Look at Me
dal 23/9/2005 al 19/3/2006
Segnalato da
23/9/2005
Look at Me
National Portrait Gallery, London
Artists, photographers, poets, and videographers who create their own self-portraits
A new exhibition will showcase the art of community groups from across the UK who have worked alongside artists, photographers, poets, and videographers to create their own self-portraits. The National Portrait Gallery's Look at Me is the third project in its innovative Reaching Out, Drawing In series of exhibitions aimed at involving new audiences. The Gallery has worked in partnership with a diverse range of organisations over a period of 6 months. These include young travellers, homeless people, those in care, those with mental health issues, young people outside formal education and those seeking asylum.
The project was set up to encourage people to engage with portraiture, heritage and the arts and to offer them an opportunity to develop their own successful artistic project. The artwork is displayed alongside the stories of those who made them, and offers a unique insight into the diversity of those living in Britain today. Inspiration was taken from the portraits in the Gallery's own collections as well as portraits from other institutions, and a selection of self-portraits from the Gallery's Collection will also be included in the exhibition.
The Gallery worked closely with partner organisations both in London and across the UK including: Barnardo's, Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens, National Museums Liverpool, National Museums of Scotland, Look Ahead Housing and Care, The Connection at St Martin's and the National Trust's Montacute House, Somerset.
Caroline Jeeves, Project Learning Officer at Montacute House said, "This is an amazing opportunity for these young people to work with a fabulous collection of portraits and to create their own work for show on a national stage. It demonstrates how heritage can truly engage with younger generations and give them foundations which they can use in their lives."
"It was a new experience for me to work on a piece of artwork, I enjoyed creating something of my own." Young person from Look Ahead Housing and Care.
"I am pleased how it has turned out. It's changed my view of the National Portrait Gallery and I actually come now. I started looking forward to coming into the Gallery on a Saturday." Young person from Barnardo's.
Reaching Out, Drawing In is a key part of the National Portrait Gallery's educational and outreach work over the next three years. The project enables the Gallery to undertake a sustained programme of new audience development and to give wider access to the Gallery's collections. In particular the project engages particular groups including young people, disabled people and minority ethnic groups. Using a series of six exhibitions in the Studio Gallery as a focus, each of the displays arises directly out of working with community groups and organisations. The displays are accessible and promoted to all visitors to the Gallery. Future exhibitions will include working with the RNIB and involving visually impaired people in a visual arts and music project, and a photography project with the Chinese community in London and elsewhere. Reaching Out, Drawing In has been made possible by the generosity of the Heritage Lottery Fund.
Supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund
Studio Gallery
Admission Free
On views
SHOOTING STARS: CAMERA PORTRAITS BY CORNEL LUCAS (27 Jul 2005 - 22 Jan 2006)
Cornel Lucas (b.1920) has enjoyed a career as a leading photographer for over 40 years, first as one of the pre-eminent portraitists working for British Film Studios, from the late 1940s until the end of the 1950s, and thereafter as an independent photographer working in portraiture, advertising and fashion. This display brings together 50 of Lucas’s finest works both in black-and-white and colour.
Image: Marilyn Monroe by Bert Stern, 1962. Photograph by Bert Stern © 1962
For further press information please contact: Sarah Crompton, Press Office, National Portrait Gallery Tel 020 73216610
National Portrait Gallery
St Martin's Place, London WC2H OHE
Opening hours:
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday, Sunday 10am - 6pm (Gallery closure commences at 5.50pm)
Late Opening: Thursday, Fridays:10am - 9pm (Gallery closure commences at 8.50pm)