The Bluecoat to be home to Turner Prize winners of tomorrow
Artist Hew Locke and Indra Khanna, curator at Autograph ABP, visit the Bluecoat galleries
The Bluecoat revealed the artistic and creative vision for the building and an outline programme of visual art, live art, music, dance, literature and debate at Liverpool Culture Company’s 08 highlights launch.
Liverpool city centre’s oldest building and one of the UK’s oldest art spaces, previously showcased the early works of everyone from Picasso and Van Gogh to Benjamin Britten, Yoko Ono, Captain Beefheart, Michael Clark, Nitin Sawnhey and Jeremy Deller.
The refurbished and extended space will open early in Liverpool’s Capital of Culture year and provide a true legacy for the 08 celebrations by building on the tradition of supporting and showcasing the very best creative talent as it emerges.
It will nurture new talent by providing studio space for young artists within a unique creative community. It will use new exhibition spaces to showcase the talent across all creative disciplines and develop programmes which emphasize the Bluecoat’s tradition of experimentalism and support for emerging artists and projects.
Alastair Upton, Chief Executive at the Bluecoat, said: “Like the new Liverpool, we are building on the great strengths of our past to create something different, ambitious and very exciting.
“The Bluecoat will be a place where you can see creative talent on the cusp of national and international renown - the Turner Prize winners of tomorrow, leading new composers, choreographers, musicians, designers, writers, craftspeople and artists of all kinds.
“Our 2008 programme, to be announced later this year, will set the bar high, establishing us as a major landmark on the UK map of contemporary culture and a unique expression of a changing city with a dynamic vision for the arts.”
