Interest area: culture

The Walker Art Gallery has announced a ground-breaking new exhibition combining fashion, football and art, as told from the terraces of the stadiums. Art of the Terraces is the first major exhibition to tell the story of a movement that defined sports culture of the 1970s, 80s and 90s.

This pioneering exhibition considers the culture of football ‘casuals’, which began on Britain’s football terraces in the late 1970s. Through the medium of art, it highlights the clothing brands and sports footwear, music and encounters between rival groups of football supporters which defined an era and generation.

In a fusion of art, fashion and popular culture, Art of the Terraces explores the work of a generation of contemporary artists and designers who have been influenced by this movement over the last 40 years. It celebrates a cultural scene that has been overlooked by the mainstream art world, but which has created its own dynamic art forms and which is now credited with the mass popularisation of sportswear as leisurewear – a worldwide phenomenon.

Visitors will see artwork by leading contemporary artists such as Leo Fitzmaurice, Turner Prize winners Mark Leckey and Mark Wallinger, Pete McKee, Lucy McKenzie, Ross Muir and Dave White.

Pauline Rushton, Head of Decorative Arts at National Museums Liverpool, said: “It’s been our ambition for a long time to hold an exhibition of this kind at the Walker. Terrace culture originated among football fans here in the North West in the 1970s, and it’s difficult to overemphasise quite how far-reaching its influence has become.

“We’ll consider the highs and lows of going to the match, and the sense of identity and belonging that could be discovered and signalled to others through wearing a certain pair of trainers or branded sports top.”

The story of the movement, its wider significance in British and European popular culture and its artistic legacy will be told through more than 100 paintings, graphic designs and fashion items, as well as video and installation art.

This movement created a whole new approach to fashion, which still inspires brand loyalty today, and has attracted a new generation of fans of retro and classic sportswear and footwear. National Museums Liverpool is the first British museum to present the story of this sub-culture, which has had significant and far-reaching influence.

Dave Hewitson, exhibition partner and creator of the 80sCasuals website and clothing brand, said: “This wasn’t just a group of kids following fashion and wearing the latest trends, these kids were creating their own trends and style. The clothes, the attitude and ultimately the match defined the culture.”

Art of the Terraces is led by National Museums Liverpool in collaboration with four external partners: Dave Hewitson, creator of the 80sCasuals website and clothing brand; Hamburg-based artist Jens Wagner; illustrator Peter O’Toole and brand designer Adam Gill of Grammar Studio, Huddersfield. Staff and students of the Fashion: Design & Communication BA (Hons) course at Liverpool’s John Moores University are also collaborating on the exhibition. It is supported by Scotts Menswear and Tessuti.

If visitors enjoy Art of the Terraces, we’re asking them to pay what they think is appropriate, to support our museums and art galleries. Visitor contributions enable us to offer a rich programme of exhibitions and events, and support us in caring for our internationally known collections and reaching thousands of young people each year.

liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/artoftheterraces 

 

This summer the Bluecoat will open a new heritage exhibition The Bluecoat’s Looked After Children, examining the history of the building as a charity school and the unheard voices of the children it housed.

This exhibition brings archival material relating to the school together with contemporary art, including documentation of past Bluecoat exhibitions and performances that have interrogated this history.

The Bluecoat has worked directly with a group of adults with experience of the modern care system, along with creatives, to research some of the individual children identified in the school’s archive. Under the guidance of Liverpool writer Margy McShane the participants have creatively reimagined the lost voices of these children.

The work produced by this adult group will be featured in a new installation commission from interactive design studio Stand + Stare, which will form the centrepiece of the exhibition, and bring to life some of the stories of the children from the Bluecoat’s past.

Liverpool-based dance artist Paula Hampson has collaborated with a second group of participants, young people from Kinship Carers, to further explore the day to day life of a nineteenth-century Blue Coat pupil. Kinship Carers are an organisation supporting children looked after by family members and friends.

The Bluecoat building was originally a school, known as the Blue Coat Hospital or simply The Charity School. Founded in 1708, it then occupied larger, purpose-built premises – the current Bluecoat building  – dedicated in 1717 to ‘train destitute children in the principles of the Anglican church’.

The Bluecoat was a boarding school for boys and girls, many of whom had been orphaned. The pupils led a harsh life, working in a ‘manufactory’ – making pins, spinning cotton and picking oakum – alongside their lessons. At the age of 14 or 15, many of the boys were apprenticed to merchants for a further seven years, while girls often were employed in domestic service. Some girls stayed on at the school, employed as assistant teachers for younger girls, or as laundry assistants.

After nearly two centuries, the school moved to larger premises in Wavertree, where it continues today, and the Bluecoat building became an arts centre, the UK’s first.

Looked After Children is part of the Bluecoat’s Echoes and Origins project, exploring the eighteenth-century origins of the building through an engagement with local people. The first strand of this project, ‘Colonial Legacies’, involved young people interrogating the contemporary ramifications of the transatlantic slave trade that many Liverpool merchants who funded the school, notably its founder Bryan Blundell and his sons, were involved in.

A Family Day on Sunday 17 July from 11am-4pm will celebrate the opening weekend of the exhibition. This event will feature spoken word performances in the Bluecoat’s garden, craft activities and a special performance from young participants working with dance artist Paula Hampson.

A full programme of events will accompany this exhibition in September. Details will be announced nearer the time on the Bluecoat website.