Following the success of the first Open Show, Boundaries, we have decided to organise a second. Thanks to the generosity of Manx National Heritage, this time the venue for the show will be the Temporary Exhibition Gallery at the Manx Museum in Douglas. Many Manx artists over the years, have aspired to show at the Manx Museum. Here is a wonderful opportunity for a number of our members to do just that.
We hope that many artists will be inspired to submit work. The final selection of pieces to be included in the show will be made by three guest curators: Ian Coulson, (Manx artist and educator); Katie King, (Curator of Art and Social History at Manx National Heritage) and Michael Sandle, (internationally renowned artist with strong Manx links). We are extremely grateful to each of them for kindly agreeing to take on this challenging role and in Ian’s case for agreeing to do it for a second time.
The selectors will once again be tasked with choosing which works to bring together to create a meaningful exhibition which explores broad ideas surrounding the theme. An exhibition catalogue will be produced to complement the exhibition and to preserve what Home means to us beyond the duration of the exhibition.
The exhibition
Artists are invited to submit work, (sculpture, painting, mixed media, photography, digital/AV, textiles, ceramics etc.), around the theme of Home.
The exhibition will be displayed in the temporary exhibition gallery at the Manx Museum, Douglas, opening on November 18th, 2023 and continuing through to Spring 2024.
The Theme – Home
Is home a place?
A country, region or specific location?
Or is it simply an organised pile of bricks and mortar?
Where do you feel ‘at home’?
Is home just a feeling?
A sense of belonging, of community, of security?
Is the Isle of Man home? If it is, is that through birth, choice or circumstance?
Are you away from home?
It could be argued that modern society suffers from many more people being away from home than ever before: many more people without a sense of belonging or a sense of a place as home; many more people being displaced through circumstance (conflict/famine/poverty/economics etc.). How does this affect a communal sense of home; a communal sense of belonging/ownership?
What is being ‘homesick’?
Does home matter?
Or is it ‘wherever you hang your hat’?
Important dates
Deadline for submission of artwork via digital format is Friday 1st September 2023.
Artists will be notified in early October if the curators have selected the work to be included in the exhibition.
A photo session of work will be arranged in October 2023 for those that need help getting a catalogue image of their work.
The selected artworks should be delivered to the Manx Museum on the 11th November (date and times will be confirmed to exhibiting artists nearer the time).
Exhibition opens Saturday 18th November 2023 with a launch event.
Exhibition closes April 2024 (closing date to be confirmed).
Exhibition Curators
Michael Sandle RA:
Although born elsewhere, Michael spent many of his formative years on the Island and has a continued fondness for the place. He has actively maintained his support of the development of art provision on the Island, standing as Patron of the IOM Arts Council and the Sayle Gallery. Michael Sandle studied at Douglas School of Art from 1951 to 1954 and then the Slade School of Fine Art, London from 1956 to 1959.
Michael has enjoyed a long career as a respected British Sculptor and monumental examples of his work can be found across the world (including four public pieces of sculpture on the Island, along with drawings and prints). He has also had a long career as a professor of sculpture in Germany where he lived and worked for a number of years.
Michael is represented in many important art publications and collections including: V&A; Tate Britain; Imperial War Museum; British Museum; Metropolitan Museum, New York; Städtische Kunsthalle, Mannheim, Germany: Australian National Gallery, Canberra; Hakone Open Air Museum, Japan and The Henry Moore Institute, Leeds. He has exhibited in numerous group exhibitions in Britain and internationally including the 5th Paris Biennale, 4th and 6th Documenta and Sao Paulo Biennale.
Ian Coulson:
Ian has practiced as an artist and art educator on the Island most of his life. He himself trained under Norman Sayle and then went on to inspire countless young Manx artists as the leader of the Art Foundation course at Isle of Man College. Since retiring, Ian has managed a more prolific output of artwork and a recent project about Peel driftermen has been bought in it’s entirety by the Isle of Man Arts Council for their Loan Collection. At the end of 2021, Ian had a very successful exhibition of his large-scale paintings/drawings of Douglas buildings and places. At the same time, he and Valerie Cottle launched their joint publication which combined Ian’s artworks and memories alongside Val’s researched stories about the town. Further Manx town studies are hopefully in the pipeline.
Katie King:
Katie is a part of the curatorial team at Manx National Heritage with responsibility for Social History and Art. Katie co-curates many of the exhibitions staged at the Museum. Most recently she oversaw the major Museum 100 exhibition, to mark 100 years since the inception of the Manx Museum in Douglas and 100 years of building the amazing and diverse collections held there.
Katie considers herself to be, chiefly, a Social Historian and it will be her expertise in this area which will colour her approach to selecting works for the Home exhibition. She will have a particular interest in the stories behind the works and their context within/relevance to an overall document of our experiences/thoughts in the 21st century.
Assisted by: Hannah Murphy MNH and Carola Rush, representing The Creative Network.
Submission requirements
The selection of artwork will be made through submitted digital image(s) and accompanying artist statement, which outlines the ideas behind the work and how it links to the exhibition theme, along with other details such as installation instructions/requirements, dimensions, media used etc. Artists will be notified if they have been selected for the final exhibition and will be requested to deliver their artwork(s) to the Manx Museum for hanging.
Works must respond to the theme of the exhibition.
Images must be in jpeg format and of high resolution (around 5mb in size). These images will be used in the accompanying catalogue where suitable (there will be an opportunity to create new photographs if needed).
Digital images should be accompanied by: an artist’s statement outlining the concept behind the work; a description of the work (i.e. is it a single piece or a series of images which makes up a single work?); dimensions; installation requirements; the artist’s name; artist’s contact details; title of work and medium.
Submissions will only be accepted from current network members (for details of how to join visit www. creativenetworkiom.com/join).
No more than 7 images per entry should be sent. These can be of the whole piece plus detail images or a representative set from a work made up of multiple images.
Images and accompanying information (as a Word document or equivalent) must be sent via We Transfer (www.WeTransfer.com) to [email protected]
By sending images for the exhibition artists agree for the images to be used for the purposes of the exhibition and accompanying publicity material. Images will be used solely for the purposes of the online and physical exhibition/publicity and any exhibition catalogue.
There is no restriction on the number of entries each artist can make
Entries may include multiple images/objects which form a single piece of work.
There is a submission fee of £20 for each piece of work (this applies to works which comprise both single or multiple images), which will cover administration costs for staging the exhibition. This payment can be made via Bank Transfer to the Creative Network bank account (The Creative Network, Isle of Man Bank, sort code 55-91-07, account number 14068621). Please clearly indicate what payment is for i.e. Open Show submission and who it is from. Or, by cheque, made payable to The Creative Network, and sent to: Maureen Kennaugh, 41 The Promenade, Castletown, IM9 1BG, Isle of Man.
All works must be ready to hang/exhibit and be suitably labelled. Please note that all 2D works will be hung with mirror plates which will be fitted by MNH technicians, so work should be handed in with no hanging fittings left on frames (unless they already have mirror plates). 3D works should be supplied with a plinth for display (unfortunately, we have no plinths to supply for the exhibition but will try to assist any artist who may struggle to source their own plinth for their work. We do not want a lack of available display plinths to put any artist off submitting their work).
Any queries re submissions can be made to: [email protected].
We hope that many artists will be inspired to submit work. The final selection of pieces to be included in the show will be made by three guest curators: Ian Coulson, (Manx artist and educator); Katie King, (Curator of Art and Social History at Manx National Heritage) and Michael Sandle, (internationally renowned artist with strong Manx links). We are extremely grateful to each of them for kindly agreeing to take on this challenging role and in Ian’s case for agreeing to do it for a second time.
The selectors will once again be tasked with choosing which works to bring together to create a meaningful exhibition which explores broad ideas surrounding the theme. An exhibition catalogue will be produced to complement the exhibition and to preserve what Home means to us beyond the duration of the exhibition.
The exhibition
Artists are invited to submit work, (sculpture, painting, mixed media, photography, digital/AV, textiles, ceramics etc.), around the theme of Home.
The exhibition will be displayed in the temporary exhibition gallery at the Manx Museum, Douglas, opening on November 18th, 2023 and continuing through to Spring 2024.
The Theme – Home
Is home a place?
A country, region or specific location?
Or is it simply an organised pile of bricks and mortar?
Where do you feel ‘at home’?
Is home just a feeling?
A sense of belonging, of community, of security?
Is the Isle of Man home? If it is, is that through birth, choice or circumstance?
Are you away from home?
It could be argued that modern society suffers from many more people being away from home than ever before: many more people without a sense of belonging or a sense of a place as home; many more people being displaced through circumstance (conflict/famine/poverty/economics etc.). How does this affect a communal sense of home; a communal sense of belonging/ownership?
What is being ‘homesick’?
Does home matter?
Or is it ‘wherever you hang your hat’?
Important dates
Deadline for submission of artwork via digital format is Friday 1st September 2023.
Artists will be notified in early October if the curators have selected the work to be included in the exhibition.
A photo session of work will be arranged in October 2023 for those that need help getting a catalogue image of their work.
The selected artworks should be delivered to the Manx Museum on the 11th November (date and times will be confirmed to exhibiting artists nearer the time).
Exhibition opens Saturday 18th November 2023 with a launch event.
Exhibition closes April 2024 (closing date to be confirmed).
Exhibition Curators
Michael Sandle RA:
Although born elsewhere, Michael spent many of his formative years on the Island and has a continued fondness for the place. He has actively maintained his support of the development of art provision on the Island, standing as Patron of the IOM Arts Council and the Sayle Gallery. Michael Sandle studied at Douglas School of Art from 1951 to 1954 and then the Slade School of Fine Art, London from 1956 to 1959.
Michael has enjoyed a long career as a respected British Sculptor and monumental examples of his work can be found across the world (including four public pieces of sculpture on the Island, along with drawings and prints). He has also had a long career as a professor of sculpture in Germany where he lived and worked for a number of years.
Michael is represented in many important art publications and collections including: V&A; Tate Britain; Imperial War Museum; British Museum; Metropolitan Museum, New York; Städtische Kunsthalle, Mannheim, Germany: Australian National Gallery, Canberra; Hakone Open Air Museum, Japan and The Henry Moore Institute, Leeds. He has exhibited in numerous group exhibitions in Britain and internationally including the 5th Paris Biennale, 4th and 6th Documenta and Sao Paulo Biennale.
Ian Coulson:
Ian has practiced as an artist and art educator on the Island most of his life. He himself trained under Norman Sayle and then went on to inspire countless young Manx artists as the leader of the Art Foundation course at Isle of Man College. Since retiring, Ian has managed a more prolific output of artwork and a recent project about Peel driftermen has been bought in it’s entirety by the Isle of Man Arts Council for their Loan Collection. At the end of 2021, Ian had a very successful exhibition of his large-scale paintings/drawings of Douglas buildings and places. At the same time, he and Valerie Cottle launched their joint publication which combined Ian’s artworks and memories alongside Val’s researched stories about the town. Further Manx town studies are hopefully in the pipeline.
Katie King:
Katie is a part of the curatorial team at Manx National Heritage with responsibility for Social History and Art. Katie co-curates many of the exhibitions staged at the Museum. Most recently she oversaw the major Museum 100 exhibition, to mark 100 years since the inception of the Manx Museum in Douglas and 100 years of building the amazing and diverse collections held there.
Katie considers herself to be, chiefly, a Social Historian and it will be her expertise in this area which will colour her approach to selecting works for the Home exhibition. She will have a particular interest in the stories behind the works and their context within/relevance to an overall document of our experiences/thoughts in the 21st century.
Assisted by: Hannah Murphy MNH and Carola Rush, representing The Creative Network.
Submission requirements
The selection of artwork will be made through submitted digital image(s) and accompanying artist statement, which outlines the ideas behind the work and how it links to the exhibition theme, along with other details such as installation instructions/requirements, dimensions, media used etc. Artists will be notified if they have been selected for the final exhibition and will be requested to deliver their artwork(s) to the Manx Museum for hanging.
Works must respond to the theme of the exhibition.
Images must be in jpeg format and of high resolution (around 5mb in size). These images will be used in the accompanying catalogue where suitable (there will be an opportunity to create new photographs if needed).
Digital images should be accompanied by: an artist’s statement outlining the concept behind the work; a description of the work (i.e. is it a single piece or a series of images which makes up a single work?); dimensions; installation requirements; the artist’s name; artist’s contact details; title of work and medium.
Submissions will only be accepted from current network members (for details of how to join visit www. creativenetworkiom.com/join).
No more than 7 images per entry should be sent. These can be of the whole piece plus detail images or a representative set from a work made up of multiple images.
Images and accompanying information (as a Word document or equivalent) must be sent via We Transfer (www.WeTransfer.com) to [email protected]
By sending images for the exhibition artists agree for the images to be used for the purposes of the exhibition and accompanying publicity material. Images will be used solely for the purposes of the online and physical exhibition/publicity and any exhibition catalogue.
There is no restriction on the number of entries each artist can make
Entries may include multiple images/objects which form a single piece of work.
There is a submission fee of £20 for each piece of work (this applies to works which comprise both single or multiple images), which will cover administration costs for staging the exhibition. This payment can be made via Bank Transfer to the Creative Network bank account (The Creative Network, Isle of Man Bank, sort code 55-91-07, account number 14068621). Please clearly indicate what payment is for i.e. Open Show submission and who it is from. Or, by cheque, made payable to The Creative Network, and sent to: Maureen Kennaugh, 41 The Promenade, Castletown, IM9 1BG, Isle of Man.
All works must be ready to hang/exhibit and be suitably labelled. Please note that all 2D works will be hung with mirror plates which will be fitted by MNH technicians, so work should be handed in with no hanging fittings left on frames (unless they already have mirror plates). 3D works should be supplied with a plinth for display (unfortunately, we have no plinths to supply for the exhibition but will try to assist any artist who may struggle to source their own plinth for their work. We do not want a lack of available display plinths to put any artist off submitting their work).
Any queries re submissions can be made to: [email protected].
| home_submission_form.docx |