Northampton’s population forms the starting point for NN Contemporary Art’s 2015 season presenting different ways to think about diaspora. The programme includes artists working with ideas of migration, home, exchange and the ultimate future diaspora of the human race.
Third Space begins the season with an exhibition by two Northampton-born artists working with family, culture and personal history at a time when immigration is in the headlines daily in the leadup to the general election.
Sayed Hasan’s paternal grandfather was born in Pakistan and maternal grandmother in England. His multidisciplinary practise documents and response to identity, from his experience as a British mixed-race male. He uses lens-based media, performance and material forms to present personal narratives.
Sayed’s previous projects include My Grandad’s Car, exhibited at Heathrow Terminal 5 in 2012. Sayed Hasan and Karl Ohiri each travelled thousands of miles to Pakistan and Nigeria, in an attempt to bring their grandfathers’ cars to the UK. For Sayed, this car is a memory of visits to see family in Pakistan as a child and has become a symbol for contemplating the complexity of belonging to multiple places and cultures.
For Third Space, Sayed is making a site-specific piece in NN’s ground floor gallery. His work focuses on representing the space which forms as a result of culturally mixed world, how it connects with the past and offers new possibilities.
Vivienne Rattray’s parents were born in Jamaica and came to the UK in the 1950s, settling in the Midlands. Vivienne’s work is influenced by her experience as a first-generation African Caribbean from her family born in Britain.
Third Space presents Vivienne’s monochrome oil paintings produced from photographs of her childhood and family in Jamaica, as well as personal collections of postcards representing her conflicting ideas of home.
Vivienne has adopted the Scottish surname given to her grandfather of Rattray for her artistic practice. Vivienne’s works focus on the perception and visibility of culture, its public and private face, identity, belonging and gender roles.
Events
Exhibition tour with the artists
10 April 2015, 2 pm
Join artists Sayed Hasan and Vivienne Rattray with Curator Catherine Hemelryk for an informal tour of the Third Space exhibition.
From Art To Commerce
11 April 2015, 11 am–1 pm
9 May 2015, 11 am–1 pm
From Art To Commerce is a regular workshop at NN for artists and makers at all stages of their career. Run by NN’s Development Director Tracey Clarke, each session has a particular business focus from business modelling to marketing and finance.
Write Club
16 April 2015, 7 pm
Write Club is for anyone wanting to brush up on their art writing from artist statements to critical texts, get together for peer critique over a coffee. This session will look at artist statement writing.
Crit Group
21 April 2015, 7 pm
NN hosts the Crit Group for artists at all stages of their career to come together to discuss their work in progress.
The Social
24 April 2015, 8 pm
A social night to bring together anyone and everyone working in the creative sector across Northamptonshire.
Film Night
30 April 2015, 7 pm
To accompany the exhibition NN is screening a selection of previous works by Sayed Hasan followed by Good Hair (2009), Chris Rock’s exploration of African American hairstyling in this comedy documentary. Good Hair: certificate 12A.
