Sculpture strand visit to Yorkshire Sculpture Park

Tuesday 27^th October

Schedule

11:00 – 11:30 with Natalie Rudd Viewing the Arts Council Collection

View exhibitions:

·         Anthony Caro

·         Bill Viola in the Underground Gallery and Chapel

·         Rob Ryan in the Restaurant

·         Bob and Roberta Smith in the Garden Gallery

·         The poppies on The Cascade Bridge

·         Eileen Adams in NAEA Building

2:00pm - NAEA building for an introduction to the Archive with Anna Bowman

This was a really good day getting a chance to see behind the scenes at Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Finding out about the Arts Council Collection and how it runs was very interesting. It has been going since 1946 (70 years next year!) and has been show casing artist around the country making art accessible to everyone. With nearly 8000 works by over 2000 artist, when it is not on show somewhere it is all kept save in storage at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park in a building at the far side of the site. The talk that Natalie gave was really interesting but I would of loved to see how the collection is actually stored but it was till amazing to hear about The National Collection in Yorkshire!

The NAEA- or the national arts education archive, was really interesting to see the history of how art is taught in the UK, they have gathered work by children and students as well as educators and relevant artists. The wide variety is brilliant collection that tells a story of art in this country. Being able to walk through the collection as well was a brilliant experience, to see how the collection works and how it is managed an kept safe. There was so much in there we had to go in two separate groups and in single file around the collection, shelves stacked high of papers, books and art. A fascinating history all in one place.

Visit to the Henry Moore Foundation.

We visited the Henry Moore Institute and got to look at the archive collection which was an amazing experience because you could see the original works of artists. They even bought out the tools of an artist, which was very exciting seeing the actual tools he used to carve his sculptures. We has to wear white gloves when handling the archive material, it's all very professional. It was an exciting opportunity and an invaluable experience. I will definitely be heading back there for further primary research!

Artist talk: Rachel Maclean

Rachel Maclean, one of the exhibiting artist's in the British Art Show 8, came to LCA to give an artist talk. She was a brilliant speaker and explained her ideas behind her work in the BAS8 'Feed me'