Birmingham Business Improvement Districts find success in new photography exhibition
The Library of Birmingham, in partnership with Colmore Business District, Jewellery Quarter Business Improvement District and Birmingham City University, supported by Arts Council England, has this month commissioned a 50 piece outdoor photography exhibition which celebrates the unique qualities, heritage and environments of the Jewellery Quarter and Colmore Row and surrounding area.
FINDINGS is a new commission from GRAIN: the Photography Hub and Network for the West Midlands, an Arts Council England funded project based at the Library of Birmingham.
The exhibition which launches on the 25th April in and around Church Street Square and St Paul’s Square, will feature 50 images by internationally acclaimed photographer, Tom Hunter and will reveal places and spaces in Birmingham’s historic Jewellery Quarter, a designated conservation area with over 200 listed buildings and the modern corporate spaces and historical buildings found within the adjoining Colmore Business District.
Tom Hunter, whose work has been shown at the Saatchi Gallery, White Cube Gallery and recently commissioned by The Victoria and Albert Museum, will explore and reveal sites ranging from the everyday to the historically significant. FINDINGS will feature venues such as Birmingham and Midland Institute, Birmingham School of Art, Birmingham Coffin Works, The Rose Villa Tavern and Birmingham Assay Office.
Tom Hunter said: “For me this project is a journey back into the country’s industrial heritage and at the same time a personal journey into my own history.
“Many of the buildings I have photographed so far are monuments to this industrial past, showing us the fingerprints of working lives and the products that these endeavors created and from them a way of life and culture. I have always been attracted to these shrines from a disappearing world, a world my grandfather was meshed too, with his engineering company in Birmingham. A world I have explored through photography in Hackney Wick, where the industrial landscape became a playground for the dispossessed, and is now reincarnated as an Olympic wonderland.
“All these elements have aligned themselves in this photographic essay, connecting my history to my country’s and Birmingham to Hackney. In the same way Alexander Parkes of Birmingham invented Parkesine, the base material of my film and took it to Hackney Wick to be mass-produced, I now take my pinhole photography back in time to Birmingham, to illuminate and document this very special place.”
FINDINGS will be the first time Colmore BID and the Jewellery Quarter BID have collaborated on a project. The exhibition will assist in transforming public spaces whilst contributing to the external environment and bridging the gap between the two BIDs.
Mike Best, deputy chair of Colmore Business District said: “CBD has been a champion of bringing arts and business together in public spaces around the District, and is delighted to be working with the Jewellery Quarter BID on our latest project, ‘FINDINGS’.
“This will be an engaging piece of work, portraying images of CBD and the Jewellery Quarter both historic and current. We are particularly pleased to have commissioned a talented photographer like Tom Hunter to work with us, through our friends at the Library of Birmingham.
“We will once again be showcasing the exhibition in Church Street Square, one of our legacy projects and a great place to spend time out of the workplace.”
Keith Stanley, operations director for the JQDT and JQ BID, said: “The Jewellery Quarter is very proud of its heritage but thanks to new, creative businesses moving into the area and an increasing student population, the Quarter has developed into a thriving urban village with a diverse range of businesses, residents and visitors.
“The Quarter welcomes thousands of visitors a year and the photographic project will provide an interesting addition to the area’s existing attractions, located on the iconic site that is St Paul’s Square. We are also hoping that people will be encouraged to visit both displays, showing them just how close we are to the city centre and vice versa.
This project is one of the BID’s early initiatives since it officially began in October 2012 and we’re very excited to see Tom’s interpretation of the Jewellery Quarter.”
To further information please visit www.findingsbirmingham.co.uk
