A new sculptural artwork has been loaned to Netherstowe High School, and it to be resident there until early spring next year. The sculpture entitled: Bull In Dynamic Form will be seen by students, teachers and visitors as they enter the school, and is already proving to be a talking point. 52 Weeks of Art is about showing people the variety of the visual arts, from the realistic to abstract and sound art to performance. Its about talking about art and about seeing new things.

52 Weeks of Art will be developing 4 collborative art projects in 2009-2010. These will relate to four different artforms, alongside the development of new audience and participatory opportunities.
Discussions this week wil see artwork produced as a result of these projects being previewed in both Netherstowe High School and Chase Terrace High School. The artworks will be loaned to the schools for academic terms and located in areas of the school where the students will be able to view and interact with. It is aimed that this will help develop students understanding of alternative, abstract and contemporary art practice.
Discussion with other schools in the area with hopefully mean that this opportunity to view artwork will extend to as many students as possible.
The loan of the works will also incorporate an opportunity to discuss the work with artists.
Following display of the work at the schools further venues and locations for exhibition will be sought.

Saturday August 15th saw the second and final summer open day for involvement in the Son et Lumiere event. Held at the Guildroom in the city centre the day saw the project artists on hand to discuss the project and offer opportunities to become involved in the artwork production.
125 people attended on the day, joining in adding their faces to the Wordplay Project, alongside helping in the production of the interactive artwork which will feature on the Market Street facade of the Johnson Birthplace Museum. The event also saw Louise Morgan, a young artist from Lichfield taking the opportunity to join the artists and become part of the team for the production of the event.
Saturday also saw the final light test for the September Event, with passers by treated to a sneak preview of the visuals for the event.

Artist Andy Mckeown and Composer David Harper outside the Samuel Johnson Birthplace Museum, the backdrop for the Son et Lumiere in September.

Screen shot from Wordplay - a collection of the faces of the people of Lichfield

Sample view of the interactive artwork which will feature during the Son et Lumiere event on the 18&19th of September.

This striking image in the style of Andy Warhol is the second of the poster series, which will be appearing in Lichfield soon. The pop art depiction of Samuel Johnson sits comfortably with the way in which Warhol reinvented the way in which we look at the subject establishing contemporary iconic images, and is similar in appearance to the mid-20th century iconic silkscreen paintings he produced, from soup cans to the celebrity of Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe.

The image has been produced by Andy Mckeown

To find out more about Andy Warhol please click here. (This is an external site not affiliated to 52 weeks of art).

The first design for a series of 26 public art posters to be sited around Lichfield has been revealed. The poster series will highlight an A-Z history of art in the 20th Century through depicting some of the most significant movements, artists and artworks produced, but with a twist. Each piece being reworked to have a link to Lichfield itself.

The first poster links to one of the centuries most important figures - Joseph Kosuth, who is regarded as one of the first conceptual artists. The poster, is literally a definition of the word poster, which echos the early work of Kosuth. Through the use of the definition of a words various incarnations, the artwork itself if formed, depicting a conceptual picture of what a specific word is.

The choice of a work relating to the legacy of Kosuth as a the first image of the series has been chosen as it is an obvious link to the history of the city and its most famous son Samuel Johnson, whose use of illustrative poetic quotations helped inform the manner in which he approached the construction of his Dictionary of the English Language.

To find out more about Kosuth please click here. (This is an external site not affiliated to 52 weeks of art).