Saturday 25 August 2007

O Dreamland



This August Bank holiday, Transition Gallery have teamed up with Club Shepway in Folkestone to present O Dreamland, a contemporary arts festival that takes a subversive yet affectionate look at the seaside.

The title is taken from Lindsay Anderson's short Free Cinema documentary made in 50s Margate about the Dreamland pleasure park. The film focuses on the partying day-trippers, juxtaposing them with some of the more grotesque elements of a typical amusement park.

Curated by Cathy Lomax, O Dreamland features over 20 artists who each respond to the subject in a uniquely contemporary way. The event will be centred around a 1930s 'Modern' house in Greatstone, Kent, which overlooks the English Channel to the front and the curious Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Light Railway to the back. The house is itself an interesting counterpoint to some of the more kitsch elements on show and embodies ideas of architectural modernist utopias.

Work on show will include Matthew Rowes' handcrafted shingle beach, Lucy Harrison's flag, Cathy Lomax's paintings of beauty queens, Sophie MacCorquodale's film portrait of Rhyl, Ruth Calland's alter ego Dame Batlove's psychic performance on the beach and much much more

This pertinent event comes at a time when many of our seaside towns are in crisis. In between the creeping gentrification and crumbling deprivation the spirit of the seaside is being lost. O Dreamland addresses this in a defiantly un rose-tinted way.

Watch the O Dreamland Film
http://www.transitiongallery.co.uk
http://www.clubshepway.com


Genuine Imitation Shingle
Matt Rowe 2007




deep sea diving flouncy Edwardian lady figurine
Matt Rowe 2007

Untitled figurine
Matt Rowe 2007

Participant in the mobility scooter drive by
also pictured Dame Bat Love

Sunday 19 August 2007

work in the Arty Sea Side Eddition



Join Arty on a trip to the coast and find Chris Moxey’s modest Modernist palaces, Paul Rennies dippers, Delaine Le Bas’s nuclear visions, Matt Rowe’s down at heel funfair, an anthology of poetry by Gary O’Connor, Annabel Tilley’s hotels and much much more.

Writers Martin Figura, Lucy Harrison, Helen Ivory, Tom Keogh, Cathy Lomax, Alex Michon, Laura Mansfield, Paul Rennie, Annabel Tilley

Artists Sara Chew, Jake Clark, Rebecca Gould, Lucy Harrison, Damian Le Bas, Delaine Le Bas, Cathy Lomax, Sophie Maccorquodale, Alex Michon, Chris Moxey, Laura Pasterfield, Matt Rowe, Annabel Tilley

Wednesday 15 August 2007

Bathing Beauties Parade 2007


Bathing Beauties Parade 2007 part of the O Dreamland contemporary arts festival

costumes by Lady Lucie and photography by Matt Rowe

Miss Club Shepway 2007
Vicky Butterfly
© Matt Rowe

Miss Nuclear reactor A
Dangerous Dolly


Miss Transition
Veronica Valentine

Miss Peep Toe (magazine)
Honey Lu Lu

Miss O Dreamland
Lil' Miss Chievous