stratford | Andy Roberts

I posted to youtube.com

Stratford Orbit Tower

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5hj-wDENOY&feature=youtube_gdata
- Tags:
- London
- Travel
- Stratford
- Orbit
- orbit tower
December 10 2011, 12:39pm | Comments »
I posted to flickr.com

The Stratford Orbit Tower

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aroberts/6487052787/

AndyRobertsPhotos posted a video:

The Stratford Orbit Tower
- Tags:
- The
- Stratford
- Orbit
- tower
December 10 2011, 9:30am | Comments »
I posted to flickr.com

The Orbit Tower London Stratford

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aroberts/6227532817/

AndyRobertsPhotos

The Orbit Tower London Stratford
- Tags:
- London
- The
- Stratford
- Orbit
- tower
October 9 2011, 4:44pm | Comments »
I posted to flickr.com

The Orbit Tower London Stratford

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aroberts/6228041320/

AndyRobertsPhotos

The Orbit Tower London Stratford
- Tags:
- London
- The
- Stratford
- Orbit
- tower
October 9 2011, 4:41pm | Comments »
I posted to flickr.com

Westfield, Stratford

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aroberts/6214554145/

AndyRobertsPhotos

Westfield, Stratford
- Tags:
- Stratford
- westfield
October 5 2011, 1:09pm | Comments »
I posted to flickr.com

Westfield, Stratford

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aroberts/6214550681/

AndyRobertsPhotos

Westfield, Stratford
- Tags:
- Stratford
- westfield
October 5 2011, 1:08pm | Comments »
I posted to flickr.com

Westfield, Stratford

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aroberts/6215061628/

AndyRobertsPhotos

Westfield, Stratford
- Tags:
- Stratford
- westfield
October 5 2011, 1:06pm | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

Is the Olympics skills legacy on track?

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/05/05/is-the-olympics-skills-legacy-on-track

Voluntary sector organisations in the capital have expressed concerns about local peoples’ ability to secure jobs during and after the London 2012 Olympic Games

This article titled “Is the Olympics skills legacy on track?” was written by Dave Hill, for guardian.co.uk on Thursday 5th May 2011 15.59 UTC I’ve been doing a bit of homework for a forthcoming Guardian podcast and found two things I’d like to share. First, the fun thing. That was from last September. The Games Makers programme is now at the selection phase, with successful applicants being measured up for different roles. But what will it contribute to the long term regeneration of East London which is, of course, the ultimate objective of the great Olympics adventure? How about the complementary London Ambassadors scheme and the Personal Best initiative, which was designed to prepare the long-term unemployed for securing some of the Games’s 70,000 volunteer roles and beyond that “encourage 20,000 people into work”? What about local peoples’ hopes of securing the new jobs in the pipeline at Stratford City? This brings me to the second thing. It’s less fun than Eddie Izzard but still deserves your attention. In February, the London Assembly’s economic development committee heard from guests who are closely involved with ensuring that East Londoners are equipped not only to take advantage of the employment and skills opportunities that the Games will provide, but also to use them to secure jobs and careers in the regeneration years to come. I’ve picked out a few quotes from the transcript of the meeting. First, a word of warning from Jonny Boux, the head of employment and training at the East London charity Community Links: [This] is a once in a lifetime opportunity for people in East London and I think there is a real danger that the focus, in terms of sustainability and longer term opportunity is lost…our experience tends to be, we are hearing a lot around the wonderful short-term opportunities…and the fact that people may find work for a month, but there are no guarantees beyond that.

Next up, Kerry Tweed, Director of Greater London Volunteering on the Personal Best scheme: The problem is that Personal Best is effectively finished now in London. I have not heard about any evaluation or any further work that might be possible to do with the around 4,000 people who have been through the programme to work with the training that they have been provided with to work with employers to see how that is transferable for them, to offer further support and training to move the participants closer towards work. The last stats that I had from Personal Best was that actually the biggest outcome for␣most people was they went on to further volunteering. Clearly, they need a bit more time to develop their skills, their confidence and their employability.

Committee chair Len Duvall asked about “barriers that may prevent long-term unemployed Londoners taking advantage of the Games Time opportunity.” Jonny Boux answered first: One of the main barriers is a lack of skills, particularly around some things you need for particular jobs, and also life skills is an important factor. One of the things that, particularly, our long-term unemployed people face is often a difficulty around reliability and low confidence. There is often a lack of motivation as well; it is what we call, broadly, life skills. Then, I guess, multiple barriers which can be anything from major housing issues to difficult family circumstances and financial pressures. Many people we support are heavily in debt.

Then, Lindsey Donoghue the Employment Manager of the Bromley-by-Bow Centre said: I would echo everything that Jonny said. Obviously some of the roles are quite short-term and that is an issue for some people in terms of them having been on benefits for quite a long time and feeling comfortable on those or perhaps feeling that coming off them might be a risk and feeling unwilling to do so for a short period of time. Also, doing roles like that they would need to arrange things like childcare; a lot of the people that we work with are parents. So, again, a short time role is difficult for them because they need to arrange childcare for that. Something that we have seen in our community is␣a␣sense of, “Well, it’s␣not really for me”. We have perhaps seen a limited number of people go into roles in the Olympics so far and because of that people sort of feel, “Well, maybe it is happening separately to me or it is not something that is necessarily part of our community”.

And here’s quite a striking speech by Roger Taylor, Director of the Olympic Host Boroughs Unit. If you asked anybody in the host boroughs what they felt about legacy, they would say that there is an ever-present danger that legacy becomes conflated exclusively with what happens during the Games and what happens on the comparatively limited, although very important, opportunities that will follow on on the Olympic Park. We feel it is terribly important to constantly remind somebody of what the bid promise was: the most enduring legacy of the Olympics will be the regeneration of an entire community for the direct benefit of everyone who lives there, and also to link that with the sheer scale of the opportunity that inner East London has within its grasp over the next 20 years. We are not just talking about the Olympic Park, we are not just talking about Westfield and Stratford City, although we think that is actually a pretty successful model largely down to people like Newham and Westfield themselves. We are also talking about the already-given planning approval effectively to double the size of Canary Wharf, and the very, very significant developments that we still expect to take place in the Royal docks and on the Woolwich and Greenwich waterfronts. Essentially, if anything I think the Mayor’s promise about 70,000 jobs is an understatement of what over the next 20 years is likely to be an opportunity in East London. The question then is whether or not we have got a sufficiently strong and clear vision to be able to ensure how that opportunity relates to the people in the communities in East London. I think that is where the really challenging questions lie.

On this evidence, I’d say that there’s plenty of work still to be done if a really impressive skills and employment legacy is to be delivered for East London in particular. Something for the Mayor to get a good, firm grip on.

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogIs the Olympics skills legacy on track?

Related posts:Iran claims London 2012 Olympics logo spells ‘Zion’ London’s 2012 Olympics must be a ‘regeneration games’ London 2012 Olympics countdown clock stops
- Tags:
- London
- greenwich
- newham
- General
- train
- Green
- East London
- Stratford
- sign
- 2012 Olympics
- Article
- Society
- Blogposts
- development
- Olympic Games 2012
- Olympic Park
- Dave Hill
- 2012 olympic games
- london 2012 olympic games
- Dave Hills London blog
- mayor
- london assembly
- Housing
- Londoners
- unemployment
- olympics
- sustainability
- East Londoners
- economic development committee
- Eddie Izzard
- initiative
- Lindsey Donoghue
- london charity
- new jobs
- objective
- outcome
- Roger Taylor
- Stratford City
- transcript
- Tweed
- voluntary sector organisations
- Volunteering
May 5 2011, 12:56pm | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

Olympic Park: name that neighbourhood

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/04/19/olympic-park-name-that-neighbourhood

Some sort of competition for naming the five Olympic villages for the London 2012 Olympic games in Stratford East London.

This article titled “Olympic Park: name that neighbourhood” was written by Dave Hill, for guardian.co.uk on Tuesday 19th April 2011 09.47 UTC The Olympic Park Legacy Company recently made known four of the entries to its competition to name the five residential areas the park will eventually contain. It says the four are a sample of the “hundreds” it has received, and quite an instructive sample it is. I’m guessing that the suggestion of Plastic Fantastic is aimed at Area 3 and a historical reference to the development of early forms of plastic in the old chemical industry area of Hackney Wick, where dry cleaning too was pioneered. But who would rush to reside in a place called that? Would it assist estate agents in their noble task of wooing purchasers of the mixture of flats and family homes destined to rise alongside the Lea Navigation Canal? Stylish modern living in, ah, Plastic Fantastic? The OPLC’s Duncan Innes anticipates it being “quite a funky little area,” with “lots of arty people living there,” perhaps because the new local industry is galleries. From the commercial point of view, I’d be looking for bog standard pretentiousness in that case. Leaside Quarter? Wick Modern? Old Laundry? The three other suggested names released are Little Athens and Redgravia, whose Olympic inspirations, though ingenious, are perhaps a bit too obvious, and Dog and Bike, which to me sounds like a pub and only a pub. Still, I suppose the efforts made public were chosen to give clues and motivation to other potential competitors rather than on the basis of quality, and they do concentrate the mind on the complexities of the task. It needs to be tackled seriously. The organisers reserve the right to reject all contenders if they don’t think they’re up to scratch and impose their own instead. Should the five neighbourhoods’ names be Games-connected or reflect local history? They can’t really be both. If Games-connected, should they have a British or an international flavour? If localist, how local? And if history is to be the guide, whose history should take priority? That last is, of course, a political question and there was more than a whiff of politics about the decision to elongate the park’s name to the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. Would such eager deference to royalty have happened under a Labour government and Labour London Mayor? The very Conservative Boris Johnson is plainly pleased with the monarchical association, and it is one that could in theory be extended to the neighbourhood names, giving the whole area a thematic unity. Charles Environs? Middleton Village? On the other hand, perhaps Boris’s predecessor, who played such a big part in securing the Games for the capital, should have a neighbourhood named after him to recognise his contribution? Alas, Kenton and Kensington have already been taken. I’d been interested to hear your suggestions for Olympic Park neighbourhood names, and I’m sure the OPLC would too. Full details of its competition and the five neighbourhoods are here and the BBC, a partner in the enterprise, provides further helpful information here and here. I’ll be away on holiday when this post goes live, which means I’m unlikely to respond to comments. However, I’m sure there will be more to say on this subject before the competition’s closing date of May 18.

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogOlympic Park: name that neighbourhood

Related posts:London Orbit Tower Rises at Olympic Park Who will live in the Olympic Park homes? 2012 Olympic Park: after the Games
April 19 2011, 6:36am | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

Olympic stadium completed on time

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/03/29/olympic-stadium-completed-on-time

London 2012 Olympic Stadium designers hail ‘the beginning of the end’ of the construction phase as the main arena comes in on schedule and under budget.

This article titled “Olympic stadium completed on time” was written by Owen Gibson, for The Guardian on Tuesday 29th March 2011 19.51 UTC The designers of the Olympic Stadium in east London have hailed its completion as “the beginning of the end” for the construction phase of the 2012 Games. As International Olympic Committee inspectors arrived in the city for a three-day visit to check on progress, organisers hoped the good news on the completion of the Stratford stadium would overshadow an ongoing row with the British Olympic Association over how any hypothetical profit would be distributed. Lord Coe, the chairman of the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games, watched Frankie Fredericks, a four-time Olympic silver medallist, lay the last piece of turf on the infield. The £486m stadium is the second major venue on the Olympic Park to be finished, after the Velodrome was unveiled earlier last month. “I do not want anybody to run away with the idea that this stadium is ready to stage a track-and-field championship tomorrow,” said Coe. “But as a chairman of an organising committee to be able to tick off this venue is terrific. It is fantastic. I think it will be an intimate theatre for sport and it has fantastic legacy potential, too.” Work began on the 80,000-seat stadium in May 2008 and the Olympic Delivery Authority, which is responsible for spending £8.1bn of public money on the infrastructure to host the Games, said its completion was a “huge milestone”. “The Olympic Stadium has been finished on time and under budget,” said ODA chairman John Armitt. “To complete a complicated project such as this in less than three years is testament to the skill and professionalism of the UK construction industry.” Rod Sheard, of stadium architects Populous, said he was looking forward to watching “this innovative design perform for the first time”. He added: “Its completion marks the beginning of the end of the construction phase of London’s Olympic Games.”

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogOlympic stadium completed on time

Related posts:West Ham win delivers Olympic Stadium option nobody wanted London Orbit Tower Rises at Olympic Park 2012 Olympic Park: after the Games
March 29 2011, 3:35pm | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

Will the Orbit become London’s Eiffel?

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/03/22/will-the-orbit-become-londons-eiffel

How does Anish Kapoor‘s design for the London Olympics Orbit Tower compare to Gustave Eiffel‘s Paris icon?

This article titled “Will the Orbit become London’s Eiffel?” was written by John Graham-Cumming, for guardian.co.uk on Friday 2nd April 2010 13.00 UTC At the unveiling of Anish Kapoor’s design for the Orbit tower it was compared to the Colossus of Rhodes and the Tower of Babel. But the history of those follies isn’t auspicious. The Colossus of Rhodes was destroyed by an earthquake after standing for only a few decades, and the Tower of Babel was, the book of Genesis tells us, constructed to glorify those that constructed it. I can’t help wondering to what extent the ArcelorMittal Orbit is being built for the glory of Boris Johnson, Kapoor and Lakshmi Mittal. And as details emerge of its Olympic corporate entertainment role, it looks less and less like a work of art. But setting the motivation of the creators aside, the worst comparison of all is with the Eiffel Tower. Gustave Eiffel’s iconic tower was not designed as a piece of public art, nor was it intended to remain in Paris more than 20 years. It was built as a grand entrance for the Exposition Universelle of 1889, and was designed to be easy to take apart. It became a work of art in the eyes of the world against the protestations of the Parisian art world. And it remained, in part, because of its utility. It was used for early radio experiments at the start of the 20th century and in 1910 the tower was used to detect cosmic rays. To this day its top bristles with antennae, and its bottom bustles with tourists. Another problem with comparing Kapoor’s structure with Eiffel’s is that what makes the Parisian tower so pleasing to the eye is that its shape was dictated by the forces of the wind, not by the foolishness of man. Eiffel is quoted as saying: “Now to what phenomenon did I have to give primary concern in designing the Tower? It was wind resistance. Well then! I hold that the curvature of the monument’s four outer edges, which is as mathematical calculation dictated it should be will give a great impression of strength and beauty, for it will reveal to the eyes of the observer the boldness of the design as a whole.” By following the forces of nature, Eiffel’s massive iron structure appears graceful and almost part of the natural environment. By comparison, Kapoor’s structure is a prime example of man demonstrating his mastery over nature. The sweeping shape is reminiscent of melted roller coaster ride, or as one Twitter user put it: “It looks like congealed intestines”. The horror of which was only replaced in my mind by the relief of recalling that Kapoor and not Damien Hirst had been awarded the design contract. But the worst part about comparing the Orbit with the Eiffel is the idea that London needs to rival Paris in the metal tower stakes. London already beat Paris to host the 2012 Olympics; now it seems Johnson wants to rub salt in French wounds. The copycat unoriginality of building London’s Eiffel verges on parody when one realises that the Orbit will be 100m shorter than the Parisian monument and 20m shorter than the diminutive Blackpool Tower. The true determinant of whether the Orbit deserves a place on London’s skyline should be how it is perceived by Londoners. It would be hard to find a Parisian today who hates the Eiffel Tower; Boris Johnson should set a 20-year time limit on Kapoor’s tower and let the public decide. If in 2032 it hasn’t endeared itself to the residents of Stratford and beyond it should be pulled down. Since the tower is to be made of steel it could be safely recycled. That standard has applied to at least one other London icon. The giant ferris wheel London Eye, after all, was initially a temporary attraction that married engineering prowess with a graceful form. It has stood the test of time and looks set to stay on the banks of the River Thames. In it London already has a worthy rival for Eiffel. And from it a panoramic view of London is already possible. Writing in the Times, the architecture critic Tom Dyckhoff described the tower as a “giant Mr Messy”. But initial reactions should be tempered by allowing time to pass; perhaps I’ll get over thinking it looks like a giant blood clot. Whether you love it or hate it, the last word should go to Johnson, who said of the Orbit: “It would have boggled Gustave Eiffel”. There’s no arguing with that.

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogWill the Orbit become London’s Eiffel?

Related posts:Orbit Tower in progress The Orbit Tower, Olympic Park Stratford East London 2012 London Orbit Tower Rises at Olympic Park
March 22 2011, 8:55am | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

Orbit Tower in progress

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/03/21/orbit-tower-in-progress

Orbit Tower (ArcelorMittal Orbit) #2 a photo by George Rex on Flickr. Orbit Tower (ArcelorMittal Orbit) #2 20110302 work-in-progress. The Orbit Tower will be one of the attractions in the London 2012 Olympic Park. There will be two viewing platforms accessible by elevator. Sculptor: Anish Kapoor, Structural Designer: Cecil Balmond. Design and Engineering: Ove Arup. The controversial red tubular steel tower will be 115m tall and completion is due in spring 2012. London Borough of Newham. Image: George Rex Photography) Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogOrbit Tower in progress

Related posts:The Orbit Tower, Olympic Park Stratford East London 2012 London Orbit Tower Rises at Olympic Park Olympics Anish Kapoor tower hopes to attract 1m visitors a year
- Tags:
- London
- newham
- photography
- sculptor
- flickr
- Stratford
- Engineering
- 2012 Olympics
- Orbit
- Olympic
- Olympic Park
- Anish Kapoor
- london 2012
- 2012 olympic
- arcelor
- cecil balmond
- george rex
- tubular steel
- work in progress
March 21 2011, 12:21pm | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

London Orbit Tower Rises at Olympic Park

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/03/20/london-orbit-tower-rises-at-olympic-park

Video show the construction well underway of the Orbit Tower at the London 2012 Olympic Park site in Stratford East London. Click here to view the embedded video. The 115m tall art sculpture with a public viewing platform is formally named the Arcelor Mittal Orbit, and will be 22m higher than New York’s Statue of Liberty when completed, which looks like a matter of weeks as the pr-constructed iron pieces can be seen waiting on the site ready to be welded into place. Further pictures and videos of the growing installation will be uploaded over the coming period. Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogLondon Orbit Tower Rises at Olympic Park

Related posts:The Orbit Tower, Olympic Park Stratford East London 2012 2012 Olympic Park: after the Games Big fire near Stratford, East London Olympic 2012 site
- Tags:
- Art
- statue
- youtube
- Sculpture
- East London
- Stratford
- construction
- 2012 Olympics
- Orbit
- Olympic Park
- platform
- Anish Kapoor
- New York
- london 2012 olympics
- london 2012
- 2012 olympic
- arcelor
- arcelor mittal
- countdown
- installation
- iron pieces
- public viewing
- statue of liberty
March 20 2011, 5:26am | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

London’s 2012 Olympics must be a ‘regeneration games’

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/03/15/londons-2012-olympics-must-be-a-regeneration-games

Unless the London 2012 Olympics deliver their promised regeneration legacy for East London, the whole project will have ultimately failed

This article titled “London’s 2012 Olympics must be a ‘regeneration games’” was written by Dave Hill, for guardian.co.uk on Tuesday 15th March 2011 12.57 UTC There are 500 days to go, the tickets are on sale and the big question on Radio 5 Live this morning was, “Are you up for the Olympics?” Well, I am, in spite of everything. Everything? Well, there’s been Locog’s miserable decision to switch the marathon route away from the East End, enabling overseas TV viewers to be spared seeing what real East Enders look like and instead compare their chocolate box mental images of Buck House with scenic pictures of the real thing. There’s the mad prices of some of the seats and the lurking whiff of ligging and privilege. There’s the colourful tale of Boris Johnson, his “fund-raising champion“, her former lover and the eighty grand that unhappy gentleman coughed up to help an arty monument tower immodestly above the Olympic Park. The result, being bolted together as we speak, is formally called the ArcelorMittal Orbit, though London blogger Diamond Geezer thinks only by people who write press releases. Then there’s the logo, which I still can’t learn to love. There’s the unending, well-meaning bilge about the Games inspiring a modern equivalent of Muscular Christianity, when we all know perfectly well that Britannia’s couch potatoes will take still deeper root when high definition telly makes it plainer to them than ever that serious sporting exertion involves pain. Most of all, there’s my bedrock scepticism about the Olympic project as a whole: I like sport, but the industry that attends it is absurd; I like the idea that London 2012 will bring prosperity to what has long been the capital’s poorest compass point, but am wary of the very concept of urban regeneration. Who really profits in the end? And yet I’m “Up for the Olympics” anyway. For one thing, is there a choice? The rash of post-credit crunch commentariat demands that London 2012 should emulate the austerity Games of 1948 struck me as joyless and contrary. There was no point in rowing back by then. The Games have long been a case of in for a lot of pennies, in for a lot of pounds and work like crazy to make the investment pay. For another thing, I live near the Olympic Park. Once these words are safely launched I’ll be running from my doorstep to the stadium and back as part of my London Marathon training schedule. Over the months I’ve watched the various venues grow from seed. I challenge anyone to stand on the Greenway linking Stratford and the River Lea and remain unstirred by the romance of the Olympic vision even if, like me, you fret that history will judge it foolhardy. I don’t mean patriotic dreams of sporting glory, intoxicating though they are. I mean those hopes that the running and the jumping, the pedaling and the diving, will indeed prepare the ground for the gradual creation of new London neighbourhoods that bring new jobs and homes to the Londoners who need them most and exemplify the best in big city planning. West Ham’s securing of the stadium as their new home was a hopeful sign. Neither their bid nor Tottenham’s was ideal, but the principle that the publicly-funded Games infrastructure should have some continuing public use has been honoured. Will the same spirit guide the sorts of homes built on the wider Olympic Park – the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park as it’s become since the general election – over the next twenty years? Will as many as possible be affordable to low-paid and even averagely-paid Londoners? Will the press and broadcast centres, which have formed before the sometimes disbelieving eyes of residents of Leabank Square, really give career opportunities to locals who lack them now? I could be applying for my Freedom Pass by the time answers to such questions are truly known. Tomorrow morning, the London Assembly will be trying to find out if those answers will be “yes”. Unless they are, more ominous one will soon arise. What were the 2012 Olympics really for?

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogLondon’s 2012 Olympics must be a ‘regeneration games’

Related posts:Iran claims London 2012 Olympics logo spells ‘Zion’ Olympic Games 2012 medal haul will beat Beijing, promises UK Sport Olympics Anish Kapoor tower hopes to attract 1m visitors a year
- Tags:
- politics
- stadium
- Boris Johnson
- project
- East London
- Stratford
- neighbourhood
- 2012 Olympics
- Environment
- Olympic Stadium
- Article
- Orbit
- Society
- capital
- Blogposts
- industry
- Olympic
- Olympic Games 2012
- Olympic Park
- infrastructure
- Anish Kapoor
- profit
- Dave Hill
- Buck House
- Dave Hills London blog
- diamond geezer
- london 2012 olympics
- London 2012 Olympics blog
- monument tower
- olympic project
- Regeneration
- The Queen
- West Ham
March 15 2011, 8:11am | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

Artist Anish Kapoor warns arts cuts are ‘rolling us back to the Thatcher years’

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/03/03/artist-anish-kapoor-warns-arts-cuts-are-rolling-us-back-to-the-thatcher-years

Anish Kapoor is the artist commissioned to build the Orbit Tower for the Olympics Stadium in Stratford

This article titled “Artist Anish Kapoor warns arts cuts are ‘rolling us back to the Thatcher years’” was written by Maev Kennedy, for The Guardian on Thursday 3rd March 2011 17.14 UTC The Turner prize-winning artist Anish Kapoor has accused the Tories of having a “castration complex” about the arts, warning that it will take decades to recover from the damage caused by current cuts. “Already they’re rolling us back to the situation of the Thatcher years, and that took 15 years for the arts to recover,” he said. “I despair of this government, they just don’t get it, they just don’t understand that citizenship, community spirit, all the things they’re talking about, can come from art, can come from a sense of cultural belonging.” “I’ve given up on them, I’m afraid. To me it seems that it is neo-rightwing policies being forced through under the pretence of being middle of the road and reasonable.” Kapoor, in uncharacteristically angry and political mood, was in Manchester for the opening of his first major exhibition outside London in 12 years. He fears that no young artist today will have the career boost from a public institution that he received when at 25 the Arts Council Collection, organiser of his current exhibition, bought some of his earliest work. The collection paid £3,500 for his 1982 piece White Sand, Red Millet, Many Flowers, which used intricate shapes and raw powder pigment. The money was enough to keep him working as an artist for many months at a time when most of his contemporaries despaired of earning a living from their art. The exhibition – at the free admission Manchester Art Gallery, now losing staff to voluntary redundancy and struggling to make major savings for a second year – includes loans from other public collections. Her Blood, three enormous reflecting discs which took two lorries to transport, is owned by the Tate but has never been exhibited in the UK before; a major mirror piece came from Bradford, and another very early pigment piece is from Liverpool, and has not been displayed for years. “The value of having these pieces in public collections is immense,” Kapoor argued. “Not just in money terms, though they are all worth far, far more than these institutions paid, but in being where people can see them freely, be inspired, believe that this is possible.” Kapoor is on a roll. His giant twisting red tower is already rising on the 2012 Olympics site, and he became the first living artist since Henry Moore to be exhibited in the royal parks when several of his mirror pieces were installed in Hyde Park last year. He mounted a huge twin city show backed by the British Council in India last year, his first in his native country, and he is also working on commissions for the Venice Biennale, as well as a site specific piece for the gigantic 13,500 sq metre nave of the Grand Palais in Paris. Surprisingly, although Kapoor is responsible for giant public art installations in cities across the UK, his last exhibition outside London was in 1999. He helped choose the works for this show, which include loans from his studio of new pieces in alarmingly blood-red wax. This is the second Flashback exhibition drawn from the Arts Council Collection, showing off some of the curators’ most inspired hunches, artists now world-renowned whom they backed in their earliest days: the first show was of Bridget Riley, and the next will be Gary Hume. The collection, now run by the Hayward Gallery at the South Bank arts complex, was founded in 1946 – “two years before the National Health”, as director Caroline Douglas points out – to support emerging artists, and holds work by Henry Moore, Lucian Freud, Francis Bacon, Antony Gormley and Tracey Emin. At a time when most cash-strapped public collections have pared acquisitions to the bone, it still has an annual acquisitions budget of £180,000, and adds around 30 works every year. As well as mounting exhibitions, the collection makes loans to institutions such as hospitals and schools. Kapoor looks fondly at the brilliant colours of the piece he made and sold just two years after graduating from Chelsea School of Art. “It made a huge difference. That a public institution had enough confidence in me to put its money where its mouth was, that meant everything.” Anish Kapoor: Flashback. Manchester Art Gallery March 5 – June 5, then touring.

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogArtist Anish Kapoor warns arts cuts are ‘rolling us back to the Thatcher years’

Related posts:Olympics Anish Kapoor tower hopes to attract 1m visitors a year Goldsmiths new arts complex 70 Years of Revisionism
- Tags:
- Art
- UK
- politics
- hyde-park
- Tate
- antony gormley
- stadium
- exhibition
- Stratford
- site
- 2012 Olympics
- The Guardian
- UK news
- Art and design
- Article
- culture
- Main section
- Orbit
- Thatcher
- Olympic
- Anish
- Anish Kapoor
- Caroline Douglas
- Exhibitions
- Gallery
- Hayward
- Henry Moore
- Lucian Freud
- Maev Kennedy
- Spending review 2010
- Tax and spending
- tower
- Tracey Emin
March 3 2011, 11:59am | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

Iran claims London 2012 Olympics logo spells ‘Zion’

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/02/28/iran-claims-london-2012-olympics-logo-spells-zion

Well this seems a bit crazy but the London 2012 Olympics logo has been controversial from the start.

This article titled “Iran claims London 2012 Olympics logo spells ‘Zion’” was written by Julian Borger, diplomatic editor, for guardian.co.uk on Monday 28th February 2011 14.29 UTC Iran has threatened to boycott the London Olympics unless the organisers replace the official logo, which Tehran claims spells out the word “Zion”. The logo, a jagged representation of the year 2012, has been said by its critics to resemble many things, from a swastika to a sexual act, but the Iranian government argues it represents a veiled pro-Israeli conspiracy. In a formal complaint to the International Olympic Committee, Tehran has called for the graphic to be replaced and its designers “confronted”, warning that Iranian athletes might otherwise be ordered to stay away from the London Games. According to the state-backed Iranian Students News Agency, which is frequently used to convey official pronouncements, the letter says: “As internet documents have proved, using the word Zion in the logo of the 2012 Olympic Games is a disgracing action and against the Olympics’ valuable mottos. There is no doubt that negligence of the issue from your side may affect the presence of some countries in the Games, especially Iran which abides by commitment to the values and principles.” The letter, from the country’s national Olympic committee, leaves unclear what “internet documents” it is referring to. Amid the popular uproar that accompanied the unveiling of the logo in 2007, there were some claims, particularly on conspiracy-oriented websites, that its constituent shapes could be rearranged to make the world “Zion” and some animations were posted on YouTube showing how to do it. An IOC official confirmed that the Iranian letter had been received but said: “The London 2012 logo represents the figure 2012, nothing else.” A spokesman for the London Olympic organising committee added: “It was launched in 2007 following testing and consultation. We are surprised that this complaint has been made now.”

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogIran claims London 2012 Olympics logo spells ‘Zion’

Related posts:Iran jams BBC’s Persian TV service Big fire near Stratford, East London Olympic 2012 site Olympics Anish Kapoor tower hopes to attract 1m visitors a year
- Tags:
- London
- East London
- Stratford
- 2012 Olympics
- UK news
- Middle East
- News
- Sport
- Article
- Iran
- Tehran
- Orbit
- World news
- International
- committee
- complaint
- conspiracy
- International Olympic Committee
- Julian Borger
- negligence
- Olympic
- Olympic Games 2012
- Olympic Park
February 28 2011, 8:43am | Comments »
I posted to distributedresearch.net

West Is West – review

http://distributedresearch.net/blog/2011/02/26/west-is-west-%E2%80%93-review

East is East was a stage play which I saw at the Theatre Royal Stratford some time in the 90s. So here’s a review not of the theatre but of a new film West is West.

This article titled “West Is West – review” was written by Peter Bradshaw, for The Guardian on Thursday 24th February 2011 22.15 UTC In 1999, East Is East was a smash-hit 70s-set British-Asian film and a key commercial cinema success of the New Labour era; it was a comedy about Pakistan, Britain and Islam that was of its pre-9/11 time, just as Chris Morris’s Four Lions is very much of our time. But this sequel shows that its scenario and characters have an awful lot of life and relevance left in them. Young Sajid (Ajib Khan) is now a tricky teenager, unhappy at school, bullied by racists and patronised by a teacher who presents him with a copy of Kipling’s Kim. So his formidable dad George (Om Puri) takes Sajid for a restorative trip to Pakistan, where he has been sending money to his first wife and family. His second, British wife Ella (Linda Bassett) pursues him out there, and effectively forces him to choose between identities. Perhaps it doesn’t have the novelty of the first film, but it’s refreshingly un-parochial, with charm and fun, and Bassett and Puri are reliably excellent.

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

Thanks for subscribing to Andy Roberts blogWest Is West – review

Related posts:The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee – review Radiohead: The King of Limbs – review West Ham win delivers Olympic Stadium option nobody wanted
- Tags:
- London
- theatre
- General
- Film
- Comedy
- stage
- Features
- Stratford
- family
- The Guardian
- Article
- culture
- Reviews
- Drama
- Britain
- Film & music
- Peter Bradshaw
- sequel
February 26 2011, 5:10am | Comments »