'No Particular Place To Go?'
35 Years of Sculpture at Castlefield Gallery

Randall, JM

Abstract

The URL above directs to the catalogue for the exhibition which contains an interview with Jill Randall on pages 44-45

Jill Randall was selected to exhibit 2 sculptures in this important survey exhibition of 35 years of exhibiting sculpture, alongside world-class sculptors such as Henry Moore, Anthony Caro and Michael Lyons.
She exhibited a sculpture 'End of the Line' produced for her exhibition, 'Changing Tack' at Castlefield Gallery in 1990, alongside 'In the upside-down land' ,created in 2018.
The exhibition was curated by art historian Dr Clare O’Dowd and artist / curator John Plowman of Beacon Bureau.

PRESS RELEASE – for immediate release Issued: Thursday 1 August 2019
No Particular Place to Go?
35 years of sculpture at Castlefield Gallery
Venue: Castlefield Gallery, Manchester
Exhibition Dates: Friday 6 September – Sunday 27 October 2019
Public Preview: 6–8pm, Thursday 5 September 2019 (press preview 5–6pm)
Artists: James Ackerley, Sir Anthony Caro, Nicola Ellis, Ana Genovés, Lee Grandjean, Charles Hewlings, Hilary Jack, Stephanie James, Stephen Lewis, Jeff Lowe, Michael Lyons, Henry Moore, Jill Randall, Veronica Ryan, Laura White.
Established by artists in 1984, 2019 marks thirty-five years for Castlefield Gallery. The organisation actively supports artistic production and artist career development, providing artists with timely exposure whilst sharing their work with the public. Castlefield Gallery is often described as a home for artists.
Curated in collaboration with art historian Dr Clare O’Dowd and artist / curator John Plowman of Beacon Bureau, No Particular Place to Go? is informed by extensive research into Castlefield Gallery’s archives and exhibition history, exploring this history through the lens of sculpture
No Particular Place to Go? highlights the gallery’s rich history of engagement with British sculpture and the role it has had, and still has as a place for the ‘sculptural zeitgeist’. Pieces in the exhibition will date back to the gallery’s inaugural programme which included a solo presentation of work by Sir Anthony Caro (Castlefield Gallery’s ‘Artist Patron’ until he passed in 2013). Caro’s Table Pieces were a focus for the 1984 exhibition, the show running alongside a presentation of larger Table Pieces at The Whitworth, the museum and art gallery subsequently purchasing Table Piece XCVlll (1970) for their collection.
A few years later in 1987 Castlefield Gallery mounted a Henry Moore solo, the first exhibition of his work at a publicly-funded gallery following his death in 1986. The exhibition featured Moore’s smaller works, including five bronze maquettes. No Particular Place to Go? in particular foregrounds sculpture’s relationship to the studio / gallery / archive, as a way to reflect upon the ‘homelessness’ of the medium, the term ‘homelessness’ in relation to sculpture first used by Rainer Maria Rilke in his famous account of Rodin, initially given as a lecture and later published in 1910. Rilke described the sculptures he saw as he walked through Rodin’s studio as isolated, self-contained things, cut off from the world: ‘His works could not wait; they had to be made. He long foresaw their homelessness.’
The artists invited to take part in No Particular Place to Go? have all exhibited at Castlefield Gallery during the last thirty-five years, with the curators inviting them to return to a place that once acted as a temporary ‘home’ for their work. To this end No Particular Place to Go? welcomes Table Piece XCVlll back to Castlefield Gallery, on loan from The Whitworth. Much smaller and more intimate than Caro’s welded floor sculptures, his Table Pieces are indicative of the intimacy of the studio, as the ‘place’ where the Table Pieces were made. The exhibition takes Caro’s Table Pieces as a starting point, focusing on
smaller objects, those made in the artists’ studio as an exploration of an idea, material, form, process, or simply a sculpture that could be at home on a table.
Sculptor Michael Lyons (1943-2019) wrote the catalogue essay for the Caro Table Sculptures exhibition at Castlefield Gallery, and his account of Caro’s working methods forms an important part of the thinking behind No Particular Place to Go? Lyons also exhibited at Castlefield Gallery in 1984, his work informing many future generations of sculptors, Lyons teaching at what was then Manchester Polytechnic’s Department of Fine Art from 1974 until he retired as Head of Sculpture in 1993. His much loved and monumental sculpture Phalanx (1977) has been a central feature in the grounds of The Whitworth since being purchased by the gallery in 1980 and remains on display in Whitworth Park today.
The intimacy of Caro’s Table Pieces is echoed in Henry Moore’s Reclining Figure-Bowl (1960), also on loan for the exhibition from The Whitworth, a small bronze that not only reflects on Moore’s working methods but is indicative of the five bronze maquettes by Moore shown at Castlefield Gallery in 1987.
Outside of the Caro and Moore loans, each artist participating in No Particular Place to Go? will exhibit a sculpture from the time of their original exhibition together with a more recent work, the show reflecting on the creative processes of the participating artists from when they first exhibited with Castlefield Gallery, to the present day.
For No Particular Place to Go? sculptor Charles Hewlings has been commissioned to work with Manchester-based sculptor James Ackerley. Together they will develop and exhibit a site-specific sculptural structure, one designed to house and display the other exhibiting artists’ works. Hewlings and Ackerley’s commission will extend across and throughout the gallery spaces, integrating with and challenging Castlefield Gallery’s distinctive interior architecture, giving the exhibiting sculptures a ‘particular place to go’.
The archival material that the curators have worked with includes press releases, installation photographs, exhibition guides and correspondence, none of which has been made publicly available before, and which the exhibition, public programme and a No Particular Place to Go? publication will contextualise and interpret. The exhibition celebrates the gallery at thirty-five years, marking the start of the organisation’s journey and programming towards Castlefield Gallery at forty years in 2024.
Events
The Making of No Particular Place to Go?
Presented by Sculpture Production Award 2019, Pangaea Sculptors' Centre (London) 6.30pm – 8pm, Wednesday 11 September 2019
Venue: Castlefield Gallery, 2 Hewitt Street, Manchester M15 4GB
Join Lucy Tomlins, Director of Pangaea Sculptors’ Centre in conversation with Castlefield Gallery Curator Matthew Pendergast and No Particular Place to Go? guest Curators Clare O’Dowd and John Plowman, alongside exhibiting artist Nicola Ellis.
Built around Pangaea Sculptors’ Centre’s commitment to making the making visible, this informal discussion event will reveal what goes into the making of both artworks and exhibitions, both conceptually and materially, taking No Particular Place to Go? as a starting point for conversation. The event will explore links between current sculptural practice and the legacies of the more established artists in the exhibition. FREE / Limited places. Book at https://themakingofnoparticularplacetogo.eventbrite.co.uk/?ref=estw
Curator’s tour, exploring sculpture between No Particular Place to Go? and a place lived by Maddi Nicholson, at Spinningfields, Hardman Square
2pm – 3.30pm, Sunday 5 October 2019

Join Castlefield Gallery’s Curator Matthew Pendergast on a sculpture tour. Starting out at Hardman Square, Spinningfields you will be guided around a place lived by artist Maddi Nicholson, a new permanent public art work co-commissioned by Castlefield Gallery and Spinningfields Estates Ltd for the site in 2019. The tour will then take the short walk to Castlefield Gallery for a tour of the exhibition No Particular Place to Go? £6 per person / Limited places. Book at https://curators-tour-35-years.eventbrite.co.uk
For further information, images or to arrange interviews, please contact: Jennifer Dean, Communications and Audience Development Coordinator at Castlefield Gallery, on [e-mail] / 0161 832 8034 or 07766046672.
ENDS//
Listing information
Exhibition Title: No Particular Place to Go?
Public Preview: 6-8pm, Thursday 5 September 2019 (press preview 5–6pm) Press Preview: 5-6pm, Thursday 5 September 2019
Exhibition Dates: Friday 6 September – Sunday 27 October 2019
Venue: Castlefield Gallery, 2 Hewitt Street, Manchester, M15 4GB
Tel: [phone]
Web: castlefieldgallery.co.uk
Opening Times: Wed to Sun 12noon – 5.30pm
Admission: FREE. The gallery is fully wheelchair accessible
Castlefield Gallery is a contemporary art gallery and artist focused organisation established in 1984. The gallery exhibits new and commissioned work at its main venue in Manchester, off-site and in the public realm. Castlefield Gallery works locally, nationally and internationally - often though dynamic partnerships and exchange. The organisation supports artists’ practice and career development, working especially with artists at early and mid- career stages. Castlefield Gallery New Art Spaces re-purposes temporarily vacant property for use by artists across Greater Manchester and the North West of England, accessed by its 200 strong plus Castlefield Gallery Associates. The celebrated Ryan Gander OBE is Castlefield Gallery's Artist Patron. www.castlefieldgallery.co.uk
BEACON BUREAU is a framework for visual art projects led by artist John Plowman https://johnplowman.com. Born out of the narrative arc created by Beacon Art Project http://beaconartproject.org Beacon Bureau utilises the skills, knowledge and experience of John Plowman. Providing opportunities for him to work with others whose interests are congruent with his own. Beacon Bureau collaborates with individuals and organisations to advise, mentor, and curate exhibitions and events. beaconbureau.co.uk
Dr Clare O’Dowd is a Manchester-based art historian and curator who specialises in the study of twentieth-century sculpture. Clare has taught in the Art History Department at the University of Manchester since 2011, and from autumn 2019 she will be joining the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds as Research Curator.
John Plowman and Clare O’Dowd, along with sculptor Charles Hewlings, have been collaborating for several years on a research project investigating the essentially nomadic nature of modern sculpture, beginning in 2013 during John’s research fellowship at the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds. Since then, the three have collaborated on several research events and workshops, with the aim of exploring the ways in which artists and curators produce and display sculpture and its relationship to different ideas of space and place.
Founded in 2013, Pangaea Sculptors’ Centre (PSC) is a not-for-profit Community Interest Company (CIC) dedicated to promoting critical engagement and innovation in the field of three-dimensional creative practice. A resource that brings together the production of sculpture with critical, cultural and educational programming on this art form, it enables the realisation of ambitious artworks by offering expertise to help sculptors hone their skills and advance their practice.
Our multifarious activities web together a rich and diverse network of individuals and organisations that share our commitment to making cultural production more sustainable, accessible, diverse and engaged.

As part of this we offer a range of technical and fabrication support services to artists, architects, designers, galleries and others. We provide skilled technicians to teach or work with artists in their studio, and fabricators who take on the complete fabrication of an artwork, large or small.
This spring PSC launched the Sculpture Production Award 2019. Open to emerging artists working in 3D and based within the UK but outside of London, the Award provides six sculptors with skills mentoring and a £1,000 production grant towards the realisation of a new work. One of the six artists will also exhibit at the Coventry Biennial 2019. The Award is aimed at artists looking to explore the process of working with external fabricators. It is a unique opportunity for artists to realise a piece of sculpture from concept through to completion with support into this new way of working. www.pangaeasculptorscentre.com | Facebook / Instagram / Twitter @PangaeaCentre
Curated and produced by
and Dr Clare O’Dowd

Citation

35 Years of Sculpture at Castlefield Gallery. [Exhibition Catalogue]. (Unpublished)

• Exhibition Performance Type: Exhibition
• Publication Date: Oct 1, 2019
• Deposit Date: Nov 6, 2020
• Publicly Available Date: Nov 6, 2020
• ISBN: 9781916205109
• Related Public URLs: https://www.castlefieldgallery.co.uk/event/no-particular-place-to-go-35-years-of-sculpture-at-castlefield-gallery/; https://www.jillrandall.co.uk; https://issuu.com/castlefield_gallery/docs/npptg_publication_oct2019_spreads_
• Additional Information: Number of Pieces : 2; Funders : Arts Council England (ACE);Henry Moore Foundation;Ronnie Duncan Arts Foundation; Projects : 'No Particular Place To Go?'