A NEW art project is set to bring the pages of an publication to life through multimedia events in Reading.
The project, led by visual artists Lisa-Marie Gibbs and Philip Newcombe, is called Island Life, and will realise some of the contents of a community periodical.
It’s supported by the High Street Heritage Action Zone, which also commissioned the production of The Oxford Road Times in the Summer of 2022.
The one-off, 28-page publication celebrated local heritage and events, as well as a numby of artistic studies and stories.
Among them was Bearing Witness to Grey, which studied the colours found inbetween the IDR and West Reading bridge.
It also included propositions for future events events and exhibitions.
Now some of those proposals are coming to life in the OpenHand OpenSpace gallery, in a mixture of media.
The two week exhibition will see multiple events, including film screenings, workshops, and performances.
it is described as an art ‘laboratory’ which will be used to test some of the methods of a community arts collective, The Engine Room.
The independent collective celebrates arts and community, initiated by a group of residents facing mental health challenged.
It was created to promote safe spaces where creative experiences are accessible, as well as encouraging empowerment, recovery, and healthy development.
The exhibition will feature film screenings in its first week, which concludes with a live-feed screening of sets from Reading’s DJ Amature and DJ Magpie.
DJ Amature mixes disparate and diverse influences, including jungle, ska, and drum and bass, to create reconstructed, foot-shuffling rave-reggae.
The second week starts with a workshop based on the Bearing Witness to Grey study, where attendees will take part in a walk along Oxford Road to chart their own colour palettes and discuss how colours are used to establish relationships between people and spaces.
The exhibition will be open for viewing for the following week, with a closing part on the final Saturday.
The exhibition opens on Friday, November 24, with a launch event from 6pm, and again from 1pm-6pm on Saturday and Sunday, November 25-26.
Film screenings take place from 1pm-5pm on Tuesday, November 28, and from 6pm-8pm on Thursday November 30.
The live stream of DJ performances takes place from 6pm-8pm on Saturday, December 2, open from 1pm.
The Bearing Witness to Grey workshop takes place at 1.30pm on Sunday, December 3, setting off from the exhibition space.
The project closes with a final party from 2pm-4pm on Saturday, December 9.
Events take place at the OpenHand OpenSpace Gallery, 571 Oxford Road.
Entry is free and full details are available via: whatsonreading.com/venues/openhand-openspace-ohos/
