Culture of Birmingham

This article is about culture and the arts in the city of Birmingham, England. It covers both notable history and notable contemporary activities.

Popular music

Black Sabbath

History

Birmingham has had a vibrant and varied musical history in popular pop and rock music, since the 1950s.

1950s

Fifties bands such as Billy King and the Nightriders, Pat Wayne and The Deltas and The Dominettes gave rise in the following decade to the Brum Beat era of the early 1960s featuring early progressive rock and bluesbands such as The Spencer Davis Group, Traffic, The Fortunes, The Rockin' Berries, The Idle Race, The Moody Blues and The Move (members of the last two going on to form The Electric Light Orchestra and Wizzard).

1960s

The Brum Beat era of the early 1960s featured early progressive rock and bluesbands such as The Spencer Davis Group, Traffic, The Fortunes, The Rockin' Berries, The Idle Race, The Moody Blues, The Uglys and The Move (members of the last two going on to form The Electric Light Orchestra and Wizzard).

The city is often cited as the birthplace of heavy metal music^[1] in the late 1960s, with Black Sabbath and Judas Priest coming from Birmingham. Robert Plant and John Bonham, later members of Led Zeppelin and being local to the city, played in bands which were part of the Birmingham music scene, they performed and rehearsed frequently in the city. Rob Halford of Judas Priest attributes the band's success to 'Birmingham having that [...] tough, working-class feeling [...] We weren't born with a silver spoon in our mouths. We had to go to work and work really hard. Some people that work in a coal mine or work in the car industry might argue and say, "These guys haven't worked a day in their lives." That's not true. To be in a band – to be in a worldwide, successful band – is incredibly hard work.'[1]

Also in the late 1960s, there were psychedelic rock bands, such as Velvett Fogg a cult British psychedelic rock band. Tony Iommi was a member in mid-1968, but soon left to form Black Sabbath. Their lone eponymous album was released in January 1969, and re-released on CD by Sanctuary Records in 2002. Also Bachdenkel, who Rolling Stone called "Britain's Greatest Unknown Group".

1970s

In the 1970s members of The Move and The Uglys formed the Electric Light Orchestra and Wizzard. In the 1970s, Birmingham's increasing West Indian population contributed to the popularity of reggae, with Steel Pulse's ground-breaking album Handsworth Revolution being a notable product of the time.

Early 1980s

As the 1980s arrived, the Rum Runner nightclub played a significant role in rock music in the city, particularly in the case of New Romantic supergroup Duran Duran. Dexys Midnight Runners, Stephen Duffy, The Au Pairs and The Bureau also emanated from the city's music scene at this time.

Later Musical Youth, UB40, the first truly mixed-race UK dub band, and Pato Banton found commercial success, as did 2 Tone band The Beat who drew their influences from Jamaican ska music.

Political skiffle was, for a short time in the mid-1980s, a notable Birmingham sound - led by bands such as Terry & Gerry.

The hip hop scene dates back to at least 1980, and has produced popular performers like Moorish Delta 7 and Brothers and Sisters.

Late 1980s

Later in the 1980s, Grindcore music, a blend of punk and heavy metal, was pioneered in the city by Napalm Death. The Charlatans, Dodgy, Felt, The Lilac Time, and Ocean Colour Scene were other notable rock bands founded in the city and its surrounding area in this period. Pop Will Eat Itself formed in nearby Stourbridge and consisted of Birmingham band members, as did Neds Atomic Dustbin.

House had been played in the City from the mid eighties, DJ's such as Constructive Trio, Rhythm Doctor at the Powerhouse. Rhythm Doctor worked in one of the shops selling a lot of the early house 12"'s, Tempest. Frenchy (Constructive Trio) also worked in a record shop selling house - Summit Records & Tapes as well as being involved in radio. Pretty B Boy (constructive Trio) had his own record shop opposite St Martin's Church. Mixmaster (constructive Trio) was, as his name suggests, a master of the mix, and also worked in radio.

There were places such as 49er's, Roccoco, Willies T Pot, Mojo, Dial B, Salvation..which played a mixture, from funk, jazz, soul through to house via hip hop and all sorts of everything. Bill, Dick used to do 49ers bar and Roccoco, and earlier Anthony's, along with Ean and Aidan, who did Mjo and Willie's T pot. Nathan dj'd at 49er's around this time, playing everything from Prince to House and Balearic.

The city embraced the national acid house scene with Lee Fisher and John Slowy's Hypnosis on a Thursday night at the Hummingbird Carling Academy Birmingham. Followed shortly after by Snapper club at the same venue, which was Jock Lee and John Maher's Friday night, along with Jock and John, DJ's such as Martin & Bear, Pretty Boy B, amongst others. This span off into bank holiday all-dayers with guests including Lee Fisher, Sacha, Carl Cox etc. Although illegal acid house parties had been popping up in Birmingham before, the first proper legal all night acid party/rave was at The Hummingbird also, and was called Biology, which was a London organisation. Acid house nights such as Spectrum took place in Tamworth and at The Hummingbird in Birmingham. Land of Oz at The Dome with Paul Oakenfold and Trevor Fung in 1989 which occurred on a Wednesday night, the same night The Happy Mondays played at The Hummingbird. Pirate stations such as Fresh FM and PCRL help publicize the music and parties, which help expand the scene in Birmingham. West End Bar was a major meeting place before parties, with Steve Wells and Steve Griffiths and was another important venue throughout this period of time. Electribe 101 hit the charts in 1988 with 'talking with myself'.

Besides popular music on the airwaves, Birmingham was also witnessing a huge explosion in 'invisible' music, notably from the Indian sub-continent and also with the popularity of gospel and 'black church' music. Evolving out of the latter musical movement, Birmingham's a cappella quintet Black Voices, established in 1987, was instrumental in creating a niche with their soulful renditions in both the sacred and secular. Black Voices has continued with that tradition up to the present (2010).

1990s

The Streets

Electronic artists include electro dub music creators Rockers Hi-Fi, Higher Intelligence Agency, Big Beat musicians Bentley Rhythm Ace, UK garage/house act The Streets, and Electronica bands Broadcast, Pram, Plone, Surgeon, Add N to X, Electribe 101, Mistys Big Adventure, Editors and Avrocar.

Electroacoustic and experimental music emerged in the city, via ensembles such as BEAST.

The city's cultural diversity also contributed to the blend of bhangra and ragga pioneered by Apache Indian in Handsworth. When hip hop performer Afrika Bambaata visited Britain he inspired new rappers and hip hop DJs including Moorish Delta 7 Elements, Juice Aleem, Roc1, Mad Flow, Creative Habits, Lord Laing, Fraudulent Movements, and DJ Sparra (twice winner of the DMC mixing championships). Brothers and Sisters took place in the 'Coast to Coast' club in the old ATV television studios on Broad Street in the early 1990s. Then came Fungle Junk, held for many years beneath House music club 'Fun'., and bringing The Psychonaughts, Andy Weatherall and the Scratch Perverts to the city.

List of notable historical musical artists

Successful Birmingham singer/songwriters and musicians include: Joan Armatrading, Steve Gibbons, Mike Kellie (of Spooky Tooth), Blaze Bayley (former vocalist of Wolfsbane and Iron Maiden), Keith Law (of Velvett Fogg & Jardine) Jeff Lynne, Phil Lynott, Carl Palmer (of Emerson, Lake & Palmer), Roy Wood, Jamelia, Kelli Dayton of The Sneaker Pimps, Juice Aleem (from Big Dada Records), Martin Barre (guitarist with Jethro Tull), Nick Mason (of Pink Floyd), Bev Bevan, Ali Campbell, Steve Cradock (guitarist for Ocean Colour Scene and Paul Weller), Stephen "Tin Tin" Duffy, Tony Iommi, Ozzy Osbourne, Denny Laine, Fritz Mcintyre (keyboardist of Simply Red), Christine Perfect (of Fleetwood Mac), Robert Plant (born in West Brom and played in Brumbeat bands), Nick Rhodes, Ranking Roger, John Henry Rostill (bass guitarist/composer for The Shadows), Matt Skinner, Dave Swarbrick (of Fairport Convention), John Taylor, Roger Taylor, Ruby Turner, Ted Turner (guitar/vocals, Wishbone Ash), Peter Overend Watts, Steve Winwood and Dave Mason.

See also: List of songs about Birmingham

Famous instruments

Birmingham-based tape recorder company, Bradmatic Ltd helped develop and manufacture the Mellotron. Over the next 15 years, the Mellotron had a major impact on rock music and is a trademark sound of the progressive rock bands.

Contemporary bands, labels and recording studios

Many varieties of music from metal to punk and electronic to dance continue to cross-fertilise in the city with acts such as The Bluebeat Arkestra, Bentley Rhythm Ace, The Streets, Rockers Hi-Fi, Editors, Surgeon, Mistys Big Adventure, 51 Breaks, Munchbreak, and Broadcast.

Notable dance music record labels include Network Records (of Altern8 fame), Different Drummer, Urban Dubz Records, Badger Promotions, Jibbering Records, Iron Man, Earko, FHT[2] and Munchbreak Records. Punch Records, in the Custard Factory, run street dance and DJ training courses.

While there is a thriving music scene in the city and a number of rehearsal studios such as Robannas, Rich Bitch and Madhouse (many of which have their own demo recording studios) there are very few working at a professional level. Until Circle Studios opened its 3,000-square-foot (280 m²) facility in 2007, aside from private studios in the hands of UB40 and Ocean Colour Scene and smaller studios such as Artisan Audio, there was no high-end recording studio operating in Birmingham.

Independent shops in the city selling records include Swordfish Records, Tempest Records, Jibbering Records, Punch Records, Old School Daze, Dance Music Finder Records, Three Shades Records and Hard To Find Records, which is the original 'dance music finder' in the UK and now trades as one the largest vinyl record and DJ shops in the world. Summit Records sells mainly reggae and doubles as an Afro-Caribbean barbers.

Contemporary Venues and Music Festivals

Birmingham's largest indoor venue, the National Indoor Arena

Birmingham's current music venues - large and small - include Symphony Hall at the ICC, The National Indoor Arena, O2 Academy Birmingham, the National Exhibition Centre, The CBSO Centre, The Glee Club, The Adrian Boult Hall at Birmingham Conservatoire, The Yardbird, mac (Midlands Arts Centre) at Cannon Hill Park, The Custard Factory, the Drum Arts Centre, The Jam House, and pub and bar venues including The Rainbow (Digbeth), The Bull's Head (in the suburb of Moseley), The Cross (Moseley), the Ceol Castle (Moseley), the Hare and Hounds (Kings Heath), Scruffy Murphy's, the Jug of Ale, The Queen's Arms (city centre), a branch of Barfly and the Hibernian. Leftfoot is a soul jazz and funk night that has featured on BBC Radio 1.

Party in the Park is Birmingham's largest annual music festival, at Cannon Hill Park, where up to 30,000 revellers of all ages listen to popular chart music.

The newest music festival that Birmingham has to offer is Gigbeth, first piloted in March 2006 and now annual on the first weekend of November in Digbeth. Gigbeth is a music festival celebrating local independent music from the West Midlands.

Jazz

Andy Hamilton

Jazz is popular in the city. Many venues support a jazz scene in the city, often promoted by Birmingham Jazz. Jazz musicians associated with the city include Andy Hamilton, Soweto Kinch, Julian Arguelles, Ronnie Ball, Tony Kinsey, Douglas "Dougle" Robinson and King Pleasure and the Biscuit Boys.

The busiest promoter of contemporary jazz in the city is the voluntary organisation Birmingham Jazz, which mounts dozens of concerts every year featuring local, national and international artists in venues such as the CBSO Centre, the mac arts centre, the Glee Club and Symphony Hall. It enjoys the support of the city council and the Arts Council of England and also commissions new works from both local performers and performers of international standing.

Classical music

History

The Birmingham Triennial Music Festival took place from 1784–1912 and was considered the grandest of its kind throughout Britain. Music was written for the festival by Mendelssohn, Gounod, Sullivan, Dvořák, Bantock and most notably Elgar, who wrote four of his most famous choral pieces for Birmingham.

Albert William Ketèlbey was born in Alma Street, Aston on 9 August 1875, the son of a teacher at the Vittoria School of Art. Ketèlbey attended the Trinity College of Music, where he beat the runner-up, Gustav Holst, for a musical scholarship.

John Joubert, the distinguished composer of choral works, joined the University of Birmingham's Music Department as Senior Lecturer in 1962, retiring in 1986 to concentrate on his music. During that time he had written the second of his operas and was working on his third, as well as completing a number of orchestral and chamber works. In 1995 the orchestra of Birmingham Composers Forum put on what was only the second UK performance of his Second Symphony, dating from 1970.^[2]

Groups, venues and orchestras

Birmingham Town Hall

The internationally-renowned City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra's home venue is Symphony Hall, which in acoustic terms is widely considered to be one of the greatest concert halls of the twentieth century and also hosts concerts by many visiting orchestras.

Other professional orchestras based in the city include the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, a chamber orchestra specialising in modern music with some world premieres; the Royal Ballet Sinfonia, who give concert performances under music director Barry Wordsworth in addition to playing for the Birmingham Royal Ballet; and Ex Cathedra, one of the country's oldest and most respected early-music and Baroque period instrument ensembles.

Birmingham is an important centre for musical education as the home of the UCE Birmingham Conservatoire, founded in 1859. The Royal College of Organists is based in Digbeth. Birmingham City Council appoint the Birmingham City Organist to provide a free series of weekly public organ recitals.

The Birmingham Royal Ballet resides in the city as does the Elmhurst School for Dance, based in Edgbaston, and which claims to be the world's oldest vocational dance school.

Birmingham's professional opera company - the Birmingham Opera Company - specialises in staging innovative performances in unusual venues (in 2005 it performed Monteverdi's Il Ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria in a burnt-out ice rink in the Chinese Quarter). Its artistic director, Graham Vick, has also directed at La Scala, Milan, the Metropolitan Opera in New York and the Royal Opera House in London.

Visiting opera companies such as Opera North and Welsh National Opera perform regularly at the Hippodrome.

Birmingham's other principal classical music venues include The National Indoor Arena (NIA), CBSO Centre, Adrian Boult Hall (ABH) at Birmingham Conservatoire, the Barber Concert Hall at the Barber Institute of Fine Arts and Birmingham Town Hall. Concerts also regularly take place in churches around the city including St Phillips Cathedral, St Paul's in the Jewellery Quarter, St Alban's in Highgate and The Oratory on the Hagley Road.

Symphony Hall

Literature

Many famous literary figures have been associated with Birmingham:

Historical authors

• W.V. Awdry wrote his first Thomas the Tank Engine in Kings Norton and remained in the city until 1965.
• W. H. Auden grew up in Harborne, Birmingham, and taught for many years at schools in nearby Malvern. Local references include Bristol Street in "As I walked out one evening" and his panegyric of 'The view from Birmingham to Wolverhampton' in "Letter to Lord Byron".
• Barbara Cartland was born in Edgbaston in 1901. The family home was on Cartland Road, Kings Heath.
• Henry Francis Cary, a translator best known for his version of Dante's Divine Comedy, was educated at grammar schools in Sutton Coldfield and Birmingham during the 1780s and published a volume of Odes & Sonnets while at the latter.
• Charles Dickens once gave readings in Birmingham Town Hall and was the sixteenth President of The Birmingham and Midland Institute.
• Leonard Cottrell was a Brummie author, archaeologist, commentator, and producer for the British Broadcasting Corporation. He also worked as a war correspondent for the Royal Air Force, and later wrote many work on ancient history became the editor of the Concise Encyclopaedia of Archaeology (1965)^[3].
• Arthur Conan Doyle [3] lived in Aston from about Spring 1879 - early 1882 and some of his works include references to people or places he knew there.
• John Drinkwater, a Georgian poet and playwright who came to the city in 1901, he eventually became the first manager of Birmingham Repertory Theatre.
• D. J. Enright (born in Leamington Spa) was an Extramural Tutor at Birmingham University between 1950-3. There are references to the city and Black Country in his early poetry.
• Edgar Guest was born in the city in 1881, moved to America with his family as a boy and achieved fame there as a poet.
• Alfred Hayes was born in Wolverhampton and educated in Birmingham. Secretary of the Birmingham and Midland Institute from 1889–1912, he wrote the school song for King Edward's School, Birmingham and was author of several volumes of poetry.
• Gerard Manley Hopkins taught under John Henry Newman at the Oratory School in Edgbaston when he graduated and converted to Catholicism in 1867. It was here that he first developed his ideas of inscape and instress that were to prove central to his poetic practice.^[4]

W. H. Auden

• William Hutton 1723-1815, moved from Derby to Birmingham at a young age and became well known in the region as a poet and documented the history of the region in many books.
• Washington Irving [4] stayed with his sister in Birmingham for some time, during which he wrote stories including Rip van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Bracebridge Hall, or, The Humorists, A Medley is based on Aston Hall.
• Samuel Johnson's father, a Lichfield bookseller, ran a bookstall in Birmingham market at the start of the 18th century. Johnson stopped in the city between the end of 1732 and the start of 1734, writing articles for the Birmingham Journal, with whose editor he was lodging. During this time he also wrote his first book, A Voyage to Abyssinia, which was published in the city.
• Edward Lowbury came to work as a microbiologist at Birmingham Accident Hospital in 1949. Between then and his departure from the city in 2001 he wrote his most distinguished poetry, as well as the topographical collection Birmingham! Birmingham!
• Louis MacNeice lectured in classics at the University of Birmingham in the early 1930s, and wrote several poems about the city, including parts of Autumn Journal.
• Charles Madge was professor of Sociology at Birmingham University from 1950-70. During the 1930s he made a reputation as a Left-leaning progressive poet.
• Constance Naden was renowned for her scientific and philosophical essays and judged by William Ewart Gladstone to be among the top eight women poets of the 19th century. She died at the age of 31 in 1889 and a medal named after her is annually awarded by Birmingham University for the best MA thesis in the Faculty of Arts.
• John Henry Newman, theologian and churchman, lived in the city almost continuously from 1847 to his death. Among his better known work written there was the autobiographical Apologia Pro Vita Sua and the poem The Dream of Gerontius.
• Charles Talbut Onions: Birmingham born and educated, he was a prominent etymologist who worked on the Oxford English Dictionary and was general editor of its shorter version.
• Lenrie Peters, the Gambian surgeon and poet, worked at Birmingham Accident Hospital in the early 1960s, during which his early poetry and one novel were written.
• Enoch Powell was born and raised in Birmingham, and was a significant poet as well as a politician.

John Rogers, editor of the first complete authorised version of the Bible to be printed in the English language

• John Rogers was born and educated in Deritend and went on to become the compiler and editor of the 1537 Matthew Bible, parts of which he also translated. This was the first complete authorised version of the Bible to be printed in the English language^[5] and the most influential of the early English printed Bibles, providing the basis for the later Great Bible and the Authorized King James Version.^[6] Rogers' 1548 translation of Philipp Melanchthon's Weighing of the Interim, possibly translated in Deritend, is the first book by a Birmingham man known to have been printed in England.^[7]
• Sax Rohmer, author of the Fu Manchu thrillers ^[8], was the pseudonym of Arthur Henry Ward, who was born in Birmingham but pursued his writing career in London and then New York.
• J. R. R. Tolkien spent most of his childhood in the Birmingham area, and his work is much influenced by his time there [5]; his parents also came from Birmingham.
• R.F. Willetts, Professor of Greek and Chairman of the School of Hellenic and Roman Studies at the University of Birmingham, wrote several works on Ancient Crete. He was also a published poet and translator.
• Although never a resident of the city, the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein had close links with Birmingham, visiting the city regularly in the years leading up to World War I to stay with his friend David Pinsent in Selly Park. It was in Paradise Street opposite Birmingham Town Hall in 1913 that he dictated the typescript that would become Notes on Logic, his first philosophical work.^[9] Wittgenstein was to visit the city regularly again in the 1930s and 1940s, when he was part of a close circle of friends centred around George Thomson and Nicholas Bachtin at the University of Birmingham, whose intellectual culture at the time was more outward looking than that at Cambridge, where he was based.^[10]
• Emma Jane Worboise, known as Mrs Etherington Guyton, was born in Birmingham in 1825 and was well known for her many novels (including "Overdale", subtitled "The Story of a Pervert").
• John Wyndham, author of The Day of the Triffids, The Midwich Cuckoos and many others, was born in nearby Knowle and lived in Edgbaston until he was eight years old.
• Francis Brett Young was born in Halesowen and studied medicine at Birmingham University. It was only after he left the city in 1907 that he began writing the ‘Mercian novels’ that made him famous; in these Birmingham and the Black Country often figure, but under fictitious names.

Contemporary authors

Benjamin Zephaniah

• Gavin Bantock^[11], grandson of the composer Granville Bantock, was born in Barnt Green in 1939 and educated at Kings Norton Grammar School and Birmingham Theatre School. He has lived in Japan since 1969 but his poetry continues to be published in England.^[12]
• Jonathan Coe was born and raised in Birmingham, which is the setting of two of his novels The Rotters' Club and The Closed Circle.
• Judith Cutler's crime novels are set in present-day Birmingham.
• Andrew Bidmead's political polemic 'The Last of England' is set in Birmingham
• Roshan Doughe became the fifth Poet Laureate for Birmingham in October 2000.
• Julie Boden became the seventh Poet Laureate for Birmingham in October 2002.
• Roy Fisher was born, educated and taught in Birmingham, before moving to the Department of American Studies at Keele University in 1971. Also a poet, his first significant work was City, an evocation of Birmingham. Other local references occur in the "Handsworth Liberties" sequence.
• Roi Kwabena (1956–2008) lived continuously in the city from 1995 and was its sixth Poet Laureate (2001-2). He was also a story-teller, drummer and cultural ambassador.
• David Lodge taught in the English Department at Birmingham University. In his novels, the city figues as Rummage.
• Femi Oyebode, Professor of Psychiatry at the Queen Elizabeth Psychiatric Hospital, has published seven poetry volumes in Nigeria.
• Nick Toczek, performance poet and children's writer, studied industrial metallurgy at Birmingham University between 1969–72 and lived in the city again between 1974-9, when he began publishing innovatory poetry and prose.
• Benjamin Zephaniah is a black dub poet from Handsworth who tackles prejudice, poverty and injustice.

The city also has literary publishers such as Tindal Street Press and hosts The Young Book Reader UK festival, as well as an online literary community called Birmingham Words.

Theatre

Famous stage names

Kenneth Peacock Tynan and David Edgar are possibly Birmingham's most famous members of the theatrical scene. The Birmingham School of Acting trains actors in the city.

Theatres

There are many theatres in Birmingham. The four largest professional theatres are the Alexandra Theatre ("the Alex"), Birmingham Repertory Theatre ("The Rep"), the Birmingham Hippodrome and the Old Rep. The mac and Drum arts centres, the Crescent Theatre and the Old Joint Stock Theatre also host many professional plays. Sutton Coldfield Town Hall has theatre facilities and hosts numerous amateur productions. The actors in the long-running Radio 4 serial The Archers live in and around Birmingham, where the supposedly rural programme is recorded.

Birmingham also hosts a number of independent and community theatre companies, including Banner Theatre which was founded in the city over thirty years ago. Round midnight ltd produce work for schools, colleges and arts centres as well as film, television and radio. For ten years, Birmingham's Fierce! festival has presented a performance art festival. It has recently begun commissioning new works from British and international performers.

Comedy

Famous comedians from Birmingham include Sid Field, Tony Hancock, Jasper Carrott and Shazia Mirza. Other leading figures include Jo Enright (Lab Rats, Phoenix Nights, Time Trumpet), Natalie Haynes, James Cook, Weakest Link winner Andy White and Barbara Nice (the creation of actress Janice Connolly). The Glee Club and Birmingham Jongleurs are both prominent comedy venues. The Drum Arts Centre and the mac also host monthly comedy sessions while smaller independent comedy promoters/ venues include The Cheeky Monkey Comedy Club (The Station pub, Kings Heath - and the city's longest running independent comedy club), plus The Laughing Sole (in Strichley) and Retort Cabaret (Kitchen Garden Cafe, Kings Heath) with other nights at Old Joint Stock Theatre (city centre), Library Theatre and Alexandra Theatre (Real Deal Comedy).

The Birmingham Comedy Festival was founded in 2001 and runs over 10 days at the beginning of October with a line-up that combines leading TV names with rising talent from Birmingham and the West Midlands. The 2008 festival (Oct 3-12), in association with Wye Valley Brewery and supported by BirminghaMail.net, features Frankie Boyle, Jimmy Carr, Lee Evans, Ken Dodd and Dylan Moran.

Visual arts

Main article: Art of Birmingham

History of painting and illustration

David Cox was a famous Birmingham watercolour artist and President of the Associated Artists in Water Colour in 1810.

An "Academy of Arts" was organised in 1814, and an exhibition of paintings took place in Union Passage that year. A School of Design, or "Society of Arts", was started Feb. 7, 1821; Sir Robert Lawley, Bt (the first Lord Wenlock) presenting a valuable collection of casts from Grecian sculpture. The first exhibition was held in 1826, in a building on New Street.

The first Ballot for pictures to be chosen from the Annual Exhibition of Local Artists took place in 1835.

Edward Burne-Jones was born in Birmingham, spent his first twenty years in the city, and later became the president of the Birmingham Society of Artists (which dates from 1826). He strongly influenced the Birmingham Group, which formed the link between late Romanticism in the visual arts and the Birmingham Surrealists who were prominent in the city's arts in the early and mid 20th century.

The Scottish painter William Gear (1915–97) had studied with Fernand Léger in Paris and after World War 2 became the only British member of the Surrealist-influenced COBRA, the most avant-garde movement of the time. Between 1964-75 he was head of the Faculty of Fine Art at Birmingham College of Art and continued to live in the city until his death.

The Birmingham Arts Lab at Gosta Green was an important centre for alternative comic art in the late 1970s; in the 1990s the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery staged a historical retrospective of the work made there.

History of photography

Victorian photographer Sir Benjamin Stone (1838–1914) lived and worked in Erdington, Birmingham. The Birmingham Central Library now holds the Benjamin Stone Collection. The Victorian "father of art photography", Oscar Gustave Rejlander lived and worked at nearby Wolverhampton, and was a founder member of the Birmingham Photographic Society. The BPS later elected Henry Peach Robinson as a member.

The famous photographer Bill Brandt made an extensive series of photographs for the Bournville Village Trust in Birmingham, between 1939 and 1943. These have been published as the book Homes Fit For Heroes (Dewi Lewis, 2004). The post-war changes in the cityscape, especially the clearance of older housing and the changes to the central markets, were documented by Phyllis Nicklin (1913?-1969).

In late 1979, Derek Bishton (now Consultant Editor for The Daily Telegraph), John Reardon (became Picture Editor of The Observer), and Brian Homer were three community photographers and activists in Hnadsworth, and they facilitated the 'Handsworth Self Portrait' series of self-portraits on the streets of Handsworth, Birmingham. Other notable photographers include Pogus Caesar, his OOM Gallery Archive holds in excess of 14,000 photographic images from 1982–present. Caesar's recent exhibitions include From Jamaica Row - Rebirth of the Bullring, Muzik Kinda Sweet and That Beautiful Thing, his work is represented in Birmingham Central Library.

The city is home to famed fashion photographer Garazi Gardner.

History of typography

John Baskerville (1706–1775) was a noted type designer, the developer of wove paper, and typographic businessman in fine printing. His Baskerville font is still in wide use today. The Birmingham Guild and School of Handicrafts operated a fine arts small-press, the Press of the Birmingham Guild of Handicraft. From 1895 until 1919 this Press produced books in the Kelmscott Press tradition of the Arts and Crafts Movement. George Kynoch's Kynoch Press (1876–1981) was a Birmingham printing house that substantially contributed to the development of a British typography. The teacher Leonard Jay (1888–1963) made the Birmingham School of Printing a profound influence on a generation of typographers, and set the pattern for printing education worldwide. More recent small-press printers included F.E.Pardoe and David Wishart.^[13]

Contemporary artists

Graffiti (or "spraycan art") culture appeared in the early 1980s, with the area featuring in Channel 4 documentary Bombing. Local artists who use urban Birmingham as their canvas (this is illegal, and regarded by some as vandalism) have included Chu and Goldie. Street art competitions are still regularly held at the Custard Factory.

A variety of contemporary public art is located around the city centre, most of it created by artists from outside the Midlands. The construction of the Bull Ring Shopping Centre included three light wands which were erected at the main entrance, a huge mural on a glass façade located at the entrance facing New Street station and three fountains in St Martin's Square in the shape of cubes, which are illuminated at night in different colours.^[14]

Contemporary African Caribbean artists and photographers who have exhibited internationally include Pogus Caesar, Keith Piper and the late Donald Rodney.

Current art galleries

• The Barber Institute of Fine Arts is housed at the University of Birmingham and although only a small gallery it was declared 'Gallery of the Year' by the Good Britain Guide 2004.
• Birmingham has one of the largest collections of Pre-Raphaelite art in the world at The Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery.
• The Ikon Gallery is housed in a neo-gothic former school in Brindleyplace and showcases modern art. Number 9 The Gallery is close by.
• The Halcyon Gallery is located inside the International Convention Centre. It opened with a major retrospective of Robert Lenkiewicz, and has continued with exhibitions by artists as diverse as Rolf Harris and L. S. Lowry.
• The Waterhall gallery in the Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery displays a regular showcase of modern art which includes local artists and others sometimes from the city's own extensive collection.
• Harborne Gallery, the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists and the 'New Gallery' in St Paul's square also shows local artists.
• The old Bird's Custard Factory is now one of the largest media and arts villages in Europe, with occasional exhibitions and modern sculpture and water features.
• OOM Gallery online collaborates with the private, public and voluntary sector by developing and producing a diverse range of multimedia art projects.
• The mac hosts theatre performances, concerts, literature and poetry showcases, courses, film screenings and small art exhibitions.
• The Drum Arts Centre features works of African, Asian and Caribbean contemporary artists.
• Selly Oak ball park is home to many graffiti murals that change on a regular basis. Other graffiti art can be seen across the city on disused buildings and canal towpaths as well as subways.

There are a variety of other small and private galleries in the city.

Major arts events

From 1997 the city has hosted an annual arts festival ArtsFest during September, where families can enjoy many of the city's arts, for free. It is said to be the largest free arts festival in the UK. In December 2006 the City Council announced that it would no longer hold Artsfest. [6], but it continued in 2008 under the support of Brindley Place, Centro, Kerrang Radio and of course, Birmingham City Council. There are a number of events scheduled for the forthcoming months in Birmingham [7].

References

1. ^ Konow, David. Bang Your Head: The Rise and Fall of Heavy Metal (New York: Crown, 2002) ISBN 0-609-80732-3
2. ^ ["Inspired by Massacre of Innocents", Birmingham Post, 26 October 1995]
3. ^ See a list of these on Google Books
4. ^ The Collected Works of Gerard Manley Hopkins, Volume IV: Oxford Essays and Notes 1863-1868 (Description) Oxford University Press General Catalogue
5. ^ Chester, Joseph Lemuel (1861), John Rogers: the Compiler of the First Authorised English Bible, London: Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts, pp. 18–62, OCLC 257597540, http://books.google.com/?id=-oALAAAAYAAJ, retrieved 2009-02-14 
6. ^ Price, David (2004), Let it Go Among Our People: An Illustrated History of the English Bible from John Wyclif to the King James Version, James Clarke & Co., pp. 49–50, ISBN 0718830423, http://books.google.com/?id=eyOWfplHLVQC&pg=PA49, retrieved 2009-02-15 
7. ^ Hill, Joseph (1907), The book makers of old Birmingham; authors, printers, and book sellers, Birmingham: Printed at the Shakespeare Press for Cornish Bros., pp. 6–7, OCLC 3773421 
8. ^ Several of these can be read on Google Books
9. ^ Monk, Ray (1991). Ludwig Wittgenstein: The Duty of Genius. London: Vintage. p. 92. ISBN 0099883708. ; abstracts of the chapters are available on Oxford Scholarship Online and a partial preview of the text on Google Books
10. ^ McGuinness, Brian (2001). Approaches to Wittgenstein. London: Routledge. p. 46. ISBN 041503261X. http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=DtEEjuMjqrYC&pg=PA46. Retrieved 2011-06-05. 
11. ^ Home Page
12. ^ Anvil Press details
13. ^ http://www.birmingham.gov.uk/cs/Satellite?c=Page&childpagename=Lib-Central-Information-Services%2FPageLayout&cid=1223092632815&pagename=BCC%2FCommon%2FWrapper%2FWrapper
14. ^ Artwork of the Bullring BBC

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