gallery to bring Maas Gallery, Abbott & Holder Gallery and an important Julius Ollson which was the star some paintings from private Collections. feature of Porthmeor Past and MJ curated The exhibition, accompanying catalogue the six artists whose Porthmeor studios and programmed talks have helped to raise the were renovated by her in the Porthmeor profile of Falmouth artists H S Tuke, Charles present gallery. The exhibition was very well Napier Hemy and William Ayerst Ingram. received and 5,842 visitors were recorded. Mid-way through the year we also staged an exhibition Black and White inspired by an exhibition of the same name originally staged by H S Tuke and William Ayerst Ingram in November 1894 which attracted such “I have been coming here most of my life luminaries of the day such as James McNeil and everytime I learn a little bit more and Whister, Lord Leighton and H M Queen today’s exhibition has been wonderful. What Victoria to exhibit. a brilliant idea - to recreate the first hanging. To accompany this exhibition, we Lovely exhibition, thank you” produced a black and white catalogue of Geraldine Maynard photographic portraits of famous artists working in their studios, inspired by Hampshire 4 Instead of a Switch Gallery we have introduced our new Limelight wall which is a six day gallery for anybody who wishes to exhibit their work. We began in May 2014 and have been fully subscribed and now have a waiting list till the end of March 2016. Exhibitors are as diverse as the school age winners of the Falmouth University schools art competition to local art societies, amateur and would be artists and makers. We also gave our baby prints a bit of a break in the Community Gallery by hanging an exhibition of the photographic portraits taken by volunteer Martin Howse that complimented the exhibition Black and White and formed the basis of that catalogue. We also “Very impressive Exhibition especially the modern reactions of the current hung the artwork created by students artists. The film is especially expressive of the qualities that the symbiosis of working with Porthmeor artists Iain Robertson and Clare Wardman as historic buildings, artist and architect are trying to conserve and take forward.” part of the Cultural Triangle project. John Lowe, Dorchester 6 8 Commissions and acquisitions Digital engagement to reach new In the allotted time, we commissioned audiences was a priority in 2014. To this end our most ambitious automata to date we commissioned two stand-alone bespoke The Cornish Cultural Triangle made by Keith desks (one at wheelchair height) with fixed Newstead. It depicts Dame Laura Knight in her touchscreen tablet displays. We launched these studio in Newlyn, Dame Barbara Hepworth in as part of Black and White with a digital project her studio in St Ives and Grace Gardner a local helping to develop an app called Elements Falmouth artist asleep in bed (where she gets her of Pattern. We trialled this app with school best ideas. The automaton is electric powered children, Stroke Club, Falcare (Mencap) and and has a very clever sound track and will be a other community groups as well as members of permanent legacy of the Cultural Triangle project. the public. The tablets were reprogrammed for Porthmeor Past and Present with audio interviews conducted by the architect M J Long with Porthmeor artists and a film about Roy Walker. The tablets have since been reprogrammed to showcase Urban Uprising skateboard film and permanent access to our collection. A video of this is available to watch via our You Tube channel at: http://bit.ly/1Ln5EU2 10 For Winnie’s Wanderings (see page 17), These workshops attracted 15 new we commissioned a replica Victorian performers and culminated in an evening paint box from papier-mache artist Philip performance in the gallery on the 18th Cox. This was used by Glyn Winchester December which was attended by a further as part of her costume interpretation. 35 people. Shallal is an accessible dance To explore a different aspect of the company and we are really pleased that the Porthmeor Past and Present exhibition, we gallery can be used in this way, despite the worked with Shallal Dance Company in the awful acoustic and environmental conditions. autumn to help launch Shallal 2, a Falmouth- The legacy of this project is our based branch of the main Newlyn company. continuing involvement with Shallal 2, who The gallery spaces were offered free so that will be working on a new commission in the company could recruit new performers 2015/16. We are also supporting Shallal and for use as a rehearsal space for three artists by part funding a residency project at sessions. Porthmeor studios. 12 Community Engagement Baby Jam sensory workshops for 0 - 6 months Working with under fours is fast becoming one of Falmouth Art Gallery’s most popular activities to the extent that as part of the Cultural Triangle project we not only introduced the new Baby Jam sensory workshops but we also exported them to Helston Museum reaching a whole new “Thank you so much for audience who fed back that there was nothing like the Baby Jam session this this at all in Helston. Baby Jam and Baby Paint are a fantastic way for new mums, dads, grandparents morning! Our littles absolutely and carers to meet each other in an informal but loved it, they had a fantastic stimulating environment. Figures increased from time exploring all the different 499 (2013) to 1175 (2014). In addition, our textures, smells, sounds and toddler’s group Little Fingers were engaged with objects around them. Cannot the exhibitions Artists of the First FalmouthCommunity Art Gallery Engagment wait until next time! Will and Porthmeor Past and Present with the ‘what’s in be recommending this to the suitcase’ activity inspiring the children to create collages and improvised performances in the gallery everyone.” which were inspired by the artwork on the walls. Krystina Hunking, Baby Jam mum 14 Family Learning We did a ‘Victorian dress up and draw’ Between April 2014 and March 2015, workshop; a ‘Varnishing Party’ workshop; ‘Set Sail’ we delivered 167 activity sessions and - making H S Tuke inspired fishing boats out of events, both on and off site, involving scrap materials; ‘Clouds at Dawn’ drawing dramatic 5,721 participants of all ages and clouds inspired by the works of William Ayerst abilities. Ingram; ‘Beyond the Painting’ exploring the stories contained in the paintings particularly Percy Craft’s Hevva Hevva, ‘Pots Away’ where we looked at all the various terrracotta and porcelain pots in the paintings; ‘Still Life’ inspired by Sophie Anderson and Ellen Genn’s flower paintings.