Perhaps his broad appeal and accessibility is behind the fact that he has not only a gallery honoring his name, but a theatre, a car park and a shopping centre also.

I’d had “take family to the Lowry, Manchester” on my todo list tagged #rainyday for about 2 years. Perhaps like pretty much everyone, he appealed to me.  His ubiquitous, iconic street scenes are the ones people know – the matchstick men and matchstick cats and dogs.  Everyone, especially people who’ve experienced a northern UK town can identify with these but I found the gallery and the introductory film and other supporting info, emblazoned on the red walls of the main gallery space a brilliant eye opener into his world.

There’s another side to his painting. The memorising piece entitled The Cripples is, on closer inspection a self portrait. His work was punctuated with break-away styles – abstracts, self portraits, Dark erotica.  He was always questioning what and why he was doing what he did. Driven almost by an invisible force. His whit and incisive perception, the subject matter typically being the people in the world around him but there was also an esoteric side to his art, and a window into his obsessive and occasionally dark self loathing.

I love the moment you can get in a gallery where you ‘own’ a piece of art. Just before getting told off for taking the above photo (of his Oil on Canvas called ‘Ann’) I had a moment of exclusivity with it. I was captivated. Standing in front of a painting, able to get as close as 1cm – sans spectacles – is something I love to do. To breath in the brush strokes and see every spec and crumb of paint. Incredible.

We didn’t even explore the theatre side of the gallery (arguably, the ‘main event’) but from what we saw, we all loved it.

Click here for a link to The Lowry official site»

Had a fantastic weekend at Deershed. A very slick production indeed – Loads going on and they really did cater for the family. Stacks of quality entertainment for us, for the kids for everyone. Sold Out – I think about 1600 or so – a good number. Not too big, certainly not too small. Perhaps too much going on to squeeze into one day really – would have been good if it was an all weekeneder perhaps but no complaints – if I’d been relying on the beer tent there may have been – they ran out of beer mid/late afternoon! Can only take this as a sign of success.

The video here is a timelapse of The Art Wall (click here for the longer, bigger version) organized by www.artists.ltd.uk. A fantastic idea that loads of people seemed to enjoy! Art for everyone / Everyone IS an artist.. officially!

A few more snaps from the weekend here>>

Another Place, originally uploaded by DragonDrop.

Yesterday, on a bit of a whim we headed out to the coast to see a./ the sun and b./ Antony Gormley’s ‘Another Place’. (My photo set : here | Google Map : here)

The sun was an utterly luxurious commodity yesterday – the first proper T-Shirt day of the year – we were lucky enough to take full advantage by heading out early to the coast.

Crosby is a funny place. Shameless on Sea. I felt quite overdressed in my jeans as the order of the day there seemed to be either Liverpool or Everton football strips (in pristine condition) OR branded tracksuit / shell suits. Who would have thought that is was harbouring one of the largest art installations in the world?

100 lifesize figures, cast in iron, spread out over a 3x1km stretch of beach. Each figure has its own bracelet with a unique number. Some are right next to the steps onto the beach, some are 1 km out. Depending on when you visit, you may see none at all, as the tide can completely submerge them all. Looking out through the haze I could see figures way out – tiny dots near the horizon yet others I could walk up to and touch. It was quite fascinating watching groups of people in isolation go to an individual figure and explore it.

I found it reminiscent of the artists fantastic 90s piece entitled ‘Field of Dreams’ (which I was lucky enough to catch at Tate Liverpool, where Gormely displayed 40,000 mini figures with eyes all staring at the viewer). ‘Another Place’ again used repetition of form and invites an immersion into multiple perspective viewpoints.

Its affirmed the notion that I really like the type that I can experience. I got a lot out of experiencing something in a space where I could have my own time with it, rather than jostling for space in a stuffy gallery. Bravo to Gormley.