Axisweb

B2S online: What Curators Want
with Emalee Beddoes and Matthew Pendergast
📆 30th September | 7 pm | FREE

Two curators, one in a regional museum service and one in a Manchester gallery, on what they look for, how they come across artists in the first place, and what makes a working relationship one they want to repeat.

Every event is FREE & OPEN TO ANYONE, member or not! Axis is a charity funded by its members, and that is what pays for this: no sponsorship, no public funding, no ticket sales.

🔗 Head here: https://buff.ly/AmMSc6b

POP-UP CRIT CLUB
📆 24th September ⏰ 12-1pm 🔗 https://buff.ly/ucZwxX3

Join Axis Producer Emma Copley for an informal and supportive crit session designed to encourage discussion, feedback and connection between artists. Whether you are working towards a finished piece or are still developing ideas, this is a chance to share your work, gain fresh perspectives and hear from your peers in a relaxed setting.

Four members will have the opportunity to present work for up to five minutes each, followed by five minutes of peer observations and discussion, with Emma facilitating the session. Any remaining time will be used for an open conversation about artistic practice, current projects, challenges, or recent developments.

If there is more time left over in this 60 minute session we will then open up the room for an open conversation about our artists practices, or particular projects you are working on, struggles you may be having, or progress you are making!

🤝 Axis' meet-ups are held according to our Community Guidelines and we kindly ask you to be mindful of what you share in case images/topics are of a sensitive nature as they might cause distress to other viewers.

Highlights

1. Pilgrimage, 2023 by Anna Gillespie

Wall based work in plaster and twigs on the theme of walking and touching the earth. Made for an exhibition at Tremenheere sculpture gardens in Cornwall.

2. 270726, 2024 - 2026 by Stuart Dodman

Oil on canvas.Part of a series of work produced while thinking about accumulation, experience, mass, material and time.

3. Crushed, 2026 by Graeme Reed

At first the image looks like the remains of something that has been flattened or broken, but it is difficult to say exactly what it is. The longer you look, the more the shapes seem to shift, revealing different possibilities without settling on one. The scattered forms around the main image add to the feeling that something has come apart. Rather than illustrating destruction directly, the print captures a moment of uncertainty, leaving viewers to decide what has happened and what the fragments might represent.

4. Edge of Space, 2019 by Ginny Reed

‘Edge of Space’, appropriates video of Felix Baumgartner’s jump from the stratosphere in 2012. His body, descending at supersonic speed, tumbles feather-like in the air, before stabilising to a barely discernible, diving figure. A short-wave infrared camera; ‘JLAIR’ (Joint Long-range Aerospace Imaging and Relay), captured Baumgartner from 24 miles away. This custom-developed, high-powered optical tracking unit occasionally loses its tiny target, and the footage judders before reconnecting. The soft, low-fi quality also reflects the challenge of capturing a human at this distance and speed. Like many experiments in emergent astrophotography, Baumgartner’s dive is at the limits of the apparatus’ abilities to capture it. The soundtrack combines the sonic boom when Baumgartner breaks the sound barrier with an atmospheric imagining of outer space from the Warner Brothers sound catalogue. The reality of this record breaking dive reflects the physics defying nature of animation; a dangerous, crazily ambitious plan that the protagonist pulls off in style.

MENTOR PROFILE: Antonio Roberts

We provide monthly opportunities for our Professional Members to have one to one discussions with experts in the visual arts about their practice and development aspirations. We asked one of our mentors, artist, musician and curator Antonio Roberts, what he likes about offering these sessions.

Head here to learn more: https://buff.ly/OnXd4Wj

📷: Antonio Roberts photographed by Emily Jones

🎒 BACK TO SCHOOL

Back to School with Axis is our annual season of FREE events on the practical business of being an artist: the things art school did not teach you, or taught on the day you were not there!

👉 Free, Online with Q&As. Click here: https://buff.ly/IRmA3xR

👏 Huge thanks to our contributors:
Emalee Beddoes, Matthew Pendergast, Hettie Judah, Samra Mayanja, Lydia Figes, Karina Thompson and Diana Scarborough, with Edwin Colyer!

Highlights

1. Pressure I and Pressure II, 2024 by Julia McKinlay

Ink and gouache on paper, installed on an aluminium bar. Exhibited in Surface and Form, Air3331, Tokyo following a research residency.
18 x 20 cm and 22 x 11cm

2. Disco, 2022 by Jennifer Douglas

Silver leaf on newspaper
13.5 x 17.5cm

3. Orbital Rotation, 2006 by Robert McCubbin

Collage/print featuring weekend magazine incised and overprinted with collaged items and revealed underlayers.
33 x 24cm

4. Shifter, 2025 by James William Murray

Iron oxide, rainwater, wine on linen
75 x 75cm

Upcoming Community Events

🗓️ 17th SEPTEMBER 12-1 PM
MEET & GREET: Say Hello
For all Axis members
Join us and we can answer your questions and introduce you to other members at our monthly meet & greet!

🗓️ 24th SEPTEMBER 12-1 PM
POP-UP CRIT CLUB
For all Axis members
A great opportunity to share work and offer feedback to your peers, in a relaxed setting.

🗓️ 1st OCTOBER 12-1 PM
DRAWING CLUB: Animals
For all Axis members
Drop-in and draw with us for an hour - Follow along, or do your own thing!

👉 Head to the Axis Community to read more & RSVP ✉️
All events are free and online: https://buff.ly/sWXkZSk

Highlights

1. Now and forever until the end of time, 2014 by Paula MacArthur

Oil on canvas
200 x 300 cm

2. Resonance (1/26), 2026 by James Lumsden

Acrylic on canvas
30 x 30 cm

3. Squeeze, 2024 by Melanie Russell

Intensely squeezed, layered, busily fighting for light and spring into bloom. The subject matter of spring bulbs mirror the paint application and composition here, masked off little sections of undergrowth overpowered by structural tulip leaves. Each element in combat for space and attention.
20.5 x 25.5 cm

4. Colombage, 2024 by Gwennan Thomas

This is part of a series called Dry Narratives.
Colombage, Pigment, Mica and Acrylic on Terry Towel Cotton
27 x 22 cm

🎒 BACK TO SCHOOL

Now in its 5th year, Back to School with Axis is our annual season of free events on the practical business of being an artist: the things art school did not teach you, or taught on the day you were not there.

👉 Free, Online with Q&As. Find out more here: https://buff.ly/CHm38ie

We aim to answer some of your questions about life as an artist, with a little help from our friends: practitioners, curators and writers who know what the work is actually like and are happy to say so.

This year we have two curators explaining how they find artists, two writers on what it takes to keep going, a workshop on money, and a roundtable on working with scientists.

👏 Huge thanks to our contributors:
Emalee Beddoes, Matthew Pendergast, Hettie Judah, Samra Mayanja, Lydia Figes, Karina Thompson and Diana Scarborough, with Edwin Colyer!