On at the Tate until 29th Sept. I got a phone call from Tom Murphy's lad Ben who was one of the FACT guys who set up the exhibition on Monday. He said there's some cracking photos of Liverpool being exhibited. Never had the time to visit when I was in the 'Pool on Tuesday. If anyone gets the chance to visit, please post your thoughts here.

Found this article on the online Guardian:
[more (http://arts.guardian.co.uk/cityofculture2008/story/0,,2017940,00.html)]
"Not only did Liverpool College of Art act as a magnet for bohemians, beat poets and musicians, it also produced fine painters such as Adrian Henri, also a poet, whose panorama of Christ entering into Liverpool proudly stands at the head of the exhibition. And as well as revisiting some of Henri's lesser-known contemporaries - such as Maurice Cockrill, whose opulent super-realist canvases make Merseyside look like Hockney's LA, and Gordon Fazakerley, who left the city to form the Danish branch of the Bauhaus - the show presents that strand of poetically grim photography termed "miserable realism". Henri Cartier-Bresson came to shoot the washing lines snapping above the streets of Toxteth; then, in the 1980s, Tom Wood and Martin Parr captured the city at its lowest ebb, Wood becoming so familiar traversing Liverpool's public transport system for his "bus project" that he earned the local nickname "photie-man".

I never new Cartier-Bresson was up here, gotta check them out.

As the Guardian article referenced above says, the actual expression that Liverpool was the centre of the creative universe is attributed to Allen Ginsberg when he visited Liverpool in the Sixties when things were certainly happening in the 'Pool, music-wise and art-wise:

When the US beat poet and counter-cultural icon Allen Ginsberg arrived in Liverpool in May 1965, he declared the city to be "at the present moment, the centre of consciousness of the human universe".

As the article goes on to say,

Liverpool poet Brian Patten, whose floor Ginsberg slept on, says: "I think Allen believed the centre of human consciousness to be wherever he was at the time."

This was also my impression. In fact, I think he said the same thing when he was here in Baltimore, and I have heard it said that he stated the same thing about Milwaukee of all places. I have stated before that I imagine every artist has his or her traveling box of tricks that they trot out to delight the audience.

Chris

Carl Gustave-Jung, a much more significant figure in Western culture (IMO - it's debatable like everything else!) described Liverpool as the pool of life.

Pool of life, Centre of the Creative Universe. It suggests that something is stirring in Liverpool!

Bill Drummond (one time manager of Echo and the Bunnymen) produced this challenge as part of the exhibition

NOTICE

LIVERPOOL

In your 'Year of Culture' I challenge you to deliver

Something
That has not been shipped in from the outside world.

Something
That has not been mediated by experts brought in from the outside world.

Something
That has not been finaced by the Arts Council, The Department for Culture, Media and Sport or even The A Foundation.

Something
That is not retro sounding.

Something
which avoids blueprints that were drafted years ago.

Something
That is not sticking two fingers up to the establishment
In the hope that it will grab media attention.

If you succeed
You will win nothing but the respect of those that doubted you.

Something
That only Liverpool could do

------------------------------------------------

When I first read it I thought it was an interesting challenge. Then I thought about it some more.

When was the last time a city did something that hadn't been done before, ever?

His challenge both salutes and mocks Liverpool exceptionalism. He's not from Liverpool (I think he is a Scot?) but that seems typically Liverpudlian to me!

Hi Jericho

That might be quite a challenge to come up with something uniquely Liverpudlian. The one thing that I can think of is the Liver Bird.... although that in itself is arguably a version of the cormorant and derived from the eagle on the seal of St. John on the old charters. Certainly when you think of the Merseybeat scene of the Sixties it was heavily influenced by American rock and roll, blues, and folk, etc, the poetry influenced by the Beat poetry scene and English poetry traditions, etc.

Chris

Chris, the exhibition is on until the 9th September so you will be able to pop in and judge the tongue in cheek claim for yourself if you have time.

This one is also at the Tate - a good double bill?

http://www.tate.org.uk/liverpool/exhibitions/contemporaryartfromchina/

Bill Drummond (one time manager of Echo and the Bunnymen) produced this challenge as part of the exhibition

NOTICE

LIVERPOOL

In your 'Year of Culture' I challenge you to deliver

Something
That has not been shipped in from the outside world. Yes

Something
That has not been mediated by experts brought in from the outside world. Yes

Something
That has not been finaced by the Arts Council, The Department for Culture, Media and Sport or even The A Foundation. Yes

Something
That is not retro sounding. Yes I think

Something
which avoids blueprints that were drafted years ago. Yes

Something
That is not sticking two fingers up to the establishment
In the hope that it will grab media attention. Yes

If you succeed
You will win nothing but the respect of those that doubted you. I accept

Something
That only Liverpool could do Who else but a Liverpudlian has the whit?

------------------------------------------------


A Bucket of clean sand from New Brighton.

When I can get my scanner to work I'll post a photograph from this exhibition of the Granby area covered in snow. The houses are boarded up, the trees are leafless and impassive. A young, black Liverpudlian is running somewhere. On the wall behind him in white spraypaint someone has written:

NEWSFLASH!

THIS IS TOXTETH NOT CROXTETH
STRICTLY GANJA

Walk back to L8 in the swinging 60s
May 11 2007
by Catherine Jones, Liverpool Echo

http://images.icnetwork.co.uk/upl/icliverpool/jun2003/2/4/000B0336-716D-1EE4-A87280BFB6FA0000.jpg

THE bohemian world of 1960s Liverpool and places connected with Brian Epstein will be brought to life on two free walks organised by Tate Liverpool.

Darren Pih, assistant curator at Tate Liverpool, will lead the two-hour walk around the L8 area tomorrow.

The walk will visit many of the places that made the area a vibrant cultural centre during the swinging 60s.


www.tate.org.uk/liverpool/eventseducation/talksdiscussions/8619.htm (http://www.tate.org.uk/liverpool/eventseducation/talksdiscussions/8619.htm)

Source: icLiverpool (http://icliverpool.icnetwork.co.uk/liverpoolecho/news/echonews/tm_headline=walk-back-to-l8-in-the-swinging-60s%26method=full%26objectid=19083200%26siteid=500 61-name_page.html)