Ideas from the Norwich Art Fair meet-up!
July 23, 2012 § 10 Comments
The Norwich Art Fair – on Thursday 19th July was a great success, lots of people attended. Fantastic and new ideas were discussed. Thanks again to everyone who came along, and to @HuwSayer for leading the meeting, great idea with the post-its! Many thanks also to @SirGarnetPub the for hosting the meeting!
I’ve copied what each post-it said and have separated the ideas into different categories. Lots of ideas were repeated, so I’ve only put them on once to avoid repetition. Please add on any new ideas, or thoughts as a comment, and remember that there is the #NorwichArtFair on Twitter too, so keep spreading the word! A website and Twitter account will be created for this.
Venues
The Space, Norwich (run by Secret Art Collector)
St Andrew’s Hall
Anglia Square
Westlegate Tower
John Innes Centre
Crypt beneath Memorial Garden
N&N Hospital corridors
Forum would be involved – good for community
OPEN (Graham Dacre)
Waterfront
Norfolk Showground
Local cafes and restaurants to exhibit – Iron House, White Lion Café, Frank’s Bar, Wine Press
Big single venue – central
Vacant shops
Malls – community remit
Hire out Forum for weekend, £120 to hire, including furniture (display boards etc), have stalls and talks by curators, agents, artists in Cube & Curve rooms
Unusual spaces to create a “buzz” around, could corporate performances into the opening of spaces, also performances during expo.
Spaces bigger than the Forum – empty offices, Sport Centre
Cathedrals
Salthouse
Churches
Chapelfield Garden
Sainsbury Centre
St Stephens Church (next to Chapelfield)
Royal Arcade
Jamie’s Italian
St Gregorys
Norwich Castle
Aviva have lots of property in Norwich
Playhouse
UEA (international connections)
Galleries/outlets who already sell our work
Cinema City
City College
Popup shops
Norwich Puppet Theatre
Ideas
“Vacant Spaces Festival”
Art & Music festival – local DJ’s, involve NUCA
Art trails
Collate all the art organisations in city – STEW, Papergirl, NUCA, Sainsbury Centre, Photography groups
Overall part of Norfolk & Norwich Festival
Out of town collaborators
Multi venue, discreet timing
Mechanism for sales – central organisation
Pop up studios
Themed areas – Jubilee, abstract, portraiture, painting, photography
Plan well ahead – aim for 2013/14
Weekend mass art boot camp – lots of outputs
Curator curated by theme rather than medium
Fringe festival
One day theme – (mapping the city)
CPRE patrons – eg. Viscount Coke
Installation – BIG – national interest, i.e recreate the City wall
Have a pre-Christmas fair for catching buyers’ market
Organisation with similar brief – Sainsbury Centre, NNFest
Mix a few big names with lots of lesser-known artists – like the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition
Competition
Network through galleries to find experience
How do you decide who can exhibition – will there be different sections
Non-conformist roots if Norwich – City of Rebels
Launch at the Forum using Fusion and main area
Provide music/local talent to bring in crowds so not just an arts event
Get main attractions in Norwich/Norfolk involved (not just arts based)
Local schools involved
Use local celebrities to help promote – Delia, Stephen Fry, Lisa Goddard, Amanda Holden (Norfolk’s Got Talent!)
Produce calendars with sponsers’ logos on
Young boy from Holt whose paintings are selling from £1000’s
Local DJ’s are often in ‘arty’ circles
Norwich Lanes
Involve local graffiti artist – Lee Jay Hunton
Sponsers
Local architects e.g Hudsons
Solicitors
Local design agencies
Local accountants
Local energy companies
Identify art patrons i.e boards of Garage, Arts Centre, Heritage Lottery Fund
Support a charity or charities that are involved in the arts
Get support from Creative Arts East
Aviva
Norfolk Contemporary Art Society
NUCA
Jarrolds
Artists groups – Norwich 20 Group
Jade Free Cooperative
Library Service
Waffle House
Public involvement like Home Sweet Home
Midwich
Marsh
Norwich City FC
Google
Woodfordes
CIM
Hussey Knights
Warehouse Express
Dogfish
Main Source
UEA
Skills to help organise the festival
I’ll make a website and host it – help get the word out through Leap Flag @alifasnd
Can help with publicity via word of mouth, have contacts with London & Colchester based artists, I’m also an artist, performer & maker of things – @jcswindells
I work as an artist & photographer, used to work in publishing (assistant to editor), and I design & facilitate workshops – Anita
Great ideas everyone – keep them coming!
rosiewinnart 
[…] you to @Rosie_Winn who has just posted this on her blog https://rosiewinnart.wordpress.com/2012/07/23/ideas-from-the-norwich-art-fair-meet-up/ listing all the ideas (many and varied) for an international art fair in Norwich and Norfolk, […]
Thank you Rosie for taking on responsibility for writing up these ideas. At the very least they show the ambition of those involved so far. Now we need to show prospective sponsors and exhibitors that we are serious and hungry for an international event that sells art as much as it celebrates it.
Building a strong network of supporters, who are willing to promote cultural (particularly artistic) events in Norwich and Norfolk to their social media followers, is a good place to start. While further regular tweetups will help us develop these ideas and maintain team spirit. Shall we confirm 6pm Thursday 13 Sept in the Sir Garnet?
Thurs 13th is good for me – am looking forward to it!
PS: Posted some further – rushed – thoughts on my blog http://huwsayer.wordpress.com/2012/07/23/norwichartfair-the-start-of-a-movement-please-join/ – we can bring them together on the new site when it is up (if you think they help).
Have now set up @NorwichArtFair to follow and support artists, galleries and other cultural events in Norfolk and Suffolk. Aim is to build a good list of all those in the local artistic community on twitter, including arts professionals and collectors. We will be liberal in our definition of artists too, following painters, sculptors and photographers as well as writers, musicians and other performers.
Please follow the a/c – and more importantly tweet @NorwichArtFair with details of anyone you think we should be following. I hope this will at least help us build a list of potential supporters. Thank you.
H
@HuwSayer
PS: Don’t forget to use #NorwichArtFair in your tweets on the subject – makes it much easier for the whole crew to keep track of what is being said and done.
PPS: Please remember the next tweetup is 6pm on Thursday 13 September in the Captain’s Cabin @SirGarnetPub. We might try to set some sort of agenda nearer the time – so come prepared with ideas (all positive of course).
🙂
Eastern Events, who are based in Aylsham are experts at running fairs. They used to run the Christmas Fair at Blickling Hall and many of us are familiar with and have confidence in their capabilities. They have the gear and the know-how. Pitches were typically £250 – but that would have included costs to the National Trust – so an alternative venue should be cheaper. If we used them, we could hit the ground running.
Eastern synergy healing arts – would be willing to run a three hour healing arts workshop for artists if you supply a venue ie st margarets church would probably host.xx
Hi! Many thanks for your comments! St Magarets Church has been suggested a few times, it definitely is a popular venue! However we haven’t even discussed what type of workshops there will be or where the fair will be held – it’ll be a big venue though but I’ll definitely bring it up at the next meeting. If you are on Twitter, keep up with developments by following @norwichartfair and ‘like’ on Faebook at http://www.facebook.com/norwichartfair
I posted Huw’s original blog on my LinkedIn group “Norwich Loves…Local Businesses” and it has had a number of people offering to help/ suggestions. I didn’t realise the project had moved on so much (probably due to school holidays etc).
Here’s the link:
http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Norwich-Loves-local-businesses-3901621?gid=3901621&trk=hb_side_g