Art Club has moved to online lessons during the pandemic, and we have continued to deliver classes virtually until we know it is safe to return to our usual home at The Edge. We still have lots of Art Clubbers turn up each week and we are glad that they still want to join us and make beautiful art!  The closure of galleries and art organisations during this time has meant our young people at Art Club have not been able to take part in exhibitions and work with local artists like they usually would have. We have started going back to a bit of normality at Art Club, albeit online, but we have started making connections with artists, and like-minded organisations again which reminds us that life will be going back to normal again soon. Today, we want to share with you a few highlights from this year so far.

Pre-pandemic, we were asked by Marlene Mackenzie of Mooville Theatre to take part in the 21Pirates exhibition. It’s a regular film, video game and comics crossover exhibition, curated by the talented Ben Pinnock, and a team of like-minded organisations like Mooville Theatre. Ben and Marlene popped by Art Club before the pandemic closures to tell Art Clubbers more about the 21Pirates exhibition and Ben’s art practice. The exhibition, which was an interactive ship, with ‘scales’ displaying the artwork of artists, was due to open in Spring/Summer 2020 but was unfortunately cancelled because of the virus. We were recently contacted again by Marlene to see if we still had the existing work Art Clubbers created and if we still wanted to take part. Art Clubbers’ work went live at 2pm Saturday 20th March 2021. Our theme was an Art Club VS Pikachu battle. The aim of this was for Art Clubbers to think about, and channel, their strengths into anime/manga versions of themselves in which they would use their strengths to battle Pikachu! You can see the live event on the 21Pirates website at the top of the home page. 

During the Summer of 2020, we were also picked to take part in Art Connects’ Discover at Home trial. We invited both Art Clubbers and children from our very lengthy waiting list to take part. I nominated some of the young people for the TrinityTalent Class of 2020. Lola Simpson was picked as one of the Class of 2020 in the Arts Award category for Creative Flair. Lola took part in our trial from the waiting list and since then has been attending Art Club. Lola is a talented, focused and creative young person. You can read more about her nomination in Voicemag here. 

As we continue our journey our of lockdown, Art Club will explore what arts and culture offers are on in the West Midlands. If you are a local artist, or art organisation, and would like to work with Art Club, please get in touch with the Art Club Leader, Heather Wilson, on artclub@frictionarts.com You can also check out our work on Twitter.