LSE Arts public exhibition
Date: Monday 19 September - Friday 21 October 2016
Time: Mon-Fri 10am-8pm
Venue: Atrium Gallery, Old Building
Changing the Landscape (@BarneyGriew), an ambitious new visual arts project by British artist and curator Sarah Kogan (), is a profoundly personal and deeply poignant exploration of the cataclysmic destruction, physical, emotional and psychological, wrought by the Battle of the Somme 1916. It was exhibited as The National Archives’ first contemporary art exhibition for the centenary of the Battle of the Somme and featured on ITN news in April 2016.
Supported using public funds by the National Lottery through the Arts Council England, Changing the Landscape follows Rifleman Barney Griew’s first hand account of his journey from Hackney, London to Northern France, training to become a mapmaker and scout in the five months preceding his death on the first day of the Battle of the Somme in Yiddish Street trench. During this journey, Barney sent home over 180 illustrated letters, photographs and photographic postcards, often writing more than three times a day for five months - leaving us a unique, multifaceted, three-dimensional view of the run up to the battle. Unusually, this unpublished archive is interpreted by Barney’s great-niece Kogan, who was originally read the letters as a child by her grandmother, Barney’s sister Fanny.
The exhibition consists of an installation of 14 display cases which include items and extracts of text from Barney’s archive, artworks generated by Kogan in response to his archive, The National Archives’ own material and a specially commissioned video installation by filmmaker Jeremy Bubb. To accompany the exhibition there is a bespoke illustrated artist’s publication including a foreword by Jeff James, Chief Executive and Keeper of The National Archives and an in-depth conversation piece by independent curator and producer Paul Bonaventura.
This exhibition is open to all, no ticket required. Visitors are welcome during weekdays (Monday - Friday) between 10am and 8pm (excluding bank holidays, when the school is closed, at Christmas and Easter, or unless otherwise stated on the web listing). Please note the exhibition will close at 3pm on Friday 21 October.
For further information email arts@lse.ac.uk or phone 020 7955 6043.
Just economics and politics? Think again. While LSE does not teach arts or music, there is a vibrant cultural side to the School - from weekly free music concerts in the Shaw Library, and an LSE orchestra and choir with their own professional conductors, various film, art and photographic student societies, the annual LSE photo prize competition, the LSE Literary Festival and artist-in-residence projects. For more information please view the LSE Arts website.
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