To read Alison Dunne’s Leicester Mercury article on The Lyric Lounge please follow this link:

http://www.thisisleicestershire.co.uk/news/Fun-festival-turned-sheer-poetry/article-2553293-detail/article.html

James Black

New Walk Museum – The Other Gallery

July 31^st and August 1^st

The Lyric Lounge at New Walk Museum gave members of the public the opportunity to take part in a number of exciting workshops featuring expert tuition on a range of creative endeavours. Tim Clarke, The Lyric Lounge’s official ‘Artist in Residence’ ran two Pictures and Words workshops, (on July 31^st and August 1^st) which encouraged members of the public to ‘capture The Lyric Lounge in all of its technicolour glory,’ and write poetry that would complement their images. Tim was also present over the three days of the event to offer help and advice to budding artists and to sketch those in attendance.

Sunday morning’s workshop began with a doodling exercise. Each participant was given a blank sheet of paper on which we were asked to freely scribble lines, shapes or whatever came into their mind. Analogous to the many free writing exercises found in the poetry workshops this was stream-of-consciousness drawing rather than writing.    

When the sheets of paper were compared they contained very different styles of drawing: some had intricate details containing obvious patterns and objects whilst others were wilder and followed no particular structure or order. Tim explained that each of these pictures apparently random pictures contained a particular style or ‘signature’.   

The following exercise would be an attempt to get away from this style and free up drawing capabilities.  Firstly we drew a line down the centre of a new black sheet of paper divided into two sections. One side of the paper would contain several lines going from the top to the bottom of the page. The idea was to make a line using as many different techniques as possible and to break away from how we how would conventionally draw a line. Example of different lines drawn included using different amounts of pressure on the pencil to make the lines lighter or darker, dotted lines and a zigzagging line down the page.

The second half of the page paper would be divided into three separate shapes whether it was circles, squares, triangles the shapes would run from the top to the bottom of the page. Each shape would be entirely filled with a word repeated over and over again the idea was to fill the shape up as best as possible. This part of the exercise would later be used in a later idea of Tim’s which was based on drawing a face using words.

When the pieces of paper were places on the floor and compared with one another it was slightly harder to tell who had drawn which picture, however, elements of people’s drawing styles remained. Tim explained that it would be near impossible for a person to completely break away from their individual signature. However, trying different techniques and ideas expands the kind of work an artist is capable of producing.

Tim then proposed the idea of drawing a human face using the corresponding words to make up the features, for example, the eyes would be drawn by repeatedly writing the word ‘eye’ in the shape of an eye. Although this idea did make sense it also sounded quite difficult to achieve and once Tim spotted the uncertain looks from each member of the workshop he decided that we should  instead draw any of the pictures in the gallery in the usual fashion. Pictures that were drawn included a bearded old man with a very expressive face, a cityscape; with a piece of barbed wire in the foreground and an artistically light room containing a flower in a vase. Much to everyone’s surprise a young member of the group had drawn the profile of a woman’s face using Tim’s word-drawing exercise. The picture was very well achieved with the tiny overlapping words clearly forming the face.   

Finally we moved onto the words part of the workshop as each of us came up with a phrase associated with the weekend’s events at The Lyric Lounge put together each line would form a complete poem. We then wrote each of our words onto a single sheet of paper trying once again to write the letters in an unusual way or in a style that we are not used to writing/drawing in.

Pictures and Words was an enjoyable and informative workshop it gave the participants the chance to get involved and create their own work, learn new drawing techniques and new theories about the creation of art.                

New Walk Museum - Lord Mayor’s Room

July 31^st 2010

Mellow Baku has performed jazz, reggae, soul, funk world and blues music with bands, ensembles, and solo for over 10 years. Her work covers a range of these influences including Spoken Word. An accomplished performer and songwriter she has toured with Afro/Jazz/Dub band Soothsayers around UK/Europe, performed in New York with El Pussycat Ska, and supported saxophonist Courtney Pine.

Mellow Baku brought down the house with stunning live performance at The Steampunk Party, the official after party of The Lyric Lounge which rounded off the opening day of events.

Mellow returned to the Lyric Lounge to host ‘Lyrical Lounging’ on Saturday 31^st July. The workshop gave members of the public the opportunity to explore the legacy and vocal tradition of the Blues.

Zara Dillinger one of the participants in the workshop tells us about her experience of the event.

The workshop began with Mellow singing some blues while the group were sitting down in a circle. She briefly said what were going to do in the day’s session. The participants got into groups to create a blues song. Mellow then played her guitar and showed us how differing tempos alter the mood of the same song.

We then did some vocal exercises. Mellow played a different blues song entitled Wade in the Water. As a group we all had a quick discussion about the history of Blues and it origins from the slave trade era. A lot of the songs at this time were about pain and escape.

We then all had to think of something to put in the song. We all came up with something to use in the song then Mellow and the group transformed the ideas into 3 verses and a chorus. We got a rhythm together we started with Trouble Everyday, Take My Blues Away.

To end the session we all sang the arrangement while Mellow played guitar. It was fabulous and thoroughly enjoyable workshop with I’m sure the entire group including myself found it very rewarding.

New Walk Museum - Gallery 6

July 31^st 2010 

Filmmaker and dancer Gareth Morgan tells us about the Poetry that Dances workshop that took place at The Lyric Lounge.   

Poetry that Dances was a workshop happening in Gallery 6 on Saturday afternoon. Led by a husband and wife duo, this workshop used the spoken word to inspire movement content, using breath and vocalisation to widen the aspect of a physical being, dance in a more conventional sense.

Using native Red Indian techniques the participants were taught simple foot and marching sequences that used the spoken word to lead them through snake like floor patterns and circle processions.  

The main aspect of the workshop was the use of words and chants that echoed throughout the gallery giving the movements a magical sense of well-being and execution.

James Black

New Walk Museum - Council Room

July 31^st 2010

The official Lyric Lounge programme stated that the Get Stuffed! workshop would be ‘a writing session with the Book Doctor and a menagerie of stuffed animals!’ with this sparse information and equipped only with a notebook and pen I ventured into the unknown.   

The Council Room at New Walk Museum underwent something of a transformation last Saturday morning as the taxidermy experience that was Get Stuffed! got underway. The incongruous and slightly surreal sight of an exceptionally realistic looking fox and badger sitting squarely in the centre of the room met the participants’ gaze as they seated themselves for the two hour workshop.

The Get Stuffed! workshop was not led by a vet, (it was a little late for that,) but by a doctor of sorts Alison Dunne Leicester Libraries’ resident Book Doctor. Alison explained that the subject of taxidermy had long been a fascination of hers ever since she was a child and when the opportunity arose to view the selection of stuffed animals owned by New Walk Museum she jumped at the chance.

To begin the workshop Alison asked the assembled if they would take a walk about the room and write down any thoughts, feelings or ideas that came into their minds as they viewed the preserved creatures. Some of the more macabre sights included a jar with two moles inside, a primate foetus and a glass case which contained a number of dissected birds at each stage of the taxidermy process.    

We were then asked to come up with metaphors which could be applied to the animals; the crocodile skin was described as a handbag, the Roman snail a shrivelled up heart and the stitched-up bird as Frankenstein’s monster.  

The group then took a walk to the Wild Space area of the museum where stuffed animals are also present but are placed behind glass with descriptive notices, faux landscapes and scenery. Alison asked us whether we felt differently in this environment from being in the Council Room where we could reach out and touch the animals. There was general agreement that the sanitised Wild Space area felt much less intrusive and less like a display of dead animals than a group of artificial representations. Moreover, in the Council Room many of the creatures were in a partially dissected and dismembered state making their deaths all the more palpable and real.

Alison then used one of her favourite workshop techniques: a three minute stream-of-consciousness exercise writing anything that comes naturally without censoring or editing what is written. When this exercise was finished Alison asked us to edit what we had written into something more poetic.

Some extremely good pieces of writing were produced by each member of the workshop. One piece focused on the primate foetus, ‘strange unborn, stillborn creature with an undeveloped face resembling a tiger’s more than ape’s. So serious yet so young it has barely lived.’ Another’s writing centred on their reaction to being in this miasmatic atmosphere beginning with the powerful opening statement, ‘This is not my culture!’ denoting a visceral sense of not wanting any part of this deadly world. Perhaps the most strikingly creation came in the form a short story which imagined the animals taking their revenge capturing a woman and stripping her of her skin. There were audible gasps from The Book Doctor as this terrifying story unfolded. Once the woman had undergone the taxidermy process she was pinned down in the museum and turned into a display piece.     

The subject of taxidermy is a controversial one with many individuals and animal rights organisations seeing it as unnecessary and immoral. Many of New Walk Museum’s taxidermy pieces date back thirty or forty years to a period in time when perhaps there was not the same level of consciousness towards animal rights. The ethical debate surrounding taxidermy is an important aspect of viewing these creatures today and this subject alongside; death, the passing of time and what it means to be living creature, were raised during the two hour workshop. There is no doubt that the comically titled Get Stuffed! proved to be a thoroughly inspiring and thought-provoking workshop.