I have created a new series of works as part of a commission for The Social: encountering photography, a month long international celebration of photography across the North East of England.
Landscapes of Leisure opens on 18 October 2013, 5-9pm and will see large-scale photographs installed in locations across Sunderland, including-
City Library and Arts Centre, Fawcett Street, Sunderland, SR1 1RE
Sunderland Museum and Winter Gardens (External Installation), Burdon Road, Sunderland, SR1 1PP
The Bridges, Market Square, Sunderland, SR1 3DR
Newcastle Central Metro Station, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1.
View the maps here- http://www.thesocialnepn.co.uk/map/
Artist Talk and Walk: 19 September 2013, 11am meet at Sunderland Museum Foyer. All welcome.
Herrington Country Park, Houghton le Spring, July 2013 © Simon Roberts
About Landscapes of Leisure-
Extending his exploration of the English social landscape, Simon Roberts has worked on a major commission for The Social: encountering photography. A series of large-scale colour photographs, made in various locations throughout Sunderland, are sited in different gallery and public contexts: in the foyer of Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, on the rear façade of Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens, in The Bridges shopping centre as well as on the platform at Newcastle Central metro station. The photographs are echoingly familiar, yet also distanced. As in the traditions of large-scale history painting that inform them, we encounter highly socialized and deliberately lyrical environments. Yet these are thoroughly contemporary landscapes, where ordinary people get on with their various activities and pursuits. Some of these are solitary – taking the dog for a walk, or lost in reverie on a park bench. But most of all these are sociable and socialized environments, full of activity. To some viewers the locations will be immediately recognizable, while for many others the ways in which people use and inhabit the spaces – having a picnic, flying a kite, playing football or cycling – provide the more immediate points of connection. As in many of Simon’s projects, themes of memory and identity attach to the otherwise ordinary past-times and vistas. The relationships between people and places create a rich tapestry of social observation, while the high and often distant vantage points give a sense of the contemporary existence of each different landscape, as well as the accretions of historical use, social transformation and reinvention.
Lakeside Village, Sunderland, July 2013 © Simon Roberts
About The Social: encountering photography
The Social is an initiative of the North East Photography Network (NEPN) in partnership with the Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, Sunderland.
We are delighted to be working with an array of photographers and artists from around the world to create a dynamic exchange of photographic practices and experimentation, embracing varied social contexts and activities. Throughout our four-week programme of exhibitions, talks, tours and debates, The Social seeks to provide new opportunities for audiences to engage with high quality lens-based practice in ways that are accessible and relevant. The Social aims to create an internationally significant platform for regionally based photographers to showcase their work and will also bring artists and curators of international stature to the region to work alongside.
Sunderland is the creative hub of The Social, with important new partnerships at the Northern Centre of Photography, University of Sunderland, Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens, The Bridges Shopping Centre, Sunderland Minster and the National Glass Centre. In extending the reach of The Social across the region, we are also delighted to be working with Durham Art Gallery, Side Gallery, The NewBridge Project and PH Space in Newcastle, as well as Arts Centre Washington amongst others.
The Social is committed to the development of a vibrant creative context for photography in the region, through supporting artists to produce and exhibit new work. Key to this philosophy has been the continued support of Arts Council England and the University of Sunderland. Artists premiering newly commissioned works during The Social include: Irwan Ahmett and Tita Salina; Craig Ames; John Kippin; Sarah Pickering; Simon Roberts and Stuart Whipps.
You can find more detail about the festival on their facebook page here – https://www.facebook.com/events/590822437642659/?source=1
We English is being exhibited at the 2013 Festival Fotografico Europeo in Busto Arsizio, near Milan, Italy.
The exhibition is courtesy of mc2 gallery.
For more information visit: http://www.europhotofestival.it/simon%20roberts.php
Some new work I’ve made in Sunderland is featured in this group show, staged jointly between Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art and Sunderland Museum and Winter Gardens.
Exhibition dates: NGCA: 28 Sept – 23 Nov 2013
Sunderland Museum and Winter Gardens: 19 Oct 2013 – 23 Feb 2014.
The exhibition is part of ‘The Social: Encountering Photography’ – a month of photography in Sunderland and North-East England.
Tunstall Hills, Sunderland, July 2013 © Simon Roberts
Artists are: Craig Ames, Ulf Aminde, Haley Austin, Natasha Caruana, Nick Crowe & Ian Rawlinson, Melanie Friend, Gilbert & George, Julian Germain, Paul Graham, Chris Harrison, Nigel Henderson, Jeremy Hutchison, Yee I-Lann, Bob Jardine, James O Jenkins, Linder, Melanie Manchot, Daniel Meadows, Gustav Metzger, Tim Mitchell, Martin Parr, Reynold Reynolds, Reynold Reynolds with Patrick Jolley, Simon Roberts, Thiago Rocha Pitta, Daniele Sambo, Jo Spence, John Stezaker, Homer Sykes, Stuart Whipps
‘YOU ARE THE COMPANY IN WHICH YOU KEEP’ reveals the diverse ways in which photographers and artists using lens-based media have created images that map out our new social networks – observing the patterns of which structure our social existence, or forecasting what the twenty-first century has yet to bring. Many of the artists might be described as working in anthropological or ethnographic ways, observing how our experience of the world is mediated through camera lens, and asking how far photographic images structure our imagination. They ask: in the twenty-first century, are images the means by which we are socialised, and the means by which we can know ourselves? Do the images that we consume and internalise become the imaginative materials that we are made of?
The exhibition spans the two neighbouring venues of Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art and Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens, with each examining separate aspects of how photographic images now suffuse every aspect of our lives. At NGCA, more than 20 artists investigate how the neoliberal economics and continuing military muscle of so-called post-industrial countries determine how far the modern world is being shaped.
Pierdom will be featured in a group show titled ‘Uragano’ at the Palazzo Tagliaferro contemporary culture centre in Andora. The work will be exhibited alongside that of Andrea Guastavino and Oriella Montin, curated by Nicola Davide Angerame.
For more information about the gallery visit their website here.
My second solo exhibition at Flowers Gallery in London will be Pierdom, opening on 10th September. An associated book, published by Dewi Lewis Publishing, will be launched on the same night.
For more details, visit http://www.flowersgallery.com/exhibitions/flowers/2013/simon-roberts-pierdom
British photographer Simon Roberts has spent the past three years creating Pierdom, a comprehensive survey of Britain’s piers. Predominantly constructed during the 19th Century in the context of expanding Victorian seaside resorts and railways, these structures were often erected as landing docks for pleasure steamers and other sea craft. Growing to accommodate the needs of day-trippers escaping the smog of the city, engineers began to incorporate bandstands, cafes and music halls into their designs, embracing the growing notion of ‘pleasure seeking’ by the seaside.
Pierdom addresses the historical significance of these architectural structures placed in comparison with their modern interpretation and functionality. Roberts’ photographs of ruinous piers such as Birnbeck Pier (2012) are in contrast with those such as Ryde Pier (2012) in which the local community and everyday usage of the landscape is represented by a skate boarding park which dominates the composition. It is this socio-cultural element of the landscape that has sustained Roberts’ interest, revealing a deep fascination with the way humans interact with their environment, and in eccentric British pastimes.
At the turn of the century the British coastline boasted over 100 piers, some modest and functional, others elegant, exotic Victorian structures thrusting out into the sea. Now under half remain, the others destroyed by fierce weather and fires, with many dismantled during the 2nd World War to prevent German landings. Britain’s piers have become cultural landmarks, tracing history, national identity and economic fortunes from Victorian industrialism to the post-war boom, and finally now to the recent economic downturn.
Roberts’ large format photographs are taken with great technical precision, often from elevated positions encorporating peripheral details and the elements, thus enriching the viewing experience of each print. Through formal devices associated with the picturesque; perspective, asymmetry and juxtaposition, the photographs engage us with contemporary issues about our uneasy and fragile relationship to both nature, and our urban environments.The series is at once factual yet warm, a broad architectural and anthropological study of our coastline as a microcosm of British society.
What compels us to look at pictures of people? When is a photographic portrait successful? Does portraiture tell us more about the person sitting for the camera or the image-maker behind the lens?
Making Pictures of People considers these questions in a series of interviews focused on portraiture produced since 2000. A robust selection of works from 27 photographers sourced from within the online photo/arts community, this exhibition explores the breadth and diversity of portrait picture-making today. While some images emphasize the construction of identity through race, gender and class, others question the relationship between individuality and the ways we classify ourselves according to cultural imperatives. At the core of these different approaches is the artists’ exchange with their subjects and the creative inspirations that drive them to make images that push photographic portraiture forward.
The exhibition is an opportunity to consider the meaning of photographic portraiture as well as the multiplicity of images that define it. We’ve structured the show in a way that foregrounds the photographers’ voice — with an emphasis on their ideas, opinions, and experiences. Consider these interviews as you would a gallery talk, an occasion for the artists to share their creative motivations, the way they see the world, and the things that inspire their approach to portrait picture-making. Their images are just one part of the story — their voices add a unique dimension to understanding the work.
Making Pictures of People was produced in conjunction with the exhibition About Face: Contemporary Portraiture, organized by the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri, and shown there August 9, 2013–January 19, 2014. The exhibition will be available online in perpetuity.
Photographers included are:
Keliy Anderson-Staley • Yolanda del Amo • Christopher Churchill • Paul D’Amato • Jess T. Dugan • Doug DuBois • Matt Eich • Jason Florio • Jessica Todd Harper • Dave Jordano • Dina Kantor • Stacy Kranitz • Molly Landreth • Graham Miller • Jim Mortram • Lydia Panas • Laura Pannack • Deborah Parkin • Cara Phillips • Richard Renaldi • Simon Roberts • Marjorie Salvaterra • Betsy Schneider • Tema Stauffer • Shen Wei • Carrie Will • Susan Worsham.
Learn more about the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art exhibition »
Photographs from my series Motherland will feature in a multli-media presentation called Transcontinent, curated by Arko Datto, at the OBSCURA Festival in Malaysia. The slideshow will take place on Thursday 27th of June at 9pm in The Courtyard at CHINA HOUSE.
More information here and you can subscribe to their facebook page here.
About:
OBSCURA Festival is an international photography festival that features Asian stories through Asian photographers. It aims to showcase the best of Asian photography to the world, and also bring the finest photographic works from around the globe to the Asian audience.
OBSCURA Festival is a unique platform for exchange, education and networking. These goals are achieved through an exciting programme of exhibitions, workshops, talks, screenings and portfolio reviews.
The first of its kind in Malaysia, OBSCURA Festival will bring focus to landmark works of some of the most promising Asian photographers. At the same time, it aspires to champion a healthy discourse, using photographs to emphasise the preservation of culture and heritage.
Our long term aim is to exist beyond the festival; to nurture and support Asian photography and the continued telling of Asian stories through them.
Image: Savignano, Italy. June 2011 © Simon Roberts
My work will be included in the group show “Sin_tesis: paesaggio, industria, società” at the photography festival Rovinj (Croatia), “Rovinj PHOTODAYS” 2013. The exhibition is curated by Stefania Rössl & Massimo Sordi and includes work by
- Guido Guidi (Italia)
Via Emilia, un chilometro. 1984, 2012
- Martin Parr (UK)
Made in Italy
- Andrew Phelps (USA / Auastria)
The edge of the spiral
- Simon Roberts (UK)
Una storia italiana
- Mark Steinmetz (USA)
From a September
- Raimond Wouda (Paesi Bassi)
While everything flows
- Marco Zanta (Italia)
20 fotografie e 6 appunti
The photo exhibition will be staged at the “County Museum”, Rovinj Heritage Museum. Find out more information here.
Photograph: Southend Pier, 2011 © Simon Roberts
Work from Pierdom is included in an upcoming group show at The Museum of London Docklands called . The exhibition brings together the work of 14 renowned and up-and-coming contemporary artists who have been inspired by the outer limits of the Thames where the river becomes the sea. The exhibition marks the 10th anniversary of the Museum of London Docklands, which is housed in a quayside Georgian warehouse built upon London’s connection to the sea.
With its dramatic landscape – desolate mudflats and saltmarshes, vast open skies, container ports, power stations and seaside resorts – the Estuary has long been a rich source of inspiration for artists and writers. Through film, photography, painting and printmaking, the contemporary artists featured in this exhibition offer new insight into this often overlooked, yet utterly compelling, environment and the people that live and work there.
Featured artworks:
• Thames Film, William Raban
• Seafort Project, Stephen Turner
• Thames Painting: The Estuary and Study for The Estuary, Michael Andrews
• Purfleet from Dracula’s Garden and Dagenham, Jock McFadyen
• Horizon (Five Pounds a Belgian), John Smith
• Southend, from the Pierdom Series, Simon Roberts
• Gravesend, Christiane Baumgartner
• 51º 29″.9″ North – 0º11″ East, Rainham Barges, Bow Gamelan Ensemble
• Golden Tide, Gayle Chong Kwan
• Jaunt, Andrew Kötting
• Thames Gateway, Peter Marshall
• A new film commission by Nikolaj Larsen
Estuary runs from 17 May – 27 Oct 2013 and you can read more about the exhibition in article written by David Spence, Director of Programmes, here-
http://www.mymuseumoflondon.org.uk/blogs/blog/a-tour-in-circuits-through-london-part-one-a-trip-to-experience-the-estuary-with-david-spence-director-of-programmes/
Exhibition organiser Elpie Psalti takes you on a tour of the Estuary exhibition picking out personal highlights to tell the story of the Thames through the frame of contemporary art on Wednesday , June 26, 2013, 13 :00 -14 :00. The event is free and you can book here.
KLOMPCHING GALLERY will be exhibiting my work at the upcoming AIPAD Photography Show New York.
You can find them in Booth 433.
Check the gallery’s blog throughout March, to read a short profile on each of the artists whose work they will be presenting at the Fair – http://klompching.blogspot.com/
Opening Night Gala, benefiting inMotion
Wednesday, April 3: 5pm–9pm
Show Hours:
Thursday–Saturday, April 4–6: 11:00am–7pm
Sunday, April 7: 11:00am–6pm
