By Dan Thompson
A long-running event that sets out to break down barriers to enjoying the arts is inviting people to think about Easter and its origins on Good Friday.
The event, called First Friday, was established at Marine Studios in 2009, and has continued every month since then. It’s an informal social event, where an inquiry into a subject encourages people to turn up and then gently encourages them to talk to each other.
“It’s often hard for people to imagine that ‘the arts’ are for them,” says organiser Connor Sansby, “but First Friday is always about a topic, and if you’re interested you’ll come – the art is secondary!”
Past events have tackled subjects like the rise of AI, banned books, shipwrecks, and rising sea levels, and included activities like cardboard puppet theatres, robots battling in arenas, live poetry performances, and exploring giant handmade maps. Often interested in technology, at First Friday artists have helped people use a letterpress printing machine designed for the French Resistance, hand-stitching to make quilts, 3D printers, large-scale knitting, and once – turned a whole room into a Camera Obscura, the earliest type of moving image.
First Friday has featured artists like Paula Rego, Seb Lee-Delisle, Bryan Kneale, and Sophie Herxheimer, writers like Sunday Times bestseller Harry Baker (Wonderful, Tender), David Usborne (Objectivity), Tristan Gooley (The Natural Navigator), and Rosa Rankin-Gee (Dreamland), and companies like Coney, Paine’s Plough, Margate Carnival, and Invisible Flock.
For this month’s event, titled The Original Easter, there will be a range of simple craft activities, suitable for all ages. They will explore some of the traditions and iconography around Easter, including hares, rabbits and eggs. And it will dive into the underlying themes of renewal and rebirth, and how they relate to the coming of spring.
The studio has adopted the idea of ‘Regenerative Creative Practice’, which encourages artists and other creatives to think carefully about the environment, and that idea will also be under discussion.
First Friday is free, and this month’s event is suitable for the whole family. It’s at Marine Studios, 17 Albert Terrace, Margate from 6pm-8.30pm. For more information about Marine Studios, including desk hire and how to rent their sea-view meeting room, visit www.marinestudios.co.uk
The event, called First Friday, was established at Marine Studios in 2009, and has continued every month since then. It’s an informal social event, where an inquiry into a subject encourages people to turn up and then gently encourages them to talk to each other.
“It’s often hard for people to imagine that ‘the arts’ are for them,” says organiser Connor Sansby, “but First Friday is always about a topic, and if you’re interested you’ll come – the art is secondary!”
Right-so like the singalong, the SEN painting stuff etc it is actually about socialising & not about art at all. At least this group admits it, when will the Turner & all the other ‘art hubs’ around admit it is all about grants money for old rope?
This isn’t funded by a grant. It’s funded by us. And it is about art.
The Turner, not this.
Does anyone know what the connection is between Easter and rabbits?