New Art Exchange (NAE), Nottingham
2008
Architects: Hawkins\Brown

Next We Change Earth
Nottingham here, there, and everywhere

Preview: 6 Sep 2008
Opens: 6 Sep - 26 Oct 2008

New Art Exchange (NAE), Nottingham, announces the opening exhibition of the contemporary visual arts centre led by African, African Caribbean and South Asian artistic practice. The major £5m new facility opens on the 6th September 2008, with Next We Change Earth.

The inaugural exhibition is a group show of internationally acclaimed artists who have spent a significant period of their career in Nottingham.

Reflecting on the 1980s, Next We Change Earth is a fresh look at the aims of the ‘Trent Boys’ – a collective of students including Piper, Adrus, Donald Rodney and Stewart from Nottingham Trent University - who came together to challenge both the mainstream art world and the wider, racially exclusive, political system. Dubbed the Black Art Movement, the founders achieved national and international recognition, and this exhibition will serve to present new commissions which reflect on the issues faced by artists today. The artworks will create an exchange around notions of history, identity, and location.

Featured artists include; Said Adrus, Samson Kambalu, Keith Piper, Gary Stewart in collaboration with Trevor Mathison and Obinna Nwosu, Elshaday Berhane, Harjeet Kaur, Hetain Patel, Nazir Tanbouli, & Andrew Wright. The exhibition is curated by David Schischka Thomas and Michael Forbes who have commissioned the new work for the show.

Kaur has been awarded a British Council Fellowship. Kambalu has been exhibiting internationally and was awarded the National Decibel Award and has recently had the novel ‘The Jive Talke’ published. Tanbouli is exhibiting widely throughout the UK and abroad and taken part in a number of residencies. Berhane, has recently moved to Amsterdam, and showing huge promise, winning a prize at the Nottingham Castle Open in 2007. Patel, has an impressive range of work including residencies, exhibitions/performances and new commissions. Recently Patel was included in the 13th Biennale of young artists in Italy. Forbes who has exhibited widely in the UK and abroad, but also developed a strong careers in curating, including co-curating this exhibition. Wright was the winner of the main Nottingham Castle Open prize in 2007.

NAE is working closely with local school Manning Girls School, and local arts practitioners; Parmjit Sagoo (drama and writing), Usha Mehanthralingham, (visual artist), Jay Pollitt (dance) to provide a varied and informative education and outreach programme.

Next We Change Earth opens a program of challenging, stimulating, and visually stunning exhibitions at NAE, that will spotlight the skills of artists and young people from Nottingham and highlight their significant successes.

EDDY MAXWELL, Chair, said:
"We are challenging the clichés and myths of Nottingham as a city of danger, crime and threat and the stereotypes that portray Africa as a famine, AIDS, and war torn continent with no significant cultural history.”
 
"New Art Exchange opens its doors with this controversial exhibition to make a dramatic step towards becoming a renowned national arts centre for African, African Caribbean and South Asian arts."



New Art Exchange was awarded £5million of funding from Arts Council England, Nottingham City Council, the Greater Nottingham Partnership, East Midlands Development Agency, Radford and Hyson Green New Deal for Communities, and European Regional Development Funding, and took 18 months to build. The organisation was a big winner in Arts Council England’s recent review of national arts funding gaining a 58% increase in its annual funding grant. The award was made in recognition of the organisation’s vital role in supporting visual and performing arts.

The building designed by architects Hawkins\Brown, boasts 5 -storey building provides 1360 sqm space dedicated to visual arts with; galleries, workshop/performance/rehearsal space, artists in residence facilities, and a cafe. Distinguished from the red clay buildings of the neighborhood by its black brick façade and arrangement of frameless windows ranging in size (from 0.16 sqm to 4.84sqm), offers incidental and unexpected views into and out of the building.

The New Art Exchange ambition is to become a national centre of excellence promoting contemporary arts development within the cultural and creative industries, to deliver an innovative and exciting programme of activity to promote, support and advocate contemporary multi-cultural arts development in visual and performing arts and new media. To be a cultural centre led by African, African Caribbean and South Asian arts practice. To serve an international community from roots firmly embedded in the local area.

New Art Exchange text received 11 Aug 2008

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