With only 2 days to go until the Grand Opening of The Amazing Chang Exhibition at Leamington Spa Art Gallery and Museum at the Pump Rooms on Saturday 17th October 12 - 3.00pm, we have had a week of exciting updates!

From the confirmation of an amazing chinese dragon for the opening ceremony to the incredible radio testimonial by world famous illusionist DAVID COPPERFIELD!!!!!!!!

On Tuesday the 13th of October BBC Coventry and Warwickshire radio host Annie Othen presented an update on the Amazing Chang Exhibition featuring interviews with Changs biographer Sandie Evans, Changs son film director David Wickes and world famous illusionist David Copperfield, please follow link to iplayer listen again facility on BBC Coventry and Warwickshire Annie Othen, http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/p004n981 you have 6 days left to listen!!

Today I have spent the day helping the team at the pump rooms assemble the exhibition, we have a huge amount of memorabillia to display and each has to be handle with absolute care as many have become fragile with age.  We have a giant willow pattern plate, several hand painted banners (by Chang himself), the bullet used in the bullet catching illusion, huge preston pans and lots more, objects of great craftmanship and history.  You can almost imagine Chang looking down on us as we handle the objects resulting from his incredible career!!! 

The most exciting word on everyones lips today was COPPERFIELD, his testimonial about Chang in Annie Othens interview was thoughful, reverent and above all insightful, he showed his true respect for the predecessors of his trade, without whom his dream career would not of been fulfilled!  Huge thanks goes to him for that, I am now his newest fan!!!!!!!!!

Find in the Chang picture folder updated images of the lobby stand, willow pattern segments and a few tantalising snipets of team assembling the exhibition!!!!!!!!

Remember Grand Opening 12 - 3.00pm Saturday 17th October We would love to see you there!!!!!!!!!!!

until then Lynseyx

This Month Projects have led me to work with Amnesty International's central Birmingham Group in the creation of a life sized cut out of Burma's Democracy Campaigner Aung San Suu Kyi, for their Burma Action day on Saturday 15th August in Victoria Square, Birmingham.  Passers by were invited to link arms with the cut out for photographs in order to send a message of support to Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma, for the injustice of the recent sentence placed upon her.  Find in the photos album work in progress creating the cut out and below are links to the reports and photographs of the event, apparently 'she' (the cut out) will be travelling by train with the assistance of an Amnesty member to Orkney for her next event!

follow the link below for more reports and photos of the Burma Action 15/08/09

http://amnestybham.wordpress.com/2009/08/18/burma-action-2/

http://bit.ly/JCXTN

 

It is possible that the link to the courier article below will not work but its ok if you copy it and paste it into your address bar it seems to work that way, Regards to all!!

http://www.leamingtoncourier.co.uk/whats-on-news/Warwickshire-Artists39-new-recruit-work.5508676.jp

 

Spent the day working on the lobby cut out of my good friend The Amazing Chang, he is coming on a treat its just getting his facial expression right that is the sticking point.  I have had to ferret around for armfulls of reference (thank god we have a good supply of images of his face to work from), and if all else fails I will refer to images of clark gable as I think he is a dead ringer, such a grand looking chap!  

I had an article written about me in the Leamington Courier today, ever so slightly misquoted and the image makes me look like a good stand in for a big brother contestant but hey any publicity is good publicity and we got a mention for the Chang exhibition so all is good,  feel free to follow the link to see if you too think I would make a good BB contestant!! 

I will post some updated Lobby cut out photos in next couple of days, hes looking great!

Not Long Now!

Get Excited about magic!

http://www.leamingtoncourier.co.uk/whats-on-news/Warwickshire-Artists39-new-recruit-work.5508676.jph

26 November 6.30 - 7.30pm Hocus Pocus With Paul Kieve

7 January 6.30 - 7.30pm Roy Davenports Magic Show

The Amazing Chang

The Magic of Samuel L. Whittington Wickes

Grand Opening 17th October 12 noon - 3pm

Leamington Spa Art Gallery and Museum

Royal Pump Rooms

Leamington Spa

Warwickshire

Exhibition Run: 17th October 2009 - 10th January 2010

Feature Events:

22 October 6.30 - 7.30 Sandra Evans Biographer talks about Chang

21 November 2 -3pm Willow Pattern Plate Puppet Theatre

26 November Hocus Pocus Event with Harry Potter Illusionary advisor Paul Kieve

7 January Internationally acclaimed magician Roy Davenport presents his Magic Show - using some of Changs Props

 

Friday was spent grafting further on the lobby stand while fran got to grips with segmenting the willow pattern, and making sense of the different aspects of the design.  These segements of willow pattern will hopefully adorn the walls of the exhibition, space permitting, in order to link the whole event to Chang's passion for all things China related and also his use of the segments of the willow pattern plate in his performance backdrops.  This work continues.......... watch this space.............

On thursday, while I got to grips with attempting to interpret the colours of the Chang lobby stand from a blurred black and white photography circa 1930's, Fran moved on to the third parasol of our past world leaders, Stalin.  The Three parasols we have been working so hard on at the start of the week are of the three prominent members of the Yalta conference in 1945, the peace talks held in Yalta following the second world war.  Chang used decorated parasols as a way to make note of certain events around the time of his performance (ie. the Yalta Conference)  or even important members of his audiences. 

Wednesdays task involved making a replica of Chang's lobby stand.  This lobby stand was taken from theatre to theatre to advertise the upcoming arrival of the great magician's performance, however this piece has long since been lost most probably damaged or destroyed due to the wear and tear of its many journeys and venues!  Wednesday I was scaling up the piece from a small and very blurred black and white photograph, the only image we have of the stand.  We hope this piece will stand in the entrance to our exhibition to advertise his arrival in the same way it would of  done nearly 70 years ago in the theatres and play houses of leamington and far beyond! 

After a satisfying first day painting world flags tuesdays task was to start painting Roosevelt and Churchill, while Fran got to grips with Roosevelt I had the task of trying to make Churchill almost recognisable.  We are going to such lengths to mimic the style and technique of the original Yalta conference parasols painted by Chang himself seen in the original black and white photograph, however we keep aluding to the fact that Chang himself probably knocked these up in an afternoon, Boy could we do with some magic right now!!  After certain skin tone issues with Roosevelt bringing him back from the Obama shade with the help of a little rouge and a slight alteration on Churchills sausage, whoops I mean cigar, we are well on our way!! 

PLEASE VIEW IMAGES OF OUR PROGRESS IN THE CHANG FOLDER!!

Heres to a sucessful first day, after meeting Art Student Fran Booth in the morning we got to grips with the daunting task of planning to paint past world leaders!  There is something really satisfying we found about painting brollies!  We have got to grips with applying  the geometric structure of world flags to the flimsey surface of golf umbrellas lets hope painting world leaders will go as smoothly!!

Next week begins the honoured task of recreating the beautiful stage props belonging to illusionist The Amazing Chang.  The Amazing Chang Exhibition hosted by Leamington Spa Art Gallery and Museum will begin in October 2009.  Watch this blog for updates and images.....