Kong Lear

After a busy week getting everything ready for the launch of our Excess All Areas exhibition at Leeds Gallery, I have finally found five minutes to write about another art exhibition that is open until tomorrow at Bar Lane Studios in York.

Kong Lear is the outcome of a collaboration between two artists, Claire Hind (pictured above) and Gary Winters. The pair held a special preview last week, and talked about the development of their work together and the multi-media exhibition that punctuates their progress to-date.

Claire and Gary came together around the writing of a solo performance project, Ghost Track (coming to York Theatre Royal in April), in which Claire explores the "complexities of the psyche, the workings of the vocal chords and the intricate and anxious lives we can lead" through successive and often comical re-tellings of act one scene one of King Lear. As Claire explained, "Kong Lear came about from a slip of the tongue, an unconscious play on words, that revealed what we both felt was a potential worth persuing." That potential is exposed in the interplay between the two charachters (King Lear and King Kong) and two locations (York and New York), and in Claire's interest in the work of Sigmund Freud. "We like the idea that Kong is inside Lear's psyche – imagine that. And we like the idea that Kong Lear is a woman. Freud would have a field day."

The exhibition, which includes prints, text and sound installations and an 8mm film, documents Gorrilla Mondays, a programme of events during which Claire led small groups on a performance through the streets on York. If you find yourself on those streets yourself this weekend, I'd highly reccommend that you head down to Bar Lane Studios to check it out - especially the film, which is beautifully made and hilariously funny. There is a special, early evening viewing between 4pm and 7pm tomorrow, after which the exhibition will close.

Hebe hits New York

Welcome to AmericaHooking up with our boy W+K and Barca homie Kev.Times SquareChrysler BuildingHebe's Lee looking worried in -10 tempsSupernatural boys must be hereCarnival of the Animals @ Bergdorf GoodmanCarnival of the Animals @ Bergdorf Goodman
Some amazing architecture Leeds' Thought Bubble reppin'Hebe's Shang-Ting in Central Park

KIT CAT CLUB & PAUL FRYER

Team Hebe are currently working away on a new exhibition launching in Leeds Gallery very soon, featuring some of the amazing artwork of Back to Basics. Our research and planning has led to us rediscovering some of the best memories and music from the 90's clubbing scene in Leeds.

The Back to Basics exhibition will feature a special piece of work, created for the exhibition by Leeds expat Paul Fryer. While doing some research into Paul's work and his relationship to Leeds, we stumbled upon this gem of a video from The Kit Kat Club, which spawned the legendary Vague. To quote the video description:

"The Kit Kat Club, filmed in 1992 on 16mm. It was assembled with a selection of tracks that the lucky members of the club might well have heard at the time. The KKC was created by Paul Fryer and Suzy Mason as an antidote to the impersonal and often malevolent night clubs that were the grotty and uninspiring norm at that time, and was brought into being by them in association with Peter Master and the late Paul Lamont. The KKC had a cigarette girl, a cage, blue cocktails and cheap champagne, a variety act most weeks, a cage for dancing in and some very glamorous and funny clientele. The club later transmogrified into the legendary Leeds mixed club vague, who's history is a little better documented. I hope you enjoy this little piece of club history, with my Best Wishes, Paul Fryer (thanks Howard Storey for finding the footage, this short was created from rushes of the Cud video Purple Love Balloon, which was filmed in the KKC and directed by Chris Madden and produced by Steve Shone.)"

We have much more coming on Back to Basics and Paul Fryer in the next couple of weeks as the exhibition begins proper!

January In Pics

Simon and Dave working on the Back2Basics exhibition2.8 Days Later media judges screeningICS PimpinShang-Ting helping out with the Back2Basics exhibition Happy chinese new year! Celebrating with a 'BBQ'Years Of Back2BasicsWe love charming things like this around the city!Great Monday meeting with some great young minds, nice food too :)Our good luck gift from Dave BeerMarket Sweeties are for winners!Despite their rubbish chargers, we can't resistDJ MAG article on best flyers ever... good timing!Billy Bad-Ass returning to form with the brandy ;)

Do or DIY - a new project announcement

We are pleased to announce that York based information as material, an artists collective that includes our very own Simon Zimmerman, have been offered a month long exhibition at one of the world's most prestigious contemporary art galleries, the Whitechapel.

The exhibition will consolidate a year long programme undertaken by information as material as the gallery's 'Writers in Residence', and will be based on an essay, entitled Do or DIY, written by information as material as the foreword to the 2011 London Art Book Fair.

Do or DIY uncovers a hidden history of DIY publishing that begins (in the essay, at least) with Laurence Sterne (1713-68) and ending (for now, at least) with Kathy Acker (1947-97). It concludes with call-to-action that captures the ethos of the forthcoming exhibition: "Don't wait for others to validate your ideas. Do it yourself."

In addition the exhibition, which will open in London in spring 2012, has been selected by the crowdfunding platform wedidthis.org.uk as one of the nine projects it will promote throughout January, with a fundraising target of £1,500. You can donate as little or as much as you like, but for donations over £50 people will receive a signed copy of the accompanying publication with a printed credit (Thanks to...), and for donations over £500 the publication will be hand-printed - only three of these will ever be made.

More to follow on the exhibition in February.