WHAT WE HAVE TO LOOK FORWARD TO

WHAT WE HAVE TO LOOK FORWARD TO

by Norman Warwick

Fri 8 July | Progress Theatre, Reading (details below) | 7:30pm | £16.00 (£14.00 concessions, £8 under 16) plus maximum 5% booking fee Alban Claret guitar | Evan Clegg trumpet | Duncan Eagles tenor sax Luke Fowler double bass | Kuba Miazga drums Do you like the idea of the bebop tradition being brought bang up to date? Then you will love this gig.   Photo 1 “The Collection” comprises a quintet co-led by the French guitarist Alban Claret and the Yorkshire born trumpeter Evan Clegg. These London based musicians joined forces to record a ‘collection’ of compositions inspired by the works of some of their primary influences, notably saxophonist Charlie Parker, trumpeter Miles Davis and pianist Lennie Tristano. A shared love of bebop and composition discovered at a fortuitous meeting at Tate Britain, set the two on a path leading to the May 2021 release of their debut album The Collection. Their original material rooted firmly within the jazz tradition, powerful delivery of snappy tunes and confident improvisational passages offer a compelling yet accessible listening experience. “The Striking aspect of this album suggests great promise for the future”  – Jazzwise  “A set of highly accomplished & hugely enjoyable tunes. The quality of the playing is exceptional.” The Jazz Mann  Alban Claret was born in the South of France and began playing the guitar when he was eight years old. He studied at the Royal Conservatory of the Netherlands with Martijn van Iterson. He has played with many luminaries, including Gregory Hutchinson and David Liebman.   Evan Clegg grew up in Yorkshire and studied jazz trumpet at Royal Welsh College of Drama and Trinity College of Music. He has performed in many of London’s notable venues and in Europe, the USA, Mexico, India and the Middle East. He has toured with Max Romeo and Lee Scratch Perry.  Spending time with Kenny Wheeler further shaped his playing and he has developed a mature, distinctive style with musical ‘to-the-point’ phrasing that nods to his influences but is a unique voice of his own.

We are informed by the hard-working Miguel Ferrer, from the press office of The Cabildo that there is a new arts exhibition to be shown from the 3^rd June to 27^th August.

The exhibition by Fernando Larraz (right) is called “De un mundo raro”  and is commissioned by Nerea Ubieto and will be shown at  Sala El Aljibe – CIC El Almacén

After two decades, the Tenerife artist Fernando Larraz returns to the House of Culture “Agustín de la Hoz” to show us a suggestive selection of a part of his extensive artistic production linked to the new contemporary figuration. It is a disturbing and surprising gallery of more than eighty portraits of artists, actresses, actors and singers of forgotten, lost or recently acquired fame, who seem to look at us oblivious or trapped within a strange temporal reality or suspended in a multiplied existence of a world where the past and the present mysteriously unite.

Parallel activities include meeting with the artist Fernando Larraz and commented visit to the exhibition: Friday, June 3, at 7:30 p.m. and guided visits on a number of dates through the course of the exhibition.

If you would like go to the theatre in June, however,

YOU CAN BREATHE IN THE GARDEN AS IN A FOREST

The Count of Torrefiel CIC El Almacén – Sala El Cubo

This will take place on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th June and lasts for 35’minutesd and is suitable for all those aged over 12. Admission is free but must be previously reserved. Some covid protocols still apply

It is breathed in the garden as in a forest is a piece of theater that could essentially be defined as a scenic exercise for a single person, where whoever attends the play occupies the role of performer and audience consecutively. In this piece the two basic actions of the theatrical act are proposed: someone watches in silence while someone carries out a choreography of actions on a stage. And from this primitive theatrical convention that has lasted for thousands of years to the present day, a scenic game is proposed through a narrative sustained by simple actions that confront the participant with the convention represented. In this experience some questions emerge around how reality is understood, who is able to build it and why we love to observe in silence.

.The artistic project El Conde de Torrefiel began its career in 2010. Thescenic proposals are characterized by a visual and textual aesthetic in which choreography, literature and plastic arts coexist, seeking to transcend the parameters of verbal language. The Count of Torrefiel configures his works as specific questions according to time, moment and specific situation, but that are part of a path of research and reflection that transcend them. His proposals face the scene from an immediate temporality, formulating hypotheses that can respond to the unknowns proposed by the XXI century and its possible forms of scenic representation.

To hear music, why not go to hear FAJARDO AND TRILITRATE at CIC El Almacén on Friday 3 June at 20.00. Admission is only 5 euros for the sixty minute concert at CIC El Almacén, Arrecife

Back in June 2018, Fajardo, collaborated in the organization of a festival in Gran Canaria to which Trilitrate is invited. It is at that moment where the spark of a fervour arises that materializes in the collaboration of the Galician trio in the recording of the last album of the Canarian musician, Intuición. José Antonio Fajardo, a native of Fuerteventura, has developed a career in constant evolution towards the non-transferable;

There are talks in June on ART AND AESTHETICS by Estefanía Camejo, who is such a wonderful champion of the arts scene here on Lanzarote. You can join her at  CIC El Almacén on 6th June at 18.00 for ninety minutes. Admission is free but must be reserved in advance.

Starting from the premise of the need to explain and publicize the theoretical foundation that is associated with the artistic experience itself and the contemporary culture in which we live, this cycle of talks proposes an approach to the main concepts, postulates, principles and ideas linked to Aesthetics and the way of understanding the artistic fact,  from the informative perspective of the History of Art and thought, thus enabling both the knowledge and the analysis of the processes of meaning and interpretation of the artistic expressions of the past and the present.

We can look forward as well to a couple of more nights at the theatre in June and will take in a production of CEGUERA Cuerpo Teatro, celebrating the centenary of the birth of Nobel prize winner for literature, José Saramago, who spent the later part of his life here on the island

Performances will be given on 3 June – 21.00 h – Pabellón deportes de San Bartolomé and 10 June at 20.00 h – Centro Sociocultural de Mácher (Tías). The performance is of around fifty minutes with admission at 5 euros and is suitable for all those over 12 years old.

Blindness is a stage piece inspired by the novel “Essay on Blindness” by Nobel Prize winner José Saramago. The staging is the result of the theatrical laboratory developed between March and May of this year, in which about twenty people have investigated through the body and voice to travel through the different scenarios of the novel.

Blind bodies inhabiting the immensity of an empty white, minds deafened by the instinct to survive, fear and uncertainty breathe. In a society infected by sudden white blindness, the hope of subsisting in the abyss is blurred by savage animal selfishness. It is the darkest side of humanity illuminated by a white, harmful, dense, constant and offensive blindness?

.There will be art workshops delivered throughout June, too, and you might want to attend INICIACIÓN A LA TÉCNICA ARTÍSTICA DEL AGUAFUERTE delivered by Fabián Castilla at CIC El Almacén, in Arrecife, on 7, 8, 9 and 10 June. Registration is free but must previously made

After a brief introduction to the graphic arts and approach to the technique of etching, the artist and teacher Fabián Castilla will introduce us, in a practical way, to the familiarization with the tools and materials of this technique, as well as in the different phases of recording and printing. Next, the process of the protection and varnishing of the copper plate will be discussed, the realization of the drawing and its transfer to the plate, through the grating of the same with dry tip, the immersion of the plate in the mordant (iron perchloride), the elimination of the varnish and, finally, the realization of prints in colors,  as well as the sharing and final assessment of the work carried out.

Registration for the workshop is free and places will be limited to 8 people for each group. A morning group will be set up from 11 to 14 hours for 8 people and another in the afternoon from 17 to 20 h. for another 8 people. The registration period for the workshop will begin on Monday, May 16, at 9:00 a.m. and will end on June 2, at 1:49 p.m. through the link https://cutt.ly/NHclKdq

The allocation of the places will be made in strict order of registration, taking into account that this workshop is preferably aimed at plastic and visual artists. It is requested that, in case of not being able to go to it and being already registered, contact the telephone number 928831507 to communicate it and be able to award your place to another person who is on the waiting list.

There are further arts exhibitions to see, including “Mundos transitorios” (right) by CRISTINA TOLEDO, commissioned by Natalia Alonso Arduengo and showing in Sala El Cubo at CIC El Almacén from 9^th June to 13^th August.

Do spirits exist? The writer Allan Kardec in “The Book of Mediums” states that “if we should not believe more than what our eyes see, our convictions would be reduced to very little.” But what if spiritualism and illusionism were closely related since their inception? What if the supernatural powers to contact the afterlife were simple magic tricks? Extraordinary events, suggestion and fraud intermingle making it difficult to distinguish between fact and fiction. In this exhibition Cristina Toledo reinforces this ambivalence by entering the game of art and painting as the “illusion more powerful than the real” following the words of Jean Baudrillard.

Parallel activities include a Conversation between Cristina Toledo and Natalia Alonso, Thursday, June 9, at 7:30 p.m. Sala Cubo.   Guided tours of the exhibition on seven days throughout the showing.

Access to the guided tours will be free, but with prior reservation of place and until full capacity. To do this, interested persons must contact the CIC El Almacén on the phone 928 831 507, and check if there are places. Implementation of COVID

On 10th June artists CRISTINA TOLEDO Y NATALIA ALONSO ARDUENGO will be at CIC El Almacén at19.30 h to a ninety minute public presentation of their work. The event is open to the public and admission is free, but tickets must be reserved in advance.

Todos los públicos

Within the context of the exhibition “Transitory Worlds” a conversation has been scheduled between the artist Cristina Toledo and the curator Natalia Alonso Arduengo to address the creation process associated with this exhibition project and the relationships between spiritualism, illusionism and magic tricks as extraordinary events where suggestion and fraud intermingle,  making it difficult to distinguish between reality and fiction, something similar to what in a sense happens with painting as a formula for representation.

Another exhibition, this one by  FLORA GONZÁLEZ called  “Punto y coma” has been commissioned by Natalia Alonso Arduengo will show in Sala El Cubo at CIC El Almacén from 14^th June until 13th August. This too is open free to the public until full.

Starting from the need to channel an artistic discourse based on the transit of emotions, Flora González proposes a plastic intervention understood as the materialization of a process of creation in the form of a path, shore or stop. A necessary rest or “semicolon” within the hopeful journey that speaks to us of the transformation of the territory of darkness, the creative discovery of solitude or the strength born of personal vulnerability, as landscapes from which to configure new artistic narratives, full of meaning

Guided visits are available on several dates.

A discussion between two artists, SARAH FOX and NICOLÁS LÁIZ. will be moderated by Adonay Bermúdez at CIC El Almacén on 14^th June at 19.30. The 90 minute event is open free to the members of the public able to produce an advance booking.

The curator Adonay Bermúdez proposes a meeting between the American artist Sarah Fox, who is on the island within the program of artistic residencies of the Hotel Nautilus Lanzarote, and the Lanzarote creator Nicolás Láiz Placeres, in order to dialogue and seek connections that allow to draw bridges, see relationships and make readings between the artistic production of two creators who a priori did not know each other,  in the format of a conversation in which themes, intellectual concerns or strategies to which they resort to face artistic practice and other transversal issues of their respective creation processes will emerge

There will be what sounds like a fascinating installation to consider called from “Aberraciones visuales” by JOSÉ LUIS LUZARDO at CIC El Almacén that you will be able to see from 14^th June until 13^th August. Admission is free.

The plastic and visual artist José L. Luzardo arrives at El Almacén to show us, through several video art projections, the unexpected and disconcerting dialogue of different types of visual aberrations derived or conditioned by our observation of reality. Before us war-terrorist actions in the darkness of the night, compositional distortions based on the sexual practices of animals or light-sound interactions extrapolated from the vertiginous development of new technologies and telecommunications, as an ironic critical formula that reveals another way to observe our environment.

Guided tours take place on several days throughout the showing.

On 16^th June, we are back to music with JOAN MANUEL SERRAT “El vicio de cantar (1965-2022)” in the caves at de Los Jameos del Agua. The performance takes place at 20.30. Tickets are 70 euros for a ninety minute performance

After a forced inactivity, forced by the global pandemic of Covid-19, Joan Manuel Serrat returns to the stage with a last tour: “The vice of singing (1965-2022)”, with which he wants to say goodbye personally to the public with whom he has shared life and songs for more than half a century. The first concert took place at the Beacon Theatre in New York City on April 27, 2022 and the tour is scheduled to end at the Palau Sant Jordi in Barcelona on December 23.

As if all this isn´t of wide enough diversity Mr. Ferrer´s press release of June arts listings also includes a show by PICTORIK CIRCUS, the Aerial Circo de Lanzarote in Teatro Víctor Fernández Gopar “El Salinero” on Saturday 18^th June. There will be two shows, one at 17.30 and a later one at 19.30. Tickets are 6 euros.

We are invited to discover the wonderful universe that lives within the paintings, this museum that merges with the circus and invites us to dream of colours, brushes and canvases.

Two unique and unrepeatable characters, wonderful and enigmatic, will guide you through this own collection that we keep in our hearts and that today we want to share with you. Stop by and see, it begins: Pictorik Circus!

Aerial Circo de Lanzarote was born in 2009 as a Circus school seeking to grow, remain and spread the Circus in Lanzarote. He is based in San Bartolomé where he teaches classes in fabrics, trapeze, aerial ring, hula hope, Chinese mast and balances. He also teaches in different places on the island, among which the Municipal Circus School of Haría stands out, under the protection and coordination of the Youth Area of the City of Haría

There´are literary events, too, of course with CARNAZA AND MORRALLA. MORNING OF CASTAWAYS FROM MONDAY TO FRIDAY. This is a  Presentation of the book by Daniel Jordán, with Fernando Castro Flórez at CIC El Almacén. This will be given on 24^th June at 19.30, and is a ninety minuted delivery free to the public, bu tickets must be reserved beforehand.

After the exhibition of the exhibition “Murmura todo el teatro” by Daniel Jordán in the summer of 2019 at the CIC El Almacén, it was agreed to postpone the publication associated with said project to 2020, a circumstance that could not materialize due to various setbacks and circumstances associated with the pandemic.

Despite this adversity, in all this time Daniel Jordán and the well-known philosopher, art critic and professor of the UAM, Fernando Castro Flórez have not ceased in their efforts and kept alive an interesting discursive thread in the form of questions and answers in which they have addressed different issues of current cultural, thought and contemporary art and that has given body to this extraordinary,  dystopian and crazy chatter entitled “Carnaza y morralla”.

Then we´re off to the theatre again at Cic El Almacen to see a production of  UN PERRO LLAMADO BAUDELAIRE by the Bypass Teatro on 1^st July at 20.00. The sixty minute perfomance is suitable for those over 16 years of age and the cost of admission is 5 euros.

“A dog called Baudelaire” by the creator José Carlos Campos immerses us in the work of the cursed poet Charles Baudelaire on its 200th anniversary, through a proposal full of plasticity that rides between performance, poetry and contemporary drama.

The protagonist is a demonic being, dehumanized and chained in a purgatory from where he exposes his darkest perversions and desires, raising the eternal dichotomy between pleasure and morality.

The cursed poems denounce a hypocritical and decadent society that can only be evaded through beauty; art, poetry, excesses and love as a means to ward off suffering.

The montage raises a deep reflection on personal misery and public virtue. Eroticism as a weapon of power and power as vice. The wild man, social doctrine and the domestication of instinct. Contemporary freedom.

I am really hoping we can get tickets fo a concert by one of my favourite Canarias folk-lore group,  TEGUEY, performing “Este es

mi pueblo” at Teatro Víctor Fernández Gopar “El Salinero” on 23rd July. Their seventy five minute performamce can be seen for only 5 euros, so I am expecting some fierce on-line competition to reserve seats.

Teguey offer pieces of island folk-lore daring to compose new songs that speak of the feeling of an island. He bases their repertoire on traditional air themes of his own composition, leaving aside the versions of themes by other authors or groups. Their first album “Este es mi pueblo”, consolidates the group’s contribution to island folklore.

This concert is proposed as a tribute to our island, its municipalities and its people, in short, to the essence of Lanzarote.

For this occasion, they will have the participation of the guest soloists, José Manuel García (component of the A.F. Los Campesinos), Ruymán Martín (member of the A.M. P El Pavón”) and Nilsa Álvarez.

Coming soon for thoise who love folk music as well as classical we recommend next week´s Lendanear To Folk in-print Festival, beginning on Monday 30th May.

Lendanear logo From Monday to Friday of that week we shall post a series of daily blogs examining what has been called the álchemy of creativity. This examination will be conducted through the memories of Lendanear, a song-writing duo of the nineteen seventies who, even today, are constantly shape-shifting their songs nearly fifty years later. We will look at what opportunities writers have today to flip formats, as we lend an ear to old songs in new settings. We will examine the counter claim that there is no such thing as the alchemy of creativity, which some believe is just a way of saying accidents happen. We will carry an academic essay by the scholar who coined the phrase and then close our festival with a serendipitous tale about folk-legend Alan Bell, folk singer-writer, activist and founder of Fylde Folk Festival. With Lendanear playing devil´s advocates on either side of the argument, it should all make for some provocative reading.