Guest blogger, Sarah Cockburn has a sneaky peak at the forth-coming art exhibition at The Forum:
If you were lucky enough to see the ubiquitous Heebie Jeebies at Sheffield’s three day musical mash-up Tramlines then you’ll already know Del Hardin Hoyle – he was the bass guitarist with his shirt off, standing on the amp and getting progressively redder in the face as one of their rollicking numbers reaches its climax. But he’s not just a musical phenomena, he’s also an artist and most importantly the curator behind ‘Do It Together’ opening at The Forum on Division Street on Monday and running throughout August.
Do It Together, isn’t so much of an exhibition title as a manifesto. Something a bit more expansive, generous and altogether more exciting than Do it Yourself or as Del puts it, ‘It is better to work together than for yourself; you could say it is an ethical thing. It is not about making money or forming a clique. It is about creating a network of support… afforded by working as a group in order to excel beyond the limited network of the solitary person.’
Other than this sense of creative collaboration the exhibition doesn’t have a theme as such but instead brings together a smorgasbord of artists from the novice to the well-established, from Sheffield-born-and-bred to those from more exotic climes. These renegades include Manchester-based artist Olivia Glasser whose past work has included an installation of a fully-functioning photo booth which instead of spitting out a self-portrait, eerily delivers you the mug shot of a sitter a few places before you, as if there’s been a slip in the space-time continuum. Florence Blanchard hails from across the Channel rather than across the Pennines but you’ll have seen her moustachioed teardrop shaped ‘Drop Man’ leering out from a few Sheffield doorways. Her collaboration with fellow Frenchwoman ANACO, The Island of Misfit Toys, closes at Sheffield Archipelago Gallery just as Do It Together begins.
Another urban artist brought in from the streets is Phlegm whose nouvelle-gothic black and white etchings have crept onto many a Sheffield building. Joining him on both the exterior walls of the city and the interior walls of the Forum is the ever-popular Kid Acne. If you like this taster of his work in Do It Yourself then make your way to Museums Sheffield Millennium Gallery for his first solo show in the city, Kill Your Darlings which turns the Craft and Design Gallery into an urban playground for his mischievous comic characters and provocative ‘stabby women’. And then of course there’s Del’s own work, a spin on psychedelia in which landscapes are flipped into new and surprising graphical arrangements and magazine images go to the guillotine to create a new kaleidoscope of colour.
So if you fancy a bit of DIT with the artists themselves you can go to the 1 August where you can also enjoy some performance poetry from Tom Didlock and some African-inspired drumming. But if you prefer your art without a percussive accompaniment then the exhibition runs throughout August.
By Sarah Cockburn
Do It Yourself
The Forum, 127-129 Division Street, S3 7SP
Opening Monday 1 August 7pm – 10pm
Runs till the end of August.