New Teeth For The Old Cog

Mick will provide Machine Still Life workshops for adults, giving special attention to attracting Working Class or those people who would not normally attend art events. He will also host workshops for children based upon the heritage of their area culminating with a large outdoor sculpture at the Bostey Youth Centre. Of further interest his wife Aly will be producing a book telling the stories and history of the parents/grand parents of the Bostey kids - Walker having once been a proud centre of shipbuilding and heavy industry, now sadly all closed and the area impoverished. Wonder leads to interest and interest leads to learning - can we in some small way enrich the future of this community? (This project is kindly funded by Arts Council England).

Week 10 of the project.

Flat work. So far we have four oil paintings, nicely framed, three pastel drawings of machines and several pencil and charcoal drawings and studies. Friday saw the arrival of the "cabinet" for sculpture number one. Nice looking thing by Tecky Stu - we should be able to get a second one made, budget looks as if it will just about cope! Medium sized sculpture came together rather well this week so that's two down, one to go to meet Arts Council obligations. Not sure how "Sentinel" sculpture is going to fit in - keep plugging away, something may happen! Easter holidays should be over soon so we can get started on kid's workshops and sculpture down at the Bostey - their own heritage project will be started soon all being well.

Research trip to Darlington with Mark discussed at weekend - he knows people down there who restore steam locomotives and should be able to get me access to the workshops - watch this space. Need to revisit Discovery Museum and try to get to Beamish now the weather is improving. Meeting Rachel at The Biscuit Factory for a catch up and future planning re: exhibition, workshops and other matters. We seem, surprisingly, on schedule and within budget - well done Aly and everyone.

June - August 2023. Exhibition at The Biscuit Factory, Newcastle upon Tyne.

Consisting of two large sculptures, two medium sized sculptures and thirteen flat works. A research cabinet containing photographs, small machines and the project notebook complimented things. An opening speech by Mark Wilkes about Miner's lives and machinery was delivered. George and Christine provided musical entertainment. Refreshments by The Biscuit Factory. A large crowd attended, rather pleasing considering the unusual nature of the work. Comments about "originality" were most welcome. Three small paintings sold. Various pubs were visited afterwards.

As a result of the exhibition discussions ensued regarding collaborations between other artists and the sculpture: Michelle Goulder - textiles and rust. Hayley Hare - sociological enquiries about working class operators. Erika Tanith - photography. Amy South - shamanistic rituals.

Bostey workshops are now well underway and very well received - ten children's sessions delivered so far and build of the final large sculpture started - this is based upon the kid's own research and table top experiments. Operation upon my eye almost mended so an increase in work and productivity anticipated.

August - November 2023. Collaboration between artists Mick Smith and Michelle Goulder.

After some tentative early efforts Michelle decided that her response to Mick's work would involve printing rusty images onto textiles. A technique was developed whereby metal items found in Mick's studio were wrapped and tied within certain types of cloth and sprayed with a special solution. After a few days the image of the object was transferred and the results were either framed or wall hung. Michelle also found old tools of various kinds that had belonged to past family members and used these in a similar way - calling her part of the process "Traces". In November an exhibition "New Teeth and Traces" was held at B Box studios in Newcastle upon Tyne. ( see review by Mike Singleton elsewhere on this site).

New Teeth For The Old Cog continues it's journey and further reports will be forthcoming as events unfold.