Monday 30 July 2012

Exhibitions open at the Alfred East Gallery

Now on: Rita Tomalin and Lee Burrows ... 'this is what we do' ... 30th June to 11th August.  Following their win of the Public Choice Vote at the Open 11 exhibition, Lee and Rita exhibit their work together in this shared exhibition.  51 works showing their love of painting ... and the themes that delight and concern them.

There is also a splendid exhibition of striking prints in the connecting exhibition space: Passion2Print, Leicester Print Workshop’s biennial celebration of contemporary fine art printmaking ...

(Rita and Lee in front of some of their paintings at the Preview)

Thursday 19 July 2012

Tonight at the Gallery

Don't forget Greta Paradine-Palmer will be giving a 'Friends' talk at the Gallery this evening ... 'dressed to Impress', on the decorative trappings worn by Indian elephants.

7.30pm.  Anyone can come along ... Friends of the Museum and Gallery come free, others can pay the £3.00 on the door (and, yes, you can join the Friends or renew tonight when you arrive ...)...


Wednesday 11 July 2012

NMHH awards 2012


Kettering Museum and Art Gallery honoured at this year's Heritage Awards.
Kettering Museum and Art Gallery is delighted to have won two prestigious awards at the ‘Northamptonshire Museums and Historic Houses Forum Heritage Awards 2012’.


The Museum and Gallery team was presented with the award Best Exhibition for the popular ‘Hidden Treasures’, which was on display at the Alfred East Art Gallery from February to March 2012. The exhibition received over 2500 visitors from all over the UK and repeat visitors from the local regions. Hidden Treasures brought together a huge selection of the Alfred East’s Permanent Collection to form a rare exhibition in a traditional salon hang. Feedback from the exhibition was exceptional and plans are already in place for a bigger and better display to mark the centenary of the Alfred East Art Gallery and the life of East in 2013.


The second award presented to Kettering was the award for Work with Children and Young People for ‘The Exhibitionists’.  The Exhibitionists was a young curators’ project where local young people aged 13-19 were recruited to take part in a series of creative master-classes, working with museum staff to develop the skills needed to propose, plan and install their very own exhibition.  The participants learned how to curate and create an exhibition from scratch, develop ideas and concepts, design publicity, develop interpretation, prepare and hang work.  After much dedication and hard work from the participants, the resulting exhibition opened in February 2012, bringing in new local audiences and increased museum visitor figures; when compared like for like with this period in 2011.

Monday 2 July 2012

Olympic Torch Comes to Town

 (Kettering greets the 2012 Olympic Torch)

After a dismal morning the rain suddenly stopped and the Olympic band wagons rolled in.
 
There was a bit of a gap and it was all a bit behind schedule - but down in the heritage quarter things were a buzz ... 
 
 (Kettering Library - hopefully this will now become the main entrance again)
 
Java Java was full and queuing, the Library front doors were open, the new banners at the Art Gallery were up, the Museum and Gallery were both open for the special event and hundreds of leaflets were distributed promoting the summer programme of events and exhibitions.
 
 (Kettering Olympic welcome - there was even some of this)
 
Great to see the town full of people - and plenty of smiles despite a record breakingly bad start to the summer season.
 
 (Olympic torch at the Alfred East Gallery, Kettering)
 
The 'A Question of Sport' exhibition at the Museum is on until the end of the week.

Sunday 1 July 2012

Museum & Gallery Open on Torch Relay day ...


Usually shut on Mondays, the Gallery and Museum will be Open on 2nd July as part of the Olympic Torch celebrations ... Eleanor Baumber, from the Manor House Museum, says ...

'The museum and gallery will be opening on Mon 2nd July to celebrate the Olympic torch coming to Kettering. Why not celebrate by popping into the museum to see our ‘Question of Sport’ exhibition and trying some of our Olympic activity worksheets.'