This week our Culture Radar guests are Eleanor Liverakou & Akil Morgan of Capoeira for All C.I.C.
Loved: LEAP Dance Festival was such a success, two years in a row! Showcasing the talent that Liverpool has to offer by a really great initiative and very passionate team.
Looking forward to: We’re really looking forward to attending the Liverpool Against Racism event and although it’s quite far still we cannot wait for Africa Oyé to return next year!
This week our Culture Radar guest is Lucy Byrne, Managing Director, dot-art and member of the Culture Network LCR Board of Directors.
Loved: I loved Shirley Valentine at the Everyman; I went with my mother in law who saw the original play there 40 years ago which was extra special. River of Light at end of last year was as spectacular as ever, but I also have to say I really loved the last show at the dot-art Gallery, Iconic Women, which showcased the work of 3 female artists whose work celebrates the achievements of amazing women, both local, national and international.
Looking forward to: I can’t wait for Liverpool Biennial, which is always a treat for art lovers, but this year is curated by the wonderful Marie-Anne McQuay, plus we have the biggest ever Independents Biennial running alongside, so its really going to be wonderful. Looking into next year, I somehow managed to get tickets for Jodie Comer in Prima Facie at the Playhouse, which actually felt like winning the lottery as over 30,000 people tried!
Trivia: dot-art also runs Liverpool Art Fair, the annual, open submission selling exhibition which takes place in the Royal Liver Building. After the success of our 10th birthday last year where we showcased over 200 local artists, we are returning this summer from 11th July – 25th August. Artists who would like to get involved can submit work until 25th May!
This week our Culture Radar guest is Paul Doyle, Director, Leap Dance Festival.
Loved: I absolutely loved Glitterbox at Blackstone Warehouse last month: great vibe, good crowd, lots of disco house and David Morales. The Leap team also really enjoyed DaDaFest’s closing cabaret event: EAT ME x DadaFest present: RAGE (particularly Jay Farley’s reading from their new poetry collection A [Cupboard] Full of Tomboys, and songs from Crip Ladywood).
Looking forward to: Obviously we’re gearing up for the return of Leap Dance Festival (26th April – 9th May), and I’ve got my tickets for Radio 1’s Big Weekend and Cream Classical! It’s amazing to have so much happening in the city this summer – the team are also really excited about Liverpool Biennial and Independents Biennial 2025.
Trivia: Leap Dance Festival has been part of Liverpool City Region’s cultural calendar for nearly 30 years (formerly as part of Merseyside Dance Initiative’s annual programme). Chaos Arts CIC revived the festival in 2024 following the permanent closure of MDI in 2022, and last year we brought dance to over 37,000 people locally!
This week our Culture Radar guest is Laura Pye, Director/ CEO at National Museums Liverpool and member of the Culture Network LCR Board of Directors.
Loved: I saw Shirley Valentine at the Everyman recently and absolutely loved it, I have seen the play a couple of times and felt this version was both the most true to the original script I had seen and yet the most contemporary feeling. It was brilliant theatre.
Looking forward to: There is always loads going on across the city region so often it hard to keep up, as we approach the summer I am looking forward to WoWFEST25 in May and I have had tickets for Hamilton at the Empire for what feels like years!
Trivia: National Museums Liverpool will be 40 next year, whilst many of our museums and galleries are much older than that we were brought together as a national arms length body by an act of parliament in 1986.
This week our Culture Radar guest is Nicola Triscott, Director/CEO of FACT and and member of the Culture Network LCR Board of Directors.
Loved: DaDa Fest’s Zoe Partington’s Painting in Light, stunning text-based light sculptures conveying slogans and messages from disabled people’s activism, in venues across the city. Also the photos and engaging stories of women disability activists, artists and leaders at Open Eye.
Looking forward to: Excited for Liverpool Biennial, this year curated by Marie-Anne McQuay. And, at FACT, Amartey Golding’s exhibition featuring a huge chainmail sculpture created in collaboration with imprisoned men from HMP Altcourse. Sadly, I missed the hot ticket of Jodie Comer in Prima Facie at the Playhouse next year!
Trivia: Last year, FACT opened Studio/Lab on its top floor, a creative space designed to support artists who want to learn and experiment with digital and immersive media. We have a growing membership with opportunities to showcase work at FACT.
This week our Culture Radar guest is Madeline Heneghan, Co-Director, Writing on the Wall and member of the Culture Network LCR Board of Directors.
Loved: The launch of Jay Farley’s debut poetry book A Cupboard Full of Tomboys. Jay’s performance accompanied by techo music, was inspired and powerful. Rough Trade provided the perfect vibe and it was packed to the rafters.
Looking forward to: Sorry but it has to be WoWFest25! Our month-long annual festival returns in May and this year we’re celebrating a quarter of century of Writing on the Wall. We’re delighted with the programme and looking forward to welcoming old friends and WoW first timers, including Irvine Welsh, The Singh Twins, Gary Younge, Jackie Kay, Frank Cottrel Boyce and loads more. I’m very proud that during the festival we will be presenting Liverpool Rising Against Racism in partnership with Love Music Hate Racism & Liverpool City Halls in a cultural show of unity in the face of those that try to divide us.
Trivia: I’m the queen of the poached egg, no vinegar, no swirling – mine are perfect time. Trivia about WoW: We were part of the team that wrote the beautiful heritage plaques on Princes Boulevard. It’s one of favourite places in the city. Come and check it out.
This week our Culture Radar guest is freelance Writer, Director and Creative Facilitator, Helen Jeffery. Helen is also a trustee of Unity Theatre.
Loved: Up Next Festival at Unity Theatre in March which supported 22 artists all trying out work for the first time. A fantastic variety of work was shown over 3 days and I can’t wait to see what the future holds for some of the work that was previewed.
Looking forward to: I’m looking forward to Writing on the Wall’s annual WoWfest happening in May. This year its the 25th anniversary of the Festival and the entire month will offer an exciting programme of events comprising local, national and international writers, performers and artists.
Trivia: I am just over 4 years sober and my recent play ‘Buckled’ (which explored navigating sobriety) has finished touring venues in the Northwest last week! I run writing courses and workshops online and in person. The next 6- week online course starts 2nd April 2025 and all info is in my Linktree.
This week our Culture Radar guest is Patrick Fox, Chief Executive – Heart of Glass – we are a community arts organisation supporting the work of artists and communities. Patrick is also a member of the Culture Network LCR Board of Directors.
Loved: There’s always so much going on in the region – some recent highlights for me in the last while range from Irish comedy legend Deirdre O’Kane at the Playhouse, our recent collaborative levent with Duckie’s Posh Club at St Helens Town Hall – a brilliant queer performance and social club for over 60’s which was a sell out (plus large waiting list) and has received some of the best feedback we’ve ever had for an event, and was a complete joy all round, and then of course there was the LCR Culture and Creativity Awards where it was great to hear about the breadth and depth of work taking place amongst our peers and partners across the region. We were delighted to be nominated for our long term collaboration with Artist Mark Storor titled The Suicide Chronicles, and shout out to MAKE CIC, our partners in Huyton who were recognised for their brilliant work as Arts Organisation of the Year.
Looking forward to: The Liverpool Biennial is just around the corner, and curated by the brilliant Marie-Anne McQuay, and that is always a brilliant showcase that allows us to see and experience our city differently. Our ongoing project called How to Look After a Grieving Elephant (and other social animals), produced in partnership with Wonder Arts and Willowbrook Hospice and Child Bereavement UK is a really beautiful project and with the support of St Helens Art in Libraries will be touring library venues over the course of the year so I’m excited to see how that is received – needless to say I would highly recommend it.
Trivia: We turned 10 in 2024 and a lot of people don’t know that we were named after the Werner Herzog film of the same name in which a local artist known for making brilliant glass sculptures dies without passing on to anyone the skills of his trade, leading the owner of the town’s glass factory to obsessively attempts to recover the deceased artist’s lost knowledge. Not necessarily his best work, but a story that resonated with our origins in St Helens and our belief that art and artists are a critical part of a functioning civil society. Ps. the Blondie song is also a tune!
This week our Culture Radar guest is our LJMU Discovery Intern Tara Moyes.
Loved: I loved the Iconic Women exhibition at dot-art. Any celebration of women is going to be right up my street but this exhibition in particular blew me away with its incredible artwork and of course getting to see some familiar favourites such as Amy Winehouse, Lauryn Hill and Kim Cattrall.
Looking forward to: The No Iconic Images.Views of War exhibition at Open Eye Gallery about war photography. I currently study Journalism, so any kind of photo journalism is interesting to me. It’s also so important to look into the power of imagery and how it influences us especially in a digital age.
Trivia: I actually did Ballet for 12 years, from the age of 4-16 which is quite a long time! When I was younger I wanted to be Angelina Ballerina so badly and then I guess I just never quit until COVID came along.
Our first Culture Radar guest this week is Director at First Take, and Culture Network LCR Board Member, Jay Farley.
Loved: Loving Open Eye in general I love all their stuff – Regenerative farming and poets was especially fantastic, and RAVE ON. The Walker Art Galley – Conversations exhibition and in particular a piece by Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley where I got to experience a pro black pro trans space that also generously found space to consider and include me as a white trans person. It was interactive, engaging and liberating. I got to bury my dead name which was very emotional, cathartic and I felt seen.
Looking forward to: A shameless plug! I’m looking forward to the launch of my book A [Cupbard] full of Tomboys at Rough Trade Records Liverpool on 19th March which I will perform as a TRANS industrial techno meets uplifting /dance dance beat poetry experience. I’ll be accompanied by Meave aka Quieting who will bring the sounds and sequencers. We are connected through our mutual relationship with being trans and will be exploring how that has reshaped how we experience time. We both lived for decades outside of our true selves! What happened in those years?? So it’s about loss and missing time, but also celebration and joy of finally getting to be ourselves. It’s gonna be FUN and inclusive for all 🙂
Trivia: I D-locked myself to a hat stand in the Swiss Embassy once.