“the capital city of shopping”
Whilst sorting through box #237 of the Weir archive I came across this entertaining little booklet published by the Peterborough Development Corporation in March 1983, just over a year from when the Queensgate Shopping Centre was officially opened by Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, (no I’ve no idea either).
Filed under: Architecture | Leave a Comment
Tags: Peterborough, Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, Queensgate Shopping Centre
“summer in our hearts”
Was stuck somewhere I would rather have not been earlier in the week, the upside was that I got to catch up on some reading – including the latest issue of When Saturday Comes. Highlight of the current issue was a wonderful match report from Taylor Parkes with just the loveliest final paragraph I’ve read in a good while.
As a Norwich City fan today is probably not the best day to blog about football but it’s only a game eh?
Filed under: Football, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
Tags: Football, Norwich City FC, Taylor Parkes, When Saturday Comes
Type Writer
There doesn’t seem to have been a moment to think this week, so the arrival of this wonderful collection of work from Andy Smith was a definite highlight. Andy’s an illustrator, (originally from Norfolk (so I’m a little biased), whose work you’ll have probably already seen given his huge client list.
I originally stumbled across Andy’s work via the Newspaper Club and as a result bought one of his I Pretend To Work posters before somebody else bought one for me.
So if you ever need the services of an illustrator or just want something handsome to hang on you wall I’d heartily recommend him to you.
Filed under: Art, Design, Illustration | Leave a Comment
Tags: Andy Smith, I Pretend To Work, Newspaper Club
Out In The Country
Sometimes everything seems connected.
Earlier in the week I picked up a bundle of Country Fair magazines from the 1950s – bought largely because of the wonderful cover illustrations by an artist unknown to me, namely John Hanna. Given my unfamiliarity with Mr Hanna’s work I made a note to investigate further. However before I got the chance to utilise the efforts of California’s finest in my search, the latest issue of Creative Review arrived – with an excellent piece, presumably written entirely for me, on Nick Asbury’s efforts in “filling in the gaps and rediscovering the career of Australian commercial artist John Hanna”.
Nick had arrived at the work of John Hanna in a similar way to me, through the acquisition of a number of back issues of the Country Fair magazine. Blogging about his find unearthered some further details about Hanna from other admirers of his work, but it wasnt until some time after his post that John Hanna’s son, Max, got in touch with Nick enabling him, (and in turn us), to find out more about his father’s life and work.
It’s perhaps not surprising given the intentionally temporary nature of work such as this that it passes us by so easily, however it’s enormously rewarding when it does turn up on the radar because it’s work of such significant quality.
Nick sums it up far more poetically than me : ”It would be sentimental to say that good work always gets rediscovered - no doubt much of it doesn’t. Hanna’s work spent years consigned to people’s lofts and garages, evading the algorithms of Google and instead travelling the loose real-world network of car boot sales and second hand shops. But there was always a good chance it would resurface, looking as fresh as the day it was created.”
As an aside the contents of the magazines have some socially historic interest too !
Filed under: Art, Design, Graphic Design, Magazines | Leave a Comment
Tags: Country Fair, Creative Review, Design, Illustrator, John Hanna, Magazine, Max Hanna, Nick Asbury
Wondering
So much unpleasant news yesterday including the announcement from Iain Banks that he’s “officially very poorly“.
I’ve been a fan for many years and Espedair Street has always been one of my favourite books to the extent that I appropriated my pseudonym from it – I also seem to have committed the last half sentence from the book to memory, which I’m always reminded of when I’m “wondering if it’ll last”.
Filed under: Books | Leave a Comment
Tags: Daniel Weir, Espedair Street, Iain Banks
Unless you live within the confines of the city of Norwich you’re unlikely to come across the John Jarrold Printing Museum by accident – to begin with it’s pretty well hidden, in the depths of St James Mill a Grade 1 listed building originally built to contribute to Norwich’s textile trade in the 1830s, and in addition it’s only open Wednesday mornings between the hours of 9.30 – 12.30. That said the effort you’ll need to make in order to visit will be effort very much rewarded because it’s a fascinating place full of history and activity in equal measure.
As soon as you arrive you’ll realise it’s not the kind of museum where everything sits behind frustratingly placed red rope, which is particularly pleasing when you consider the volume of Heath Robinson inspired machinery at work. The other thing that becomes quickly apparent is the number of volunteers keen to show you around and share their accumulated knowledge of which there appears to be an abundance of.
To be honest though it’s the staggering complexity of it all that really hits you. From the, sadly dying, artistry involved in the setting of type by hand to the quite extraordinary mechanical intricacy of a Linotype machine from the 1880s – it’s difficult to take it all in.
So having taken so long to actually get to the museum I’ll be making sure that my next visit is much much sooner than later because whilst the world at large proclaims that ‘print is dead’ it’s very much alive and well in a small corner of Norfolk.
Filed under: Design, Newspapers, Print | 2 Comments
Tags: Audioboo, Heath Robinson, John Jarrold Printing Museum, Norwich, Print, Printing, St James Mill
The Art Of Noise
If like me you’ve missed listening to the dulcet tones of Charlotte Green over on BBC Radio 4 there was a chance to hear her make a fleeting return in the first “audio intervention” last Monday as part of the short Open Air series - featuring a number of three minute pieces, or as they’d prefer “interventions”, from artists commissioned by London-based arts organisation Artangel.
I particularly enjoyed the effort from Christian Marclay however having dipped briefly into the lower half of the internet it seems not everyone agrees with me :
“Art should be stimulating and make you want to know more – this mornings input was just noise. I thought it was another glitch at the new BBC studios, sad to find out you actually commissioned it.” RobRutland
I’ve collected the five pieces below and if you’re interested John O’Mahony has written more about them and the work of sound artists generally in The Guardian over here.
Filed under: Art, Radio, Sounds | Leave a Comment
Tags: Art, Artangel, BBC Radio 4, Charlotte Green, Christian Marclay, John O'Mahony, Mark Wallinger, Open Air, Open Air series, Peter Strickland, Ruth Ewan, Sound Art, Susan Hiller, The Guardian
