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What
was lost? biro ink and paper on found shopping
trolley, Air Gallery Open, 2018
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What
was lost? biro ink and paper on found shopping
trolley, 2018
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Simon
Woolham and Ruby Tingle, Manchester Museum performance (as the Gold Frog) and Past Present Future drawing commission
for the New Mills Festival, graphite rubbings on paper and suites, 2018
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Simon
Woolham and Ruby Tingle, Past Present
Future drawing commission for the New Mills Festival, graphite rubbings on paper
and suites, 2018
|
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Simon Woolham and Ruby Tingle NQL (Not
Quite Light) performance commission 2019
|
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Paper Cuts Exhibition, Brighton and Hove
Museum, paper installation, 2006
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Walking Routes, Mapping, Excavating and Performing
Histories, Barnaby Festival performance with Helen
Walford and Heidi Jamila, 2018
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Walking
Routes, Mapping, Excavating and Performing Histories installation, Barnaby Festival, 2018
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| Performing PAPER, Body, Place, Space, Market Gallery, Huddersfield, 2017 |
My
work is concerned primarily with occupied spaces; school playing fields, junked
underpasses and the like that often contain text with the tone of dialogue and
the personal and collective narrative that unfolds in them. I explore layers of
history, drawing out narrative, glimpses of speech. The dilapidated
environments come to life in a skint version of enchantment: a tree stump or a
broken fence, are filled with the meanings of the events that go on around and
about them. At the core of my practice is the collaborative exploration and
encouragement of hidden human details, shared histories, stories associated
with belonging and the relationship to specific places and spaces; providing a
voice to often unheard vistas of history.
I
explore a variety of processes, specifically around expanded drawing and
through the concept of creating a physical, virtual and psychological artistic
residency of the mind, mixing live and digital platforms, encouraging narrative
associated with a multitude of spaces and times. In my attempts to unearth this
unpredictable and fragile process of layers of history, I utilise both
traditional and non-traditional processes, biro drawings, sculpture,
performance, paper interventions, animation, video, collaborative walking and
text. I see the biro drawings as a way of performing layers of narrative in the
present, through the act of drawing them out for both myself and for others.
This is processed through how hard, how soft, how detailed and how vague I am,
a representation of the layered spatial narrative plane.
The
work is unassuming, quite often made from simple materials and with seemingly
modest aspirations. It is their quotidian qualities, however, that charges them
with emotion, not that those emotions are easy to identify. It is not that
these works are personal or autobiographical that obscures their emotional
content, it is the fact that they are irreducibly, irrevocably unsettling.
These sites are the scenes of humiliation as well as innocent play, of
rejection and failure as well as fantasy and adventure.
 |
The Abandoned Halfpipe, for This
Land Is our Land, PAPER, Gallery, Kinder Scout rubbings on paper, 2019
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The
Weight, for This
Land Is our Land, PAPER Gallery, Kinder Scout rubbings on paper, 2019
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Into
The Valley, graphite rubbings on paper, 2019
|
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Art on Paper installation, BOZAR, Brussels,
biro on paper, 2016-17
|
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The Final Countdown, biro on paper, 2012
|
Bio
Simon Woolham's work is concerned primarily with occupied spaces and the narratives that unfold in them. His drawings of school playing fields, junked underpasses and the like often contain text with the tone of dialogue. Through these glimpses of speech, the dilapidated environments come to life in a skint version of enchantment: a tree stump or a broken fence are filled with the meanings of the events that go on around and about them. In his attempts to unearth this unpredictable and fragile process of memory, he uses biro drawings, paper interventions, animation, video and performance.
Simon’s practice as an artist, curator and teaching specialism is centred around expanded drawing research and methodology and this was the focus of his practice-led PhD at Manchester Metropolitan University. The PhD explored walking (in the broadest sense) and narrative in physical, virtual and psychological space, expanding on the notion of an artists’ residency of the mind.
Between 2000 and 2012 Simon exhibited widely, including a residency and solo exhibition at The Lowry in Salford and Chapter Gallery in Cardiff, as well as numerous national and international group exhibitions. In 2008 he was included in the first Tatton Park Biennial and in 2006 he was Artist-in-Residence at Baltic – Centre for Contemporary Art in Gateshead, he won the Mostyn Open 11 at Oriel Mostyn, Llandudno in 2001.
Simon continues to explore his practice and since 2012 he has been curator and artistic programmer of the artist-led gallery PAPER in Manchester. He has presented papers at conferences both nationally and internationally, most recently at ‘Mapping Culture’ a conference in Coimbra, Portugal, and a ‘Deep Mapping’ conference at UCL in London. Recently, Simon lead a project called ‘Art Work Placement’ with the innovative Arts organization Fermynwoods Contemporary Art in Northamptonshire, whose ethos is ‘infiltrating the everyday’. The ‘Art Work Placement’ project is directly informed by Simon’s particular area of research, generating narrative, and also explores how artists’ processes and ideas can shed light on traditional institutional practices. In this instance, Simon tested virtual and digital platforms with employees of a mental care institution, in relation to histories and sense of place.
Simon also performs as M4SK 22 and collaborates with the public and other performers and for Mapping and Interpreting Surfaces Of A Place, he built a large-scale collaborative drawing installation for New Mills Festival with members of the Walking History community and performed in the drawing with Ruby Tingle. This engaged with the spaces and surfaces through the physical process of creating and collecting rubbings from the interior and exterior surfaces of the architecture around the town. For Walking Routes: Mapping, excavating and performing histories he again built a growing, collaborative drawing installation at a Theatre in Macclesfield, made from rubbings mapped-out and collected from a 2 day walk along the whole length of the Macclesfield Canal ‘route’. For the unveiling of the installation Simon performed in the artwork with other fellow musicians.
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
Dr Simon Woolham MA, PhD, FHEA
Artist/Lecturer
0.5 Lecturer – University of Huddersfield
Rogue Artists’ Studios
Curator/Artistic Programmer at PAPER
Mail: simonwooly@hotmail.com
Tel: 07759 776848
One half of music ping-pong M4SK 22
One half of music ping-pong M4SK 22
.........................................................................................
Up and Coming Projects:
(Un)Staged (co-curating)
Group Show
Collaborative Exhibitions between Leicester Print Workshop and PAPER
Collaborative Exhibitions between Leicester Print Workshop and PAPER
WALKING ROUTES: MAPPING, EXCAVATING AND PERFORMING HISTORIES
Barnaby Festival 2018 Commission
MADS Theatre
This Land Is Our Land (co-curating)
PAPER Gallery
Manchester
29 June - 3 August
INTER-SECTION (curating)
Market Gallery
Huddersfield
26 July - 3 August 2019
DRAWING OUT THE CANAL
Show / Residency
Drawing Projects UK
Trowbridge
August - October 2019
Drawing Conversations 2: Body, Place, Space
Book Chapter (Space)
Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Launching October 2019
Click on the link for film works. www.axisweb.org/p/simonwoolham
CV:
Simon Woolham
Rogue
Artists’ Studios
www.insearchoftheshortcuts.co.uk
Email: simonwooly@hotmail.com
Mobile: 07759 776848
Education
2012 – 2016 Manchester Metropolitan University
Funded Practice-Led PhD,
MIRIAD – Manchester Metropolitan University: Pass
1999 – 2000 Chelsea
College of Art
MA Fine Art, Grade:
Distinction
1996 – 1999 Manchester
Metropolitan University
BA Fine Art, Manchester
Metropolitan University, Grade: 2:1
Exhibitions
Solo Shows
2019 Drawing Out The Canal Exhibition and
residency, Drawing Projects UK, Trowbridge
2018 WALKING ROUTES: MAPPING AND
PERFORMING HISTORIES Barnaby, Macclesfield
2017 PAST/PRESENT/FUTURE
NEW MILLS, New Mills Festival
2016 In
Search of the Shortcuts (with PAPER) Art On Paper, BOZAR, Brussels
Walking
Out From Home Cresswell Crags and Wirksworth Festival, Derbyshire
TAKING BACK SPACE: The Macc Walks Barnaby, Macclesfield
2013 The
Wanderer 20–21 Visual Arts Centre,
Scunthorpe
2008 The
Short Cut Kings Lynn Art Centre, Norfolk
The
Invader (curated by Elena Schmitz) Chapter Gallery, Cardiff
Dark
Corner Margaret Harvey Gallery, St Albans
The Bridge Was a Good Place to Throw Stuff
off Leicester Art Gallery, Offsite Project 2007
Shreds of Evidence (curated
by Danielle Arnaud) Museum of Garden History, London
On The Run Wexford Arts
Centre, Enniscorthy, Per Cent Commission
Our
Place BLOC Space, Sheffield
2006 Dark
Corner The National Glass Centre,
Sunderland
Simon
Woolham at the ARTS COUNCIL North East Offices Show and commission
Jerusalem Book Space Installation Dean Clough Gallery, Halifax
2004 Hanging
Out at the Lamppost The Lowry Residency, commission and solo show
Takeover
Floating IP Gallery Plan-chest, Manchester
2001 Simon
Woolham at the Hoxton Distillery (curated by Lisa Le Feurve) Shoreditch,
London
Selected Group Shows
2019 (Un)Staged
Group exhibition at Leicester Print Workshop and PAPER
2018 ROGUE RE-LAUNCH (curated by Manifest
Arts) Rogue Artists’ Studios, Manchester
Truth
and Fantasy (curated by Martyn Lucas) Various Venues in Yorkshire
like the
lines of a hand Centre for Recent Drawing (C4RD), London
2017 like
the lines of a hand (curated by Simon Woolham) PAPER, Manchester
for
space (curated by Simon Woolham) PAPER, Manchester
Intimate
(curated by Paula and Martyn Lucas), Isherwood Gallery, Wigan
AIR Open, Altrincham, Manchester
2016 Sound
and Vision (curated by Simon Woolham) PAPER, Manchester
Drawing
Works Inaugural Group Exhibition, Camden Picture Gallery, London
2015 We
Shape Our Buildings: Therefore They Shape Us London Art Fair
2014 Unstable
Ground (curated by Simon Woolham) PAPER, Manchester
Jonbar
Archaeology NN Contemporary Art, Northampton
Soft
Estate Spacex, Exeter
2013 Soft
Estate The Bluecoat, Liverpool
Performing
PAPER PAPER, Manchester
Fine
Art Schools Exchange Group Show Kunst Acacedmie, Dresden, Germany
2012 Meanwhile
John Hansard Gallery, University of Southampton
Digital
Romantics Dean Clough Gallery, Halifax
2011 Ink
on Paper DLI Museum, Durham
In Close Succession Group show,
Norwich Arts Centre, Norwich
Virtually Real London, Leeds and Cardiff
2010 Partnering
Wysing Arts Centre, collaboration as M4SK 22 and Abbas Hashemi
Virtually Real London, Leeds and Cardiff
The Great Outdoors Aspex
Gallery, Portsmouth
Performing Presence The
National Centre for Contemporary Art, St Petersburg
Animated Oriel Davies
Gallery, Newtown, Wales
Eastern Open 10 Kings Lynn Arts Centre,
Norfolk
2009 Open End Tank TV
(online), London
Parlourdoor - All through the
House New York
The Event Various Venues
in Birmingham
Project Pigeon – Pictorial (curated by Alex
Lockett and Ian England) Birmingham
In between the Lines – Recent British Drawing Trinity Contemporary, London
Le Roman Du Lievre: Marginalia
MTS Gallery, Anchorage, Alaska
Blue Sky Ruskin Gallery,
Cambridge
Celebration of Earth Day The
Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena,
California
The Kiss of A Lifetime
Rogue Project Space and various
venues, Manchester
Place,
Identity and Memory Gracefield Arts Centre,
Dumfries, Scotland
Eastern
Open 09 Kings Lynn Arts Centre, Norfolk
TESTCARD (curated by
Projeckt) Online Project, London
ANIMATED Wysing Arts
Centre, Bourn, Cambridge
2008 AQUA Art Fair with
Danielle Arnaud, Miami, Florida
LE60 Lumen Eclipse,
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Time is Love (curated by
Kisito Assangni) Octobre Gallery, Paris
Inside-Out Wysing Arts
Centre, Bourn, Nr Cambridge
The Golden Record (curated
by Mel Brimfield) Collective Gallery, Edinburgh
Stop Watch RSA Arts and
Ecology/Animate Projects Commission, various locations
Visions of the Nunnery The
Nunnery, London
Tatton Park Biennial 2008 Tatton
Park, Knutsford, Manchester
Margate Rocks Margate,
Kent
Eastern Open 08 Kings
Lynn Arts Centre, Norfolk (prize winner)
2007 ISOBAR Fieldgate Gallery, London
Bolwick 4 Bolwick Hall,
Norwich
Creekside Open APT
Gallery, London
Harry Smith Anthology (curated
by) Alt.Gallery, Newcastle upon
Tyne
Merdre!
Pendu Gallery, New York
Art
Video Västerås, Sweden
Snow
Domes The National Glass Centre,
Sunderland
2006 Too Much Freedom! Hammer
Museum, Los Angeles, California
One Love, The
Footbal Art Prize The Lowry, Manchester
EXPO Sonic Arts Cornerhouse
and Victoria Baths, Manchester
Visions of the Nunnery The
Nunnery, London
Paper Cuts Bury St Edmunds Art
Gallery and touring to various venues
Another Product
Cornerhouse, Manchester
Jerusalem Dean Clough
Gallery, Halifax
London Art Fair Work
curated by Danielle Arnaud and Pryle Behrman
2005 Artsway Open Artsway,
Sway, The New Forest
Emergency 2 Aspex
Gallery, Portsmouth
Perspectives 05 Ormeau
Baths Gallery, Belfast
Future Landscape Shrewsbury
Art Gallery, Shrewsbury
2004 La Petit Paysage Independents, Liverpool Biennial 04
Bad Kids Warrington City
Art Gallery, Collins Gallery, Margaret Harvey Gallery
I am a Curator Chisenhale
Gallery, London
2003 Drawing
Show Keith Talent Gallery, London
Prospects
Drawing Prize 03 The Truman Brewery, London
2002 May
it Return in Spades Bart Wells Institute, London
Blinc
G39 Gallery, Cardiff
2001 Sparwasser
HQ (Z-Bar Cinema), Berlin, Germany
If
the Wind Changes You'll Stay Like That Mafuji Gallery, London
2000 Mostyn
Open 11 Oriel Mostyn Gallery, Llandudno (joint winner)
Perspectives
2000 Ormeah Baths Gallery, Belfast
Dilated
Pupils V.T.O. Gallery, Bethnal Green, London
Becks
Futures Student Prize ICA, London
Uptight
Outasight Plus Gallery, Dusseldorf, Germany
Exit 24hrs Chisenhale
Gallery, London
Publications and Reviews
2019 Drawing Conversations 2: Body, Place, Space
Published Chapter
2017 Collective and Collaborative Drawing in Contemporary Practice (featured)
2014 Unstable
Ground The Guardian,
exhibition previewed by Robert Clarke
Drawing
Paper Distributed by Drawing Paper, Liverpool
2012 Pop
Ups and Drawings Publication published by Marmalade–publishers of
visual theory
2010 Rubric
Journal Spring edition
2009 Between
the Lines Recent British Drawings Trinity Contemporary, London
2008 The
Invader The Guardian, exhibition previewed by Jessica Lack
The
Invader Metro, exhibition previewed by David Trigg
The
Golden Record Exhibition reviewed in The Times, The Herald, the
Scotsman and Metro
Tatton Park Biennial 08 Catalogue
published by Parabola, essay by
Sally O’Reilly
Three
Artists Views Engage, 22
2007 Shreds
of Evidence The Guardian, exhibition previewed by Jessica Lack
ISOBAR
Publication by Gaia Persico and Angela Kingston
Shreds
of Evidence Publication published by Parabola with an essay by Lisa Le
Feuvre
2006 Our Place BALTIC/Creative
Partnerships residency
publication
2004 Hanging
Out at the Lamppost Metro, exhibition preview
I am a Curator Chisenhale Gallery publication by Per Huttner
Bunk Commissioned article
commission for the artist-led publication Bunk
2002 Mined Commissioned piece for the
yearly publication for Tank magazine
Awards and Commissions
2018 Barnaby Festival Commission MAPPING, EXCAVATING AND
PERFORMING HISTORY
2016 D-LAB and Junction Arts Co-Commission of The Rural Routes: Walking Out From Home
Barnaby Festival Commission TAKING
BACK SPACE: The Macc Walks
2012 Arts Council England Funding
for publication of drawings, lithographs and pop-ups
Brotherton
Library 75th Anniversary Commission
of new pop-ups
2009 Arts Council England Funding
for artistic development and research
2008 Enquire Commission for
Urban Origami at Kettles Yard, Ruskin Gallery and Wysing Arts
Tatton Park Biennial 08 Commission, Knutsford, Manchester
Stop. Watch Animate
Projects/RSA Arts and Ecology commission for Ecologically Film
2007 Arts Council England Funding
for ‘Shreds of Evidence’, Museum of Garden History, London
2006 50
Drawings in Snowdomes National Glass Centre commission, Sunderland
Arts
Council North East Offices Commission and show
Per
Cent for Art Commission and residency, Enniscorthy, County Wexford,
Ireland
2004 The Lowry Commission and solo show
2003 Bookworks Shortlisted for
Chap Books Series
2002 Middlesborough Art Gallery (MIMA) Shortlisted for drawing
residency
London Arts Board Artists
Bursary award
2001 Mostyn Open 11 Joint award
winner
2000 ACAVA First Base prize
winner (one year’s free studio)
Residencies and Education
Projects
2016 DAR Space/Place Online Residency
DAR, Online
The Remote Lab2 Project
with Fermynwoods Contemporary Art
2015 The Manchester College Contemporary
Art Practice course, Artist in Residence
2014 Staffordshire University
Foundation course, lecture and tutorials
The Manchester College Degree course, lecture and tutorials
2013 Lancaster University
Degree Course, lecture and tutorials
2011 Fermynwoods: Flow
Interchange Residency 14
days residency on a narrow boat
Fermynwoods: Forest as Film Public
Residency Thrapston, Northamptonshire
Museum as Film Workshops
at V&A
2010 Bedford Creative Arts Artist in
Residence Bedford
Imagine
a Film Storyboard Workshop at Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge
Wysing
Arts Centre Escalator retreat
2009 Vital
Arts Shrink Your World project
Chisenhale
Gallery and Vital Arts Residency, collaboration with Yara El-Sherbini
Creative
Partnerships Artist in Residence in collaboration with Science and
Art
Lancaster
University Degree course, lecture and tutorials
Media
Box Project leader on digital project with disadvantaged children,
WAC Arts, London
2008 Various
schools in Cheshire Part of Tatton Park Biennial 08, Tatton Park, Cheshire
West
Suffolk College Lecture and tutorials, Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk
2007 Bolwick
4 Bolwick Hall residency and
show, Norwich
2006 The
National Glass Centre Artist in Residence, Sunderland
Berwick Gymnasium
Shortlisted for Berwick residency
BALTIC Centre for Contemporary
Art Freelance artist
BALTIC Centre for Contemporary
Art/Creative Partnership Artist in Residence
2005 V&A Museum Digital
Artist in Schools residency
ACAVA Dianne Hughes
residency in schools
Lancaster
University Visiting lecturer
V&A
Museum Digital Art Workshop leader
2004 Lowry
Art Gallery Drawing residency with St Thomas Aquinas School, Manchester
Warrington
Art Gallery Residency at Young Offenders Institute, Warrington
2003 V&A
Museum Digital Art Workshop leader
CITAS
Narrative/Image workshops with refugees, Hammersmith, London
Workshops
in schools For production of Carmen, Kings Cross, London
Manchester
Metropolitan University Lecture and tutorials on BA Fine Art
2002 ACAVA Selected for
portfolio development and artists talks in schools
ACAVA Drawing and storytelling
workshop with refugees
2001 ACAVA Hurlingham and Chelsea School
children with dyslexia workshop
Curated Projects
2019 This
Land is Our Land PAPER, Manchester (Future)
INTER-SECTION
Market Gallery, Huddersfield (Future)
(Un)Staged PAPER & Leicester Print
Workshop (co-curated)
2017 for
space PAPER, Manchester
Like
the lines of a hand PAPER, Manchester
2016 Sound
and Vision PAPER, Manchester
2014 Unstable
Ground PAPER, Manchester
Conference Presentations
2017 Drawing Conversations 2: Body,
Space, Place Coventry University
Creative Practice Completion
Symposium Hospitalfield Arts Centre, Arbroath
2016 Deep Mapping UCL, London
2014 Thinking John Berger
Cardiff University
Mapping Culture Coimbra
University, Portugal
Public Collections
Potteries Museum
and Art Gallery, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire
MMU Special
Collections, Manchester
NN Contemporary
Art, Northampton
Museum of Modern
Art, New York
Wysing Arts
Centre, Cambridgeshire
Texas State
University, USA
Professional
Footballers Association Collection
The Mag
Collection, UK
Fermynwoods
Contemporary Art, Northamptonshire
Poppy Sebire,
London
Websites Links:
www.vimeo.com/user1038690
www.animateprojects.org/films/by_artist/w/s_woolham
www.drawingcenter.org/viewingprogram/portfolio.cfm
www.bbc.co.uk/dna/collective/A24030497
www.blocprojects.co.uk/programme/exhibitions/2007/simon-woolham
www.chapter.org/13795.html
Simon Woolham's
streams of consciousness make for very engaging artworks. He doodles his
memories and fantasies on paper, often adding little tid-bits of information to
guide the viewer through the caverns of his mind: places where he camped as a
child, bleak underpasses and school playing fields – the unassuming backdrops
against which the drama of his life has been played out.
Jessica Lack on ‘The Invader’ at Chapter Gallery,
the Guardian August 2008
Woolham’s poetic
interventions take a unique response to archiving by chewing, tearing and
twisting paper into elegant sculptures which are then littered among the garden
tools on display. On the walls are animations of these sculptures come to life,
creating a magical, after-dark impression of the gallery after closing time.
Woolham’s exhibition combines playful fantasy with a rigorous investigation of
the museums neglected spaces.
Jessica Lack on ‘Shreds of Evidence’ at the Museum
of Garden History, the Guardian August 2007
I am also curator/artistic
programmer of PAPER, an artist-run gallery in Manchester
One half of music/film ping-pong M4SK 22
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