That was so 2013 – How Future Artists Came Home (A Year in Review)
by Asha
‘Home’ is where the art is…
It’s that time of year again when we bring projects to a close, look back on past achievements and re-evaluate our future goals. 2013 has been a year of graft and hard work at Future Artists, and following the success of our recent pop-up Stewy exhibition and release of our new film The Lost Generation, we are definitely closing on a high. see 2009 – 2011 reviews here
Before we start tucking into our sherry and mince pies, however, we’re thinking seriously about our plans for 2014 and what we’d like to achieve in the year ahead. Following a series of intensive research covering a variety of events such as honesty cafes (at Futureeverything in March) pop-up art galleries and film premieres, as well as our 18 month residency at the Black Lion which ended in January 2013 (we won the GQ Best Pub in the North for our efforts!), we have managed to evolve and generate a new working model that we think will bring out the best of our active media co-operative and help take alternative arts venues to whole new potential.
Being ‘alternative’ is something we have always been proud of (Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible is our rally cry!), but as we enter our 5th year of existence as a brand and Idea, we have come to the realisation that we no longer want to be sitting on the fringe, where most alternatives find themselves situated. We want to be at the forefront of art happenings where we can evoke conversations with the mainstream. We want to bring new viewpoints to the table, bring excitement and encourage the ‘norm’ of society to be questioned and re-evaluated. We have ideas. We want to share, inspire and motivate.
We now have the confidence, the business skills, the creativity and the understanding of how to put all these into action to enhance and add value to our creative community, and help inspire other groups in the UK and around the world – so watch out 2014!
In the spring of 2014, we will be instigating a kickstarter campaign to enable us to put these ideas into action. Our campaign is to be supported by the Royal Society of Arts and a variety of partnerships and will aim to raise money for a unique art space for the development and growth of 21st century future artists across film and visual arts, to create jobs, sustainability for our sector and much needed funding for arts education and businesses development.
Our aim is to build something for the community, with the community, and we will be pulling together support from landlords of empty spaces, the media, Future Artists own live creative co-op, and anyone else who wants to be involved. Meetings will be held in the near future, so if you’re interested in attending and being a part of our art revolution, make sure you are following us on Facebook or Twitter to receive further information as we release it.
Please join our mailing at the top of the page to find out more and get involved.
2014 is the year for Future Artists to find their permanent home, and we hope it is a home you will frequently visit! Thanks for all your support throughout 2013. Here’s to the next year and all the exciting opportunities it may bring!
A Year In Review – Major Projects and milestones
January 2013 – Future Artists leave THE BLACK LION, handing over the purpose built Theatre and Cinema ‘The John Cooper Clarke Theatre’ which they built to JT, who was project manager at Future Artists – JT sets up her own business Chapel Street Studios, and runs the upstairs, renting it from the pubs owners.
March 2013 – Future Artists are asked by Futureeverything the worlds leading ideas and tech conference, to run the catering and cafe at the conference in an unused office block, but do it differently! – Future Artists create an Honesty Cafe, where customers pay into a pot their purchase and take their own change. Over 4 days the Honesty Cafe has over 800 customers and makes a strong profit for the collective – proving that honesty does pay! (Leaders of the free world take note!)
April – Channel 4 hire Future Artists to shoot 4 x 15minute behind the scenes films for the Channel 4 series ‘The Mill’
August – Future Artists release ‘RIOT FROM WRONG‘ a 1 hour documentary on why the biggest riots in UK History happened in summer of 2011 on Dailymotion – 50,000 views in a few days, and twitter is alight with debate and insights.
September – M&C Saatchi and the England Football Foundation hire Future Artists to be their ‘Film Team’ in the north, over the next few months we meet half the england football team and learn the offside rule!
EFF Academy from England Footballers Foundation on Vimeo.
October – Future Artists sign two broadcast deals for original content, a 12 picture deal with Dailymotion to supply curated documentary and fiction for their homepage once a month until Jan 2015 – enabling us to broadcast to Millions of people world-wide, in the same month we sign a two channel deal with Channel Flip and Youtube, to create bespoke ad funded content – ready for launching Future Artists video on demand in 2014.
November – After 3 years of hardwork by the Future Artists media collective, ‘The Lost Generation’ gets its world premiere at the Stockport Plaza Super Cinema (enjoy the photos here) – this was the month that Future Artists realized its potential and completed its major goal, to complete production on a feature film. – The Lost Generation is available to watch on demand now, or pre order from Sainsburys or LoveFilm today (Official release Feb 17th 2014) – our first screening of 2014 will be in Liverpool at FACT on 5th Feb – tickets here.
November – The Black Lion, which we left in Jan 2013, fails to pull in enough customers after ‘Converting to a cocktail bar and bistro’ – Chapel Street studios the arts and office space, which was profitable and sustainable running the upstairs spaces, looses it’s home, many of our friends are unemployed for Christmas, we at Future Artists are very sad – but via our co op network we advised people on spaces and people to meet to soften the blow 🙁
December – Future Artists launch HOME of Future Artists, a pop up Art exhibition by world famous street artist ‘Stewy’ at the Great Northern, Deansgate, Manchester – for 7 days we took over a massive empty shop, and turned it into a creative arts space, attracted over 500 people and generated revenues for our goals in 2014 – we also raised the profile of all involved in the venture with appearances on BBC News, BBC Radio, The Manchester Evening News and also Metro Newspapers – We would like to thank Stewy for donating his artwork, to ELP for the lighting and for the team at the Great Northern for allowing us to play in their space.
Thats all folks – Team Future Artists – Done for 2013…. read this tell us what you think @futureartists