The Liverpool Art Prize is an annual competition for artists.  Now in its fifth year, the prize is exhibited, administered and managed by Metal at Edge Hill Station.

Dates: 27th April - 9th June 2012

Venue: Metal, Edge Hill Station, Tunnel Road, Liverpool, L7 6ND

Shortlisted artists: Alan Dunn, Tomo, Robyn Woolston and The Drawing Paper’s Jon Barraclough and Mike Carney.

PRIZES

The Art Prize: £2000 plus solo exhibition at The Walker Art Gallery Liverpool

The People's Prize: £1000 selected by the audience during the exhibition of shortlisted artists

Metal studio residency award: Supported studio space for a period of 1 year at Edge Hill Station

APPLY HERE - Deadline 11 May

Metal international residency: To Shanghai in partnership with Shanghai Art School

APPLY HERE - Deadline 11 May

FUTURE STATION - Metal Liverpool

A growing network of local artists, residents and creative thinkers who meet regularly at the station to develop programme ideas and initiate collaborative projects.

Meetings are FREE and open to all with food provided.

Please email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or call [0151] 7072277 for more information/if you plan to attend.

FUTURE DATES:

Tuesday 22 May 6pm with RLPO's Principal Cellist Jonathan Aasgaard

Thursday 26 July 6pm

Film screenings at Metal, Edge Hill Station in the buildings on platform THREE.

FREE ADMISSION Performances start at 6:30pm, bring your own refreshments.

Seats are limited so please call 0151 707 2277 or email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it to reserve yours.are looking for local/artist's short films (Max 20 mins) to show before features. please submit DVD's, short synopses or web-links to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or hand them in at a film screening.

Upcoming films:

Friday 13nd April 6:30pm

The Innocents (12A) (Director Jack Clayton)

Friday 27th April 6:30pm

The Hairdresser's Husband (15) (Director Patrice Leconte)

Friday 11th May 6:30pm

A Touch of Zen (12) (Director King Hu; running time 200 mins)

Friday 25th May 6:30pm

The Devil's backbone (15) (Director Guillermo Del Toro)

Metal runs a programme of Culture LABS each year that brings together groups of artists and thinkers in exploratory, week-long, intensive residencies around different themes and subjects.  Artists come from a variety of disciplines, types of practice and different places around the UK and overseas.

LABS this year have included investigations into; Digital work with emphasis on new software and hardware development;  Comedy in Live Art; Protest and Propaganda in relationship to the modern Olympic movement. 

We host LABS from both our spaces in Liverpool and Southend-on-Sea.  They are designed to help artists examine and develop their practice, assist with knowledge exchange and expertise, and to provide the opportunity for time and space to develop new ideas.

Culture LAB:  Protest and Propaganda was hosted in Liverpool from 6 - 10 February 2012.  Artists Janie Nicoll, Nicki Mccubbing, Laurence Payot, Sam Wiehl, Penny Whitehead and Daniel Simpkins took part in a week that included a series of talks from visiting artists, development sessions around skills, group discussion, time slots for individual work and some shared meals, facilitated by the Metal team.  The artists focused on the theme of protest and propaganda around the modern Olympic movement, with an eye on the 2012 London Olympics with an invitation to develop ideas for new pieces of work to be presented at Metal's Village Green festival in Southend On Sea in June.

Those ideas are currently in development.  In the meantime here are some photographs and video feedback from participating artists on the process.

Harvesting Histories Sowing Seeds

Reinstating a forgotten doorway in the approach to Edge Hill Station and transforming the unused land behind it to make a Secret Garden for the local community.

…the story of a bricked up door, in a wall; once forgotten, now found.

The Gateway to the Blitz project represents a unique social and historical ‘portal’ within the landscape of Edge Hill Station, Liverpool.  Creating a permanent memorial to those who died during the tragedy of the Blitz 70 years ago and also providing access to a new green space for today’s community to use and make new connections in.

Background
The direct hit on a shelter in Durning Road, Edge Hill, was the worst single incident in the Liverpool Blitz as regards to loss of life.  Churchill called it 'the worst single (civilian) incident of the war'.  This occurred in the early hours of 29th November 1940, during the heaviest air raid to date.
'Approximately 300 people were tightly packed into the shelter in the basement of the Ernest Brown Junior Instructional Centre in Durning Road, Edge Hill... It would have been a safe enough place if bombs fell nearby, but it could not withstand a direct hit... In all, 166 men, women and children were killed and many more were seriously injured.'*

Due to proximity to Edge Hill Station, the area was a particular target during the war because of the munitions they stored in the railway sidings.

Project objectives:

- Create a permanent memorial to commemorate the 70th Anniversary of the Blitz in Edge Hill at the gateway to a community garden.  This will be both an access point and a descriptive & instructional art work.

- Integrate an educational strand with the pupils of St Francis of Assisi school, the educational project partners, in terms of the design of the gateway, the garden and the research into the effect of the Blitz on the local area.

- The space will offer the further possibility of developing a ‘Green Gym’ site, adjacent to the railway lines, by reclaiming the area leading from the gateway.

On Saturday 15th October 2011, the area to be used for Metal and St Francis Of Assisi's community garden was unveiled. Artist Robyn Woolston has since been working with the local community and school children to develop a design for a Blitz memorial gate for the entrance to the garden.If you would like to be involved with the community garden please email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it with your details and we will add you to our mailing list.

Like the community garden on Facebook

*source: http://www.liverpoolblitz70.co.uk/2011/02/02/the-tragedy-of-durning-road