monitor

welcome

2007-05-17T10:52:00.000+01:00

Welcome to Badge Project.

Between the 14th and the 27th May you can take part in the greatest badge collecting fun on earth! How do you do it? Well on this website you will find everything you need to navigate around Leeds to collect the set - oh except for an A-Z, which might be really helpful!

How does it work: Monitor has commissioned 8 artists to make badges in response to 8 postcode areas of Leeds. To gain your FREE badges and complete the full set, you need to travel around the periphery of the city centre. The badges are ONLY available in the postcode area they have been made for so you will need to get out and about!

Click here for a list of all the venues and their addresses

Click here for a list of buses

Click here for an amazing day out on the buses in Leeds - a circular route to get all 8 badges in one day - you'll need a day bus pass and a map and your sandwiches (or buy then from the lovely deli in LS8!)

And finally but most definitely not least...a cycle route - collect all 8 badges and get fit at the same time!! Click here for the directions

LETS DO IT - WebsterGotts (art pals from Sheffield) attempt the Monitor Badge Project - video evidence that it is possible!!

Photos of our lovelly venues coming soon!

And finally - Monitor has made a badge for LS1/2/3 to complete the set (which makes a map of Leeds when you put it together). It is available on the launch night on TUESDAY 15th MAY at Subculture, Merrion Centre, Leeds from 7pm-10pm. If you've missed this - and you've collected all of the other 8 badges, email us@monitorleeds.org and we'll send you one!

Also on the website is the blog of the research undertaken by the artists in order to design their badges. Please use the archive section to navigate through the old posts.

2007-05-14T23:23:00.000+01:00

LETS DO IT : Monitor Badge Project by WebsterGotts

Text taken from WebsterGotts blogspot page:

Thursday, May 17, 2007
Monitor Badge Project

WebsterGotts were invited to make a new piece of work for The Badge Project launch party.

So here is that piece of work, a video of WebsterGotts taking part in the Badge Project. It was filmed on the day of the launch party, and hastily edited and finished about 10 minutes before it had to be shown. It is entitled 'Let's Do It'.

you can see the video on You Tube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iw3PdgV3WLE

Monitor would like it to be known that the Badge Project is not really that hard to complete, and that WebsterGotts are "slackers" for only managing to collect 4 of the badges....

_________________________________

So there you have it - it is possible if you are not a slacker to complete the Badge Project!!

VENUES

2007-05-14T10:22:00.000+01:00

In order to collect your full set of limited edition badges you need to visit the eight venues around Leeds. Here are all the details:

LS4/5
ARTIST: Mike Lewis
Available at: Kirkstall Abbey visitors centre, Kirkstall Abbey, Abbey Road, Kirkstall, Leeds, LS5 3EH
Opening Times: Tues - Sun 11am - 4pm.
Contact:General information (Tel) : 0113 230 5492
General information (Fax) : 0113 247 8397
E-mail : abbey.house@leeds.gov.uk
Website : www.leeds.gov.uk/kirkstallabbey

LS12/13
ARTIST: Louise Atkinson
Available at: Armley Library, 2 Stocks Hill, Armley, LS12 1UQ
Opening times: Monday 10am - 8pm; Tuesday and Wednesday 9am - 6pm ;Thursday 9am - 8pm;Friday 9am - 5pm;Saturday 10am- 4pm
Contact:Tel : 0113 395 1010 Fax : 0113 395 1002

LS11
ARTIST: Simon Canaway
Available at: Artist's House, 7 Saw Mill Yard, Holbeck, Leeds, LS11 5WH
Opening Hours: Wednesday-Friday 12pm-6pm, Saturday 12pm-4pm
Contact: Phone:0113 2467515

LS10
ARTIST: Alexander Stephenson
Available at: The Sun Inn, Church Street, Hunslet, Leeds, LS10 2AZ (Behind Lidl)
Opening times: Pub times (after 11am)

LS8
ARTIST: John Hall
Available at: Haley and Clifford Café, 43 Street Lane, Roundhay, LS8 1AP
Opening times: Monday & Tuesday 9am - 4.30pm Wednesday - Saturday 9am-5pm
Contact: 0113 237 0334

LS7
ARTIST: Adam Bridgland
Available at: Yes Cyber, 131 Chapeltown Road, Chapeltown
Opening times: Monday – Friday: 10am – 5pm, Saturday: 10am – 4pm, Sunday: 1pm – 4pm
Contact: Telephone 0113 262 0794 Fax 0113 262 9890 Mobile 07831 480 196
www.yescyber.org.uk

LS9
ARTIST: Rebecca Strain
Available at: The Irish Centre, York Road, Leeds, LS9 9NT
Opening times: Mon–Thu 12pm–4pm & 6pm–11pm; Fri–Sat 12pm–1am; Suns 12pm–midnight
Contact: 0113 2480887

LS6
ARTIST: Helen Grundy
25 spaces, 25 Back Kensington Terrace, Hyde Park, Leeds, LS6 1BQ.
Opening hours: Week 14th-19th May 12pm-6pm Tuesday-Saturday + extra hours for Situation Leeds events
21st May onwards: Monday and Tuesday: Closed; Wednesday to Friday - 4-8pm, Saturday - 2-8pm; Sunny Sundays only - 2pm-cold
Contact: twentyfivespaces@hotmail.co.uk (no phone)
www.25spaces.co.uk

MONITOR STRONGLY ADVISES YOU CHECK WITH THE VENUE IF IN ANY DOUBT ABOUT OPENING HOURS. WE'VE DONE WHAT WE CAN AND PROVIDED PHONE NUMBERS WHERE POSSIBLE, BUT WE CAN NOT BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE VENUES OPENING OR CLOSING TIMES CHANGING - SORRY!

bike

2007-05-13T23:00:00.000+01:00

CYCLE ROUTES FOR THE INTREPID!!

Start from Kirkstall Abbey to collect your 1st badge.

Turn left out of the Abbey grounds, along Abbey Road. Stay on this road; it becomes Kirkstall Road.
After you pass under the viaduct, turn right, past the Shell garage and the Harley Davidson centre, this is Viaduct Road.
Follow this hill all the way to the top (sorry it is a bit steep!) it turns into Canal Road and then you meet a big junction with Mike’s Carpets.
Go straight over Armley Road and onto Branch Road then turn left at the next junction onto Stocks Hill.

You’ve gone a bit over 2 miles and you have arrived at Armley Library to collect your 2nd Badge.

Go back down to Armley Road (the big main one)
And go straight over, and down the hill you just came up (reward!). But don’t go all the way down, just past Armley Mills and over the bridge turn off and go onto the canal towpath.

Cycle along the tow path right into Leeds, until you get near to Granary Wharf. You can’t go any further so go up onto the bridge and turn right. At the other side of the carpark – turn right onto Water Lane. Stay to the left of the fork in the road, and then turn left into Foundry Street.

You’ve gone about 2 miles again and you have arrived at Artist House to collect your 3rd badge.

Leave Artist House turn left back onto Water Lane.
Turn left onto Marshall Street then second left onto Sweet Street
At the end of Sweet Street you need to navigate the big junction so you go straight over to go right onto Dewsbury Road (there should be footbridges over the road here so you can avoid the junctions).

Turn left on to Apex Way
Continue along: Parkfield Street and left onto Jack Lane
Turn right at the T junction
And then turn left onto Hillidge Road
Turn left: Church Street

You’ve gone just under 2 miles and arrived at The Sun Inn to collect your 4th badge, and maybe a pint. The next stretch is a long one!

Turn left back onto Church Street
Turn right onto the A61 / Low Road for a short way and then left onto Old Mill Lane
At the roundabout, Old Mill Lane, take the 1st exit onto National Road
At the roundabout, take the 2nd exit (straight over) and continue along Atkinson Street
Turn right onto South Accommodation Road (one way busy road!) Turn right onto Cross Green Lane for a short way and then left onto Easy Road
Turn left onto Temple View Grove and then after Kippax Place, turn right onto Kitson Street
Turn left onto Pontefract Lane for a short way and then turn right onto Temple View Terrace
Turn left onto Temple View Road and turn left onto Berking Avenu

This brings you to York Road, turn right and cycle on the pavement to reach The Irish Centre – where you can collect your 5th Badge and tick off another 2 miles!

Again use the pavement to go down York Road – you can’t cycle on this road it is a motorway!!
At the bottom cross your bike on foot to the right using the crossings, under the flyover.
Get back on your bike Burmantofts Street outside the old Agnes Stewart Secondary School.
Keep going up straight, it becomes Beckett Street (you pass St.James Hospital on your left), at the junction, turn left onto Harehills Road
At the lights, turn right onto Roundhay Road
This is a long hill, you’ll pass Tesco’s.
At the top, at the lights and the Oakwood Clock Tower, turn left onto Prince's Avenue
Continue up (yes, sorry another hill!) Prince's Avenue with Roundhay Park on your right and left – nice to stop if you’re tired!
Bear left onto Street Lane (stay on the same road basically)

When you see a row of shops on the left you have arrived at Haley and Clifford and you can collect your 6th badge and have a much need rest and food stop! You’ve just done 4 miles!!

This one is nearly all down hill!!
Turn right onto Street Lane, follow Street Lane to Moortown Corner (big x junction with lights and a casino).
Turn Left onto Harrogate Road.
Cruise down hill, then go up for a bit, then cruise again all the way through Chapel Allerton. Enjoy!
Keep going on this road – as you pass Chapel Allerton Hospital on your left, it becomes Chapeltown Road.
You pass lots of shops, Yes Cyber is near the end of these shops on the right next to the International Supermarket, it is yellow.

You have arrived at the 7th Badge!! Nearly there!!

Now to go back to the city centre:

Carry on down Chapeltown road in the direction you were going.
Use the bike crossings to navigate the Sheepscar junctions and then go back up the steep hill, Claypit Lane, arriving back in the city centre, behind the Merrion Centre.

Turn right at the lights onto Woodhouse Lane and carry on all the way past the University and Woodhouse Moor Park to Hyde Park Corner.

Turn onto Hyde Park Road, and then immediately turn right onto Hyde Park Terrace. Turn left onto Midland Road.

Back Kensington Terrace is a right turn, near the end of the road.

You have arrived at 25 Spaces to collect your 8th and final badge!

Well done!! If you don’t have Monitor’s LS1/2/3 badge to complete the set, email us and we’ll send you it – you deserve it!!

Bus Routes

2007-05-13T18:25:00.001+01:00

How To Collect your badges by Bus:

Buses to each venue from Leeds City Centre

Complete Bus Route

2007-05-13T18:07:00.000+01:00

Suggested route around all the venues

- Starting from 1 Kirkstall Abbey Visitors Centre. Pick up your first badge, then catch the 15,33,33A or 670 bus (every 10 mins) from Abbey Road towards Leeds City Centre.

- Get off the bus on Kirkstall Rd at Viaduct Rd. Either walk ¾ mile to Armley Stocks Hill along Viaduct Rd, Canal Rd, Ledgard Way, Branch Rd, or wait for the no. 5 bus (every 20 mins) which takes the same route, getting off at Stocks Hill.

- Collect your second badge from 2 Armely Library.

- Catch the no. 16 bus (ever 10 mins) from Stocks Hill towards Leeds City Centre. Get off the bus at stop P6A on Boar Lane at Bishopgate St. in Leeds City Centre.

- Now walk ¾ mile to 3 Artist House: Cross the road and walk down Bishopgate St, Neville St, turn right into Water Lane. 0.2 miles along Water Lane, turn into Saw Mill Street.

- Collect your third badge from 3 Artist House.

- Retrace your steps along Water Lane, at the end turn right and cross the road. Go straight ahead on Great Wilson St., past ASDA house to Meadow Lane.

- From Meadow Lane catch the no. 12 Bus (every 10 mins), going south, away from Leeds City Centre.

- Get off the bus at Church St. and collect your fourth badge from 4 The Sun Inn.

- Catch the no. 12 Bus (every 10 mins) towards Leeds City Centre. Stay on the bus as it travels through the city centre, right up to Roundhay Park. Stay on the bus when it pauses at the park and then alight on Street Lane, by the row of shops on the left side. Here you will find 5 Haley & Clifford Café (approx 0.35 miles).

- Collect your fifth badge from 5 Haley & Clifford Café.

- Get back on the no. 12 bus at the same stop you just got off at, towards Leeds City Centre/Chapeltown (heading in the same direction you have just been travelling - these are circular routes!). Alight on Chapeltown Rd at Leopold St.

- Collect your sixth badge from 6 Yes Cyber.

- Catch the 12, 3, or 3A bus into Leeds City Centre. Get off at stop K1 on New Market St.

- Walk along New York St. and York St to stop F3 on York St. Catch the 18 or 18 A bus (every 10 minutes) going east (usually the bus is heading to Halton or Garforth)

- Get off the bus on York Rd at Appleton way. Collect your seventh badge from 7 The Irish Centre.

- Catch the no. 56 bus (every 10 mins) back towards Leeds City Centre. Remain on the bus as it travels through the city centre and alight Chestnut Ave. at Victoria Rd (next to Jacksons).

- Turn right and walk along Victoria Rd, turn right into Ebberston Grove, at the end of the street, turn left and then take the first right into Back Kensington Terrace.

- Collect your eighth badge from 8 25 Spaces.

To get back to the city centre:
- Walk back to Victoria Rd and turn right (the opposite direction from which you came).

- At the end of Victoria Rd. turn right onto Headingley Lane. Cross the road and catch the no. 1 bus (every 10 mins) into Leeds City Centre.

CONGRATULATIONS YOU HAVE COLLECTED A FULL SET OF BADGES!. If you did not attend the launch night and are missing the Monitor badge for LS1, 2 and 3, please e-mail us at us@monitorleeds.org. We will send you the Monitor badge.

2007-05-10T10:55:00.000+01:00

Monitor has been finding appropriate venues for distributing the badges. Some of these have been found by the artists, others we've had more of a hand in organising. In doing this we have already started to enter into discussion about the badges and what they throw up with regards to their postcode area. Below is an email discussion with Artist House in Holbeck whom we approached to distribute Simon Canaway AKA Supernaught LS11 badge.

From Bryan@ArtistHouse, 3rd May 2007

Hi lucy

We are happy to be involved as we are keen to support monitors work, however
what is the poster like? I don’t really agree with the ls11 badge, and would
be uneasy about putting this image in our window.

Perhaps I have misunderstood the badge’s meaning, is it, as indicated on the
blog about prostitution? – it seemed to me to be saying that the heroin
addicted women working in street prostitution were ‘cheap night life’ and
that all the office workers were perverts? I believe that the issues are a
little more complex and important than this. Am I reading to much into it?

Either way we could do with knowing what the artist was intending to convey
as people will undoubtedly ask us.

Bryan

A reply from Monitor, 4th May 2007

Hi Bryan

OK here is an edited summary of the Monitor response to your email:

Firstly your reading of the badge was totally different to how any of us read the work. The badge initially gave us associations of `cheap’ as in Holbeck Urban Village being the inexpensive way to move to the city centre (but trying to look flashy). Somehow the idea of a tall building fits with the idea of aspirational, glitzy night life but which Holbeck doesn’t quite live up to. We discussed the badge more in relation to Leeds as a whole and the outside response you get that Leeds has got great night life, but in fact it is pretty cheap and nasty and tainted when you are in the city centre at night – and that Holbeck Urban Village is selling the idea of living in the city but not really changing it.

“I also would not have come to that conclusion, said somewhere before I think the badge comments more on the mix between expensive high rise flats and the really run down parts that can be literally yards apart, or the fast and possibly cheap construction of the flats that then sell for lots of money.”

Your comments do seem to fix a meaning which is uncomfortable and difficult and made us all step back a moment. And reading Simon’s blog, he does talk about prostitution being there for the office workers in the afternoon.

This is tricky…Simon responded honestly to the area he was allocated. What he has discovered there, whether or not a comment on the prostitution in Holbeck is intended,it is what he has seen there.

It is an uncomfortable and sensitive topic and maybe Simon’s first impressions of Holbeck do not deal with the issue as sensitively as someone living or working in Holbeck but he has done what we asked him too. I don’t feel that we should begin to tell Simon what he can and can’t discuss about the area. In fact we encouraged him to not sanitise his response to LS10 into a fakely positive image of the area, unless that is what he wanted to say.
One of the main aspects about the project is that these are individual impressions of the area – and we are encouraging people who make the trip to collect the badges to do the same. To explore an area for perhaps the first time, who knows what they will find?

Perhaps we haven’t analysed the `Cheap Night Life’ badge independently of the collection of designs Simon proposed, but since your comments we feel more and more that Simon’s badge has a strong place in our collection because it does draw out this discussion and it poses a question about how an outsider reads an area, and who after all is placed to comment?

On a more practical note – the poster would not have to be displayed in the window, just in the space, so that people can see that this is a monitor badge collection point.

Please let us know what your conclusions are

best wishes
Lucy

Of course we also asked the artist to respond:

Monitor email to Simon@supernaught, 4th May 2007

Hi Simon

Lucy here. I wanted to let you know that we have had a bit of a discussion arise from your badge in trying to arrange the venue for it to be distributed. We asked some artist friends of ours who have a space called Artist House in Holbeck – it is part of the Round Foundry. It has other work on show that is part of the Situation Leeds festival, although it isn’t exactly a gallery – please see www.artisthouse.org.uk for info.

Pasted below is Bryan’s response to our request to have Artist House as your venue and our response to him. He has said he’d be happy to have it up on the blog (his idea) as part of the discussion of the work but I wanted to let you see it and have a chance to reply too, before i do that.

This is what Simon has to say:
From Simon@Supernaught, 8th May 2007

Hi Lucy

Apologies for a delayed response, I have been out of the studio until this morning.
It was interesting to read both your and Brian’s responses.

I am a little perturbed by Bryan’s not really agreeing with the badge design, surely artwork is a subjective platform upon which you place your own meaning and experience – this is how one invokes collected, and at once, personal responses.

I do however appreciate his position as an artist / distributor, and being that LS11 is his local geography can understand that he wouldn’t want ‘all the office workers (to be) perverts’.

I believe that the perceived discomfort has arisen from fixating on one comment from my observations. I am not going to ignore that the unfortunate sex trade exists amongst the redevelopment, and being raised in Teesside, having lived and worked in Leeds for three years and now residing neighbouring to Byker in Newcastle, I feel I do sensitively understand the complex and devastating social issues which gestate such a tragic depreciation of human existence – and is this not the very core of what the artwork is indeed about?

The central motif of the set was about the commodification of social space and its inhabitants in its many incarnations. I agree with your perspective regarding aspiration manifesting in materialism and status over spiritual and moral well-being. I feel that perhaps by viewing the selected badge as a single object as opposed to its proposed position of one of four designs, we do indeed – as we discussed – make the text and image relationship far more symbolic than area specific. This is beneficial in making the potential audience more global than local, but evidently it can and will invoke very heartfelt responses proportionate to emotional and geographical attachment.

I would urge you to post all of this dialogue on the project blog, I feel its a very fascinating and very important perspective of the manner in which art is consumed once it ceases to be the creators property.

Do please let me know if you feel this is inappropriate, I certainly would not want to put you or Monitor in any precarious situation with a friend and an arts organisation because of my work.

Best regards

Si

In conclusion - Monitor felt it was important that all of this dialogue (with complete consent from all concerned) was posted here. Artist House have agreed to distribute the badge from their space in Holbeck. We'd like to know what other people think about this discussion and the issues raised in Si's badge.

Final Badge

2007-04-22T16:35:00.000+01:00

Hi all,

I have had such a wonderful time in LS9. I have met some amazing charaters and I feel like I have gotten a good idea about the area, previously know as 'The Banks' by the first Irish settlers who took over the area fro the eary 1900's.
When I first came to visit the area around Burmantoffs and I found a place neglected. Residents were fearful of bored and menacing youths. Rubbish was dumped in wasteland where businesses had once been. There was just a sence of sadness and hopelessness.
Whilst researching for the project a sense of mischieve came over me and I built a fairy ring from the rubbish lying around. I was helped by a local resident and our work was inspected by three passers by. It resulted in smiley faces for all five participants. I have no idea how many people will have noticed it but half of it still survives.
Fairy rings occur naturally in woodland areas where a circle of mushrooms grow. In ancient myths and legends the fairies would meet at the fairy ring at midnight and dance and sing. They are seen as a mystical place, but a place full of joy and hope and healing. This is why I have decided to use the above image for my badge design.

There is more info about m research on my blog.

Any comments are welcome. Thanx

John in LS8

2007-04-21T09:17:00.000+01:00

Hello everyone, here's John Kenneth Hall's post in response to LS8. Blog problems...so I'm putting it up!

I don't often get sent to the suburbs to work, although
I regularly get told that the wealthier bits of anywhere are often the most culturally barren.
This is because by "culture" people usually mean "what everybody does as a group" rather than what individuals do, and in places where there is no obvious centre to the community theres nowhere to watch em doing anything. Also, you get very little arts investment in wealthier places because they cant fulfil the criteria, not enough outward signs of deprivation they can afford to go and find it, don't need it bringing to them etc although everyone might be inwardly screaming with boredom and desperate to take part in something.
Or not. There's always some sort of network, it might be anything from the PTA to a vigilante Committee, they just aren't always evident to the average bloke wandering around in the rain with a camera. And maybe that why people who can afford the suburbs choose to stay there. They like the quiet. They don't need to borrow any sugar, but they know where they could if they did.

These are sweeping assumptions of course, based on not very much. Decisions and actions are often based either on generalisations about places or individuals, or on simple readings of complex situations. Entire Regeneration programmes often seem to reflect little other than someone's determination to find something to nail a pet project to.

So given that on the one hand Ive only got a bit of time for visits, and (as one of my fellow monitors said) I don't want to just fleece the net for ideas I thought Id embrace generalisation, and spend a day or two wandering around Roundhay while only engaging with the surface. Maybe you don't have to knock on any doors. Maybe you can learn something about a place from what's between it and you.

I wasn't going to try to get inside people's houses , there's no obvious community centre apart from the library, and the few pubs I looked at didn't have much to set them apart from anything else in any other suburb..

There's plenty of estate agents on Wetherby Road. I took some of their blurbs. So Ive got a nice collection of Leeds 8 Interiors, and the first series ( I usually work in sets of three) was "Washing Machines You Probably Cant Afford."
Took some photos of initials carved into trees , some plastic bags roosting in trees on Wetherby Road.
Eventually I turn down a leafy lane, which is Lidgett Park Road, a narrow road, nice houses, very green in the wet. Quiet, really nice. There'll be security cameras too, but I couldn't see any. There's no-one about. Its a work day. A bit of traffic.
Started counting the Neighbourhood Watch signs, there's quite a few.
Neighbourhood Watch started up in Cheshire in the 80's, with a village full of people keeping an eye on each others houses. I took three photos of damaged ones; one a bit corroded, the other two broken and hanging off. Bad weather, vandals, who knows. I reckon one of these signs might be an 80's original, and worthy of commemoration. I wandered up and down this street for about an hour. Took loads of pictures in front of people's houses.
Then I went to Harehills for dinner, looked at the pictures; two of them were useless..so I went back, wandered the street for another hour, more pictures.

There's a few people in their gardens now. People moving around indoors, looking out onto the street...

4 0'clockish. Suddenly there are people about. A few people are coming home from work, kids coming home from school..No one says anything, no-one seems to mind. Good.
Then its quiet again. Take a couple more pictures of old footprints in cement, lichen on fences and lampposts, and have a slow walk around the park and back to Wetherby Road and make my assumptions as I ride the bus back into Leeds.

Tall white male in his late forties. Wearing a bright blue waterproof . Face concealed under hood. Rucksack with things sticking out of it. Wandering around in a residential Neighbourhood Watch area, Carrying a fire-damaged suggestion box from the burned out Caff in the Park. Taking loads and loads of photos from all angles, in the rain.

Maybe they had a look, did a ring-round, decided he's no trouble.
Confident and secure under the neglected signs, it's as though the neighbourhood wasn't watching at all.

Allotments

2007-04-20T17:32:00.000+01:00

Dear All

Here is my proposed artwork. The flat colours are the 5mm fold either side.
Im not saying anymore because im looking for honest, un-directed response at this point.

All the best

Si

Black Bench Awful Music

2007-04-19T16:33:00.000+01:00

Just a quick post to get some feedback on the progession of my artwork.
The focus of the work is the investment in business over the investment in people in LS11. The main spur of this is the Holbeck Urban Village project, something aspirational and economy focused glossing over elements of the area its proposal prefers not to mention. Using text from both their vision of the postcode and mine, i narrowed down to twelve phrases which i hope communicate potential and actual experience, and like the idea of two sets of two badges which compliment one another (25 each of four designs). In this manner, you afford collectors a lucky dip, letting them select which phrase they identify with or would like to wear based upon the semiotic they apply to the objects message. I particularly relish the word Allotments which i have come to consider as a project title, a nice similie for the inspiration of this visual output.

I had envisaged bold black type on white badges, leaving the actual text to be ambiguous as to its subject, but having drawn this up i worry whether it is too disconnected from its origins. The second mock up illustrates the pairing of a photographic image with a phrase, but in this instance i fear that the recipient is completely led to your conclusion, something i dont like to do in my work.
In summation, is the former concept accessible enough without appearing too minimal?

With regards locations i would like 50 badges each to be distributed from both the Round Foundry Media Centre in Holbeck and the Public Library at Hugh Gaiskell School in Beeston. Both retain the function of being an open centre for information and learning, both geographically are in the heart of and should reach a specific 'average' audience for that district and (for me, most importantly) architecturally, both individually and collectively emobdy an immaculate metaphor for the central motif of this work.

Si

Badge piece

2007-04-18T23:51:00.000+01:00

Hello everybody

Amelia from Monitor asked me to tell you all about the piece I am making for the badge project. Unlike the rest of you I am not making one badge design but making 100 separate designs that will make a ten by ten badge picture. Monitor asked me to do this because of my previous use with badges in my practice. The idea is that my piece will be hung up in a venue and visitors can come and pick a badge and take it away so that the piece slowly disassembles itself.

I came up to Leeds last weekend amd took photos and talked to people. I had a great time in Headingley. I am now making the badges and it is a big job. I hope that the piece will work.

I also hope that everything is going well for everybody else

Good luck

Helen

Badge designs...

2007-04-18T14:51:00.000+01:00

Well... with the deadline drawing nearer I thought I'd canvas some opinions on a few designs.

My areas to research were Kirkstall and Burley and I made a couple of research visits last week. I lived in various areas of Leeds during my student life, including Burley, and it's been great to get back there and wander the streets as part of this project - as with lots of areas of Leeds the already dense student population has increased dramatically in Burley and Kirkstall.

The stand-out aspect of my research was Kirkstall Abbey - a fantastic historical site which I, like many Leeds students, largely overlooked when living in the area. The Abbey has undergone some major renovations and has a new visitors centre in a restored original outbuilding (in actual fact is was the toilet block for the monks) containing artefacts from the Abbey throughout the ages. On the day I visited the Abbey, during the school Easter holidays, it was great to see families, students and couples using the grounds for picnics, sunbathing and games in the unseasonally warm April sunshine.

For anyone visiting Kirkstall and Burley the Abbey is undoubtedly the central attraction and as such I have based my designs on symbols, shapes and patterns found within the grounds. I often feature simple graphic elements in my work and these were in no short supply at the Abbey with leaded glass, iron gates, recovered floor tiles and decorative iron handles and locks. I've created a number of badges and have ended up with 3 I'd like to show here for feedback. Each is an amalgamation of various elements with colours inspired from the past and present of the Abbey.

Let me know what you all think.

Mike

2007-04-17T20:12:00.000+01:00

Dear Artists

We would like to know any ideas that you might have about where your badges could be distributed from. You may already have a specific place, talked to someone or have no idea. If you could email us or post ideas on the blog so we can follow it up ASAP. Or let us know a good area or type of venue to start from. We've come up with a system to ensure proper distribution at the venues, so now we need to know where they are going or where is appropriate to approach.

Many thanks, all of us at Monitor

Notes

2007-04-17T14:17:00.000+01:00

Tuesday 10th and Wednesday 11th saw my second visit to my designated district, Beeston and Holbeck.

With the deadline approaching, i returned with cameras and pens and an open mind to try to demistify what the media makes of LS11. The only thing Beeston is famous for in the press is its connections to 7/7, which immediately projects a negative image on the community and, as they tend to, the news likes to make issue of racial and religious tension and the potential backlash such reportage inevitably insites. I grew up in Cleveland, a region synonymous with redundant industry, high unemployment and an exemplorary record for negative social statistics. Racial integration simply does not exist and prejudice is generally speaking still acceptable. I studied in Leeds at university and lived in Woodhouse for a year, then Hyde Park and Burley for two and a half more and loved it - a wonderful model for social harmony on the whole.

I found the reality of Beeston to be somewhat as reported, starting out at Cross Flats park and traveling the expanse of the postcode limits through Cottingley and Beeston Hill. In places, i felt a very honest sense of being intimidated. My impression is of back to back red brick housing, tight alleys and overcrowding in places. I know this is perhaps the norm for most average to poor towns and villages, it wasnt the kind of place you felt secure pulling out a DV cam or even a sketch book in parts. I kept gravitating to the green spaces, the clearings amongst the brick. These are so obviously important and yet so commodified in town planning, not particularly profitable. We all want greenspace in our backyards, we go to parks and woodland to recreate, we return to the ground when were gone and adorn memorial gardens with photographs and flowers. There is an intrinsic relationship with nature and the desire to be aligned with it, perhaps the over populating of residential space and no real sense of valuing escape doesnt solely breed but certainly helps to nurture a sense of individual, human depreciation? Is it that this oppressive social climate becomes a vehicle for disaffected groups to place blame on others, is it a far more primal urge to feel free or at least valued than just your prefered system of belief?

Then we have Holbeck. Experiencing a rapid regeneration and expansion programme - Holbeck Urban Village - this area essentially starts from the rear of the train station and granary wharf and touches borders with Beeston just this side of the M621. It is a thriving business district, vast sections of redundant industry and units being leveled to make way for expensive flats, impressive and beautitul modern buildings made of glass and steel, old insutrial rennovation projects, architects and design offices, media centres. In short, it is being set up as the professional and economic centre, a flagship for the success of Leeds' business enterprise. Conversely, it is a prominant red light district which comes alive in the late afternoon, presumely accomodating for and feeding from the offices and professionals on their way home. I dont intentionally go searching for the underbelly, it really is that blatant! And as an artist i really love this motif of glossing over those elements which dont look so good in the brochure. Im sure all elements of the professional trades are booming down there.

Im not trying to get ideas above my station here, but i desparately didnt want to tackle the surface issues that anyone could google and make a badge about. I really want to know what you all think about my experiences. Im not setting out to be awkward and to look for negative elements but when there is no denying that they exist and that there is such a grossly dis-proportionate investment in quality of status over quality of life, what do you do? The directional problem is that the intention of the Badge Project is to illustrate reasons for the end user to realise and engage with more than just the city centre, so presumably it is a positive image we need to be projecting...
Apologies for the length of this diatribe.
Looking forward to some thoughts.

Si

Artwork dimensions

2007-04-17T09:07:00.000+01:00

The deadline is looming....(quite exciting for us to see the work!)

Please note, the final badges will be 25mm in diameter but ideally you should send us a circular image 35mm in diameter. The 5mm at each edge will wrap around the sides of the badge so the image/vital information should be within the 25mm. This will show on the front. I have e-mailed you each a template which might make formatting this easier.

Please submit an image at least 300dpi and in JPEG format. If you are having any problems getting your image in this format then let me know and I will help.

Amelia

Blogs, Blogs, Blogs

2007-04-17T09:03:00.000+01:00

Louise and Rebecca have been charting their progress on individual blogs. Click on their names in the right hand menu and you will be given the option to view these blogs too.

Kirkstall Abbey

2007-04-11T09:51:00.000+01:00

I headed over to Kirkstall yesterday afternoon for some research photography and managed to spend most of it in the Abbey. There's a new information centre opened up in a beautifully restored section of the Abbey containing many artefacts and information snippets.

Next up is a trip back to look at the rest of Kirkstall and Burley. For now though here are a few pics from the visit...

LS10 Hunslet, Belle Isle, Middleton. LS11 Holbeck and Beeston

2007-04-10T09:48:00.000+01:00

Many apologies to Alex who I misinformed that Holbeck was in LS10. Thankfully we realised yesterday and looked around the correct areas.

Simon, hopefully you've noticed from your map but Holbeck is actually in LS11 along with Beeston.

Amelia

Research...

2007-04-10T09:33:00.000+01:00

Hi All,

It's great to read about all the excellent research going on for the project. It sounds like there's some really interesting ideas developing out there. I'll be visiting my designated areas of Burley and Kirkstall this afternoon with my trusty digicam for some photo research. I'll keep you all posted.

Mike

Leeds zoo

2007-04-09T20:31:00.000+01:00

Hi everybody

Firstly thanks to Si for his intriguing images of subterranean Hyde Park. I love stuff like that. I have posted a comment to you Si so please keep in touch.

Also thanks to the anonymous person who left the comment. I will indeed check out this place.

I have another site to share with everybody thanks to Kevin McGowan who was a student at Leeds uni and who will be showing me round LS6 next weekend. The site: http://www.secretleeds.com/forum/Messages.aspx?ThreadID=114&StartAtMessage=0&#665

is an interesting mix of images and info about Leeds. I think the info about the bear pit is particularly interesting and lets be honest rather shameful by modern day standards.

Please check it out and let me know what you think

Have fun

Helen

Am I too old for blogs? LS7 finally contributes.

2007-04-03T08:44:00.000+01:00

Hello All,

Finally I figure out how to work this blog. You think you are street wise, you've mastered the mobile phone, the email, microsoft office etc and then comes the blog. At 27, am I past it?

Anyhow I hope all your research is going well? Mine has been focused on LS7, Chapeltown and Chapel Allerton. An interesting area but one that suits my practice very well. I made a last minute decision to go to a house party in Leeds on Saturday evening with a friend of mine and used the Sunday to do a little research. Lovely long car journey in a Volvo from London. Service station coffee and a packet of flying saucer sweets is always a treat. Good to be back in Leeds again though. I haven't been there since my friends graduated from uni couple of years and forgot how much fun the place is to go out and about in.

Most of my ideas were focused on Little London, a housing estate, and Sheepscar, the main junction out of the area, which can be found to the south of my designated area. I am particularly interested in Little London. If any of you know have any weird and unusual facts about the building that would be wonderful.

Have a good day.

Adam

LS6 Subterranea

2007-04-02T11:50:00.000+01:00

Hi Helen

I noticed you drew the LS6 postcode.
As my final major at uni i conducted a project on the underground spaces of Britain and discovered that leeds is rich with hidden structures.
There is a comprehensive WW2 bunker directly beneath Hyde Park which is only accessible from one inconspicuous point. As a component of my final piece, i orchestrated an audio performance in there at 3am one morning, building a custom PA which we could fit through the tiny entrance and then smuggled a selected audience inside and bombarded them with a disorientating soundscape.

Funnily enough, i invited one of the organisers from Situation Leeds and was politely declined on account of the all matt black print on matt black stock invites being 'intimidating'...

I can mail you some pics if its any use, the tunnels which connect Leeds Uni to the canal end of the city are another unspoken gem.

Si

No bingo!

2007-04-01T21:11:00.000+01:00

Hi all,

I missed the bingo. Maybe this week it will happen.

In the meantime I have found a new playground for me and the fairies, David believes, do you?

2007-04-01T17:01:00.000+01:00

Hi everyone,

Good to read about all your ideas and research so far. I'm intrigued to see the different ways ideas will eventually get turned into badges - whether it will be finding an image that seems to epitomise an idea or, as Alex suggested, having the way the badge is produced be important.

It's come up in discussion with Louise that the location the badge is available from could be important too. This might give another aspect to its meaning.

Re: the 07/07 bombers. As far as I can recall one of them came from Holbeck, 2 or 3 from Beeston and at least one more from Burley. Holbeck and Beeston adjoin each other - I'm not sure where the exact boundary is but I think it might be the M621 that splits them.

Rebecca, how did the bingo go?

Amelia.