Hello, and welcome to the last Cultured. On Sunday of the summer.
With Dave enjoying a very well-earned holiday, we’re (figuratively) slightly slimmer than usual this week – which is probably no bad thing as the back-to-school, back-to-work and general September sort-out shenanigans begin to kick in.
We’re starting with some celebratory news just in from the Edinburgh Fringe, before Simon Rushworth catches up with Primal Scream frontman Bobby Gillespie ahead of an upcoming Newcastle gig.
And we’ve got a double helping of Tony Henderson, who reports on a new exhibition at Alnwick’s Bailiffgate Museum & Gallery and looks ahead to another coming to Vindolanda in Northumberland.
Enjoy your Sunday and see you next season
Northumberland-set show wins Edinburgh’s top comedy prize
Big congratulations to comedian Chris Cantrill who has won the Edinburgh Comedy Award for a show inspired by his (relatively) new life in rural Northumberland.
The 42-year-old Bradford-born stand-up took the prestigious prize for Rewilding, which follows his move to the countryside and turns an act of vandalism which shocks the local community into a spoof whodunnit.
The show follows 2024’s Easily Swayed, which also drew on Chris’ relocation to Northumberland and earned him an Edinburgh Comedy Award nomination.
Chris is also known as one half of The Delightful Sausage (also previously shortlisted for the prize) alongside Amy Gledhill, who won the same award two years ago.
His screen credits include Alma’s Not Normal, Daddy Issues and Avoidance, while he co-created, co-wrote and stars in BBC Radio 4 comedy Icklewick FM.
Chris, who wrote for the recent UK version of Saturday Night Live, is a member of North East comedy collective Felt Nowt, which had its own reason to celebrate on Friday night after sharing the panel prize at the ISH Edinburgh Comedy Awards. The collective was recognised after securing a Fringe venue which provided a stage for 51 North East comedians throughout August. Lovely stuff.
Primal Scream’s Bobby dazzler doesn’t hold back
Twenty-six years ago it seemed entirely plausible that Bobby Gillespie and Andrew Innes would use Primal Scream’s lofty platform to scrutinise those in power. For too long, they’d been keeping their powder dry.
A decade on from the band’s hedonistic, party-starting breakthrough Screamadelica, there was a renewed appetite within the band to get serious. Or seriously angry. The politically charged XTRMNTR had authority in its sights and nobody was safe: in 2000 government, the police and unscrupulous multinationals all felt the wrath of a band emboldened.
“I’m very proud of that record,” says Bobby. Primal Scream are set to play XTRMNTR in its entirety at Newcastle’s NX next month and a prescient album has never sounded so relevant. “I remember meeting my future wife around that time. I was in love and I had this amazing new album ready to release.
“One night I’d had a couple of drinks and I played Accelerator (track two on XTRMNTR) at full volume through these enormous speakers and I said to the lady who would become the mother of kids ‘if I never make another record again I don’t care’.
A brush with photography
Ex-bricklayer Kev Oldham is building a reputation for his work which blurs the boundaries between photography and painting.
Kev, who lives in Amble in Northumberland, creates images using the photorealism technique.
He transfers his photographs on to canvas and then applies layer upon layer of oil paint to produce the finished image. This results in a painting with the characteristics of a photograph.
“It is not a direct copy of a photograph as I can move things and change things,” says Kev, who will be showing 27 of his works in an exhibition titled Streets to Sea at Bailiffgate Museum & Gallery in Alnwick, Northumberland, from September 1 to November 1.
Roman materials inspire modern art
Materials reflecting the everyday resources available to the people who occupied a Northumberland Roman fort nearly 2,000 years ago have inspired a new exhibition at the military base.
Running from October 9 to December 31, the installation is the latest commission in The Land We Walk On, the Vindolanda Trust’s three-year contemporary arts programme, which involves artists with the location’s internationally significant collections and pioneering climate research.
Developed during Susie MacMurray’s artist residency at Vindolanda, the work draws directly from materials preserved in the fort’s unique archaeological environment.
Using beeswax, Haircap moss, Soay sheep wool and bone, Susie has created three sculptural works that appear to emerge from the fort museum walls, reflecting the slow, organic processes of growth, decay and preservation that have shaped the site.
She has used contemporary techniques inspired by traditional making processes. Rather than replicating Roman craftsmanship, her work responds to it.