Hull 2017 Opener 'Made in Hull' Reveals Artists

More details have been released today about what to expect at Made in Hull, which will kick off Hull UK City of Culture 2017. Everyone is invited to this landmark event, which is free and will run from Sunday 1 until Saturday 7 January.

Beginning at 4pm each evening, local, national and International Artists will use large-scale projection on buildings, soundscapes, site-specific art installations, archive footage, animation and interactive live performance to transform city centre streets and buildings to tell the story of the city and its people over the last 75 years.

Creative director, the Hull born, BAFTA-nominated documentary film-maker Sean McAllister has been working alongside the writer Rupert Creed, production designer Ala Lloyd, lighting designer Durham Marenghi and composer and Sound Designer Dan Jones to create this specially commissioned event with the made in Hull team. Inspired by the city, its history and people, Made in Hull takes its cue from the tradition of son et lumière, which uses sound and light to transform the public realm with images and stories.

Artists helping to create Made in Hull include local visual artist Helga Gift; Hull-born artist Preston Likely; local lens-based artist Quentin Budworth; Hull-born BAFTA winning, Oscar nominated producer Chris Hees; imitating the dog, who mix live performance and technology and are working with Hull-born composer Terence Dunn; innovative animation director and video designer Zsolt Balogh; interactive arts company Invisible Flock; film and photography studio Sodium; makeAMPLIFY, a collaboration between dance artist Jennifer Irons and audio visual artist Zach Walker; Jesse Kanda, who works in video, music and digital art; multimedia experimentalists Urban Projections;

Design and production are well underway to transform sites around the city. Hundreds of people from across Hull have played a part in the development of Made in Hull, as a result of being interviewed, filmed and providing archive material to help capture different aspects of the city's story. This includes its role as place of arrivals and departures; the Second World War; the fishing industry; rising and falling unemployment; nightclubbing; and sport, including rugby and football.

As part of the programme development Quentin Budworth has been capturing images for his 'Hullywood' project, which will be part of the show, whilst Invisible Flock have been recording on the Hessle Road and Springbank and are due to record Hull City AFC fans chants at upcoming games against West Bromwich and Newcastle for a special sound installation.

Locations for the installations and projections include Queen Victoria Square, Zebedee's Yard, Whitefriargate, Silver Street, Scale Lane Staith, High Street, Myton Bridge underpass, the Deep and Humber Street. Over the seven evenings audiences will be able to join the trail from any starting point. They will be able to come for an hour or more, spend the whole evening and make return visits throughout Made in Hull's run.

Martin Green, CEO and Director, Hull 2017, said: "Made in Hull will be a thrilling, evocative and thought-provoking start to Hull's year as UK City of Culture. It is inspired by the concept of the son et lumière, but with one of the finest documentary filmmakers working today at the helm it will be a bit different - as you might expect in Hull. Everyone is invited and we hope that as many of Hull's 260,000 residents as possible will want to experience this ambitious project. It is deeply rooted in the city's culture and heritage and paves the way for a year in which people will look at the city with fresh eyes."

Made in Hull is free, unticketed and suitable for people of all ages. Cafés, restaurants, bars and shops are due to open in the city centre on 1 January, so people are being encouraged to make a day of it. East Yorkshire Motor Services and Stagecoach have also confirmed that they will be running a special bus service on the day. City centre car parks will also be open, although people are being urged to use public transport wherever possible and plan their journeys to and from the event.

For more information go to: www.hull2017.co.uk.

BIOGRAPHIES

Sean McAllister is best-known for his BAFTA-nominated film A Syrian Love Story, a moving fly-on-the-wall documentary that follows a family from war-torn Syria to Europe over the course of five years. Released in 2015, the film continues to collect awards all over the world. As creative director of Made In Hull, Sean returns to his roots, to the city where he grew up and where he learnt his craft.

Zsolt Balogh is an innovative animation director and video designer. Trained at NFTS and the Royal College of Art, London, his creative portfolio spans live events, theatre, exhibitions, and film production. The artistry and visual power of his designs have been widely acclaimed. As freelance designer, he has worked for 59 Productions, SDNA, One of Us, The Mill, The People Speak, Tate Modern, Tate Britain, BFI, LIFT festival, National Theatre and Royal Opera House. His work for 59 Productions has been seen on flagship projects including the London 2012 Olympic opening ceremony, exhibitions for the Victoria and Albert Museum, and productions for the National Theatre, English National Opera and Metropolitan Opera.

Invisible Flock are an interactive arts organisation based in Leeds making ground-breaking innovative work with high impact to be experienced and participated in by thousands all over the world. Impossible to pigeon-hole or simply categorise - their multidisciplinary technology driven global practice constantly seeks to redefine and disrupt traditional perceptions and models of art practice. Drawing directly from the world around us they aim to create art and foster practices that have long lasting transformative effect.

Invisible Flock have built GPS powered art games played across multiple cities, transformed discarded beach plastic into 3D printed artworks and created large scale sound installations for public spaces and new pieces that span continents. They have presented work for galleries such as the V&A, MIMA and FACT, festivals such as The Tbilisi International Festival, Brighton Festival, L'Entorse Lille, Lagos Theatre Festival and Unbox India as well as collaborating regularly with Arts Council England, British Council, Jerwood Charitable Foundation and Wellcome Trust.

Sodium are a film and photography studio based in Yorkshire creating commercial films, music videos and still imagery. Founded in 2011 by Phil Barber and Rob Booker, they specialise in short-form narrative-driven film making through storytelling, cinematography, art direction, sound design, graphics and post-production. Sodium's aim is to produce the best possible visuals with authentic vision and creative flair. They are firm believers that content is king and style is queen.

makeAMPLIFY is the collaboration between award winning dance artist Jennifer Irons and international audio visual artist Zach Walker. They work with diverse groups of people from first timer to professional to create site-specific performances and interactive installations that engage, challenge and surprise. They aim to reveal the hidden and ignored to inspire people and create meaningful experiences for audiences, clients and participants alike.

In 2011 makeAMPLIFY collaborated on Encounters; working with residents of Harlow to create an audio descriptive and interactive tour through the empty shops of the local High Street. Since then, they have developed an education and residency program and created a range of community-engaged and commercial programs. Other notable projects include Apparitions; featuring 45-metre high video mapped projections of residents of Stratford dancing in the opening of London's Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Send 'em Down in the iconic and notorious Old Sessions Court House in East London, and most recently #Intotheswich; featuring movement and video projections in the lost and forgotten spaces of Ipswich. makeAMPLIFY are recipients of the Lloyds School for Social Entrepreneurs Grant 2015/16 and are currently Associate Artists of East London Dance and BEEE Creative.

Jesse Kanda is a Japanese, Canadian and British artist working in video, music and digital art. To pinpoint dominant themes in Kanda's art, or to map it onto some biographical description of the author, would be to undermine its indefinability. His fluctuating and fluid work eludes singular interpretation in favour of unmoored emotionality and sensual ambiguity. While it is possible to locate in the visuals he has created alongside close friends and collaborators Arca and Björk tender resonances of sensitivity, innocence and beauty colliding with conventionally ugly, aggressive or distorted images, his output is empowered by the very inseparability of these apparently disparate elements. It is impossible to fully grasp, disintegrating traditional binary thought and refusing comforting distinctions between revulsion and admiration.

imitating the dog tell stories. Using a mixture of live performance and technology they make beautiful images in the space between important ideas. Artistic Directors Pete Brooks (Director), Andrew Quick (Writer), and Simon Wainwright (Video Artist) have been making work for theatre, site specific locations and learning projects since 1998. Their work has built a company with a unique reputation in the UK, Europe and internationally. Past shows have included Tosca (2016), The Train (2015), A Farewell to Arms (2014), The Zero Hour (2012) and Hotel Methuselah (2007) which toured to 15 countries and was translated for publication in 3 languages. Alongside their own work they collaborate with other artists and theatres to deliver high end production design. Recent projects have included Flit for Martin Green (Edinburgh International Festival) and The Passion for Streetwise Opera. imitating the dog have received funding from Arts Council England.

Terence Dunn is a Hull born British music composer currently based in London. After obtaining a first class honours degree in Composition for Film and Media from Northbrook College in Worthing, he went on to study a Masters in Composing for Film and Television at the National Film and Television School where he was awarded the PRS foundation and the Alan Hawkshaw music scholarships. Four of his previous projects were nominated for BAFTA awards including Edmond winner of best British short animation, A Syrian Love Story by Sean McAllister nominated for best debut feature, ManoMan nominated for best British short animation and Slap nominated for best short film.

Urban Productions was founded by Rebecca Smith in 2005 and is a creative collective of multimedia experimentalists who specialise in delivering innovative performance opportunities and creative projects for both artistic and commercial output.

Rebecca is a Multimedia Artist based in the East Midlands, UK. She creates live performances that combine cutting edge projection techniques with new technologies, including projection, mapping, augmented sculpture, live drawing systems and interactive media. Rebecca's work seeks to discover new and original ways of presenting digital media for audience interaction, pushing the boundaries of creative possibility and pioneering new approaches to mixed media application. Above all, her work always remains accessible to its audience, regardless of the intricacy of its design.

Rebecca's work her been viewed in venues throughout the UK and Europe, such as The Saatchi Gallery, Royal Festival Hall, Nottingham Contemporary and The Roundhouse. However, her work is equally at home on the street and in unusual outdoor locations. With a heavy influence of street art culture, and love of abandoned sites and objects, Rebecca uses forgotten spaces as a canvas for her work. As a live visual artist, Rebecca's work has provided live visuals to accompany a vast array of musicians and DJs including Avicii, Gorgon City and DJ Fresh. Her commercial clients have included Vauxhall, BBC, Jimmy Choo, Spotify, Coca Cola, Dr Marten and the British Red Cross.

Helga Gift is a visual artist who works autobiographically exploring my emotions through materials and found objects. Helga works in a variety of mediums gained a BA in Contemporary Fine Art Practice at Hull School of Art and Design.

Preston Likely is a Hull-born artist. He left the city in 1993, having finished a Fine Art degree course at Humberside University Art College, specialising in photography and film. Since leaving Sheffield, Preston has lived in many cities in the UK, and worked in numerous jobs, from postman to a tractor driver on a farm. Whilst working full time, Preston continued to engage in self-funded art projects, utilising a whole medley of media, including photography, performance, sculpture and music. Some of Preston's projects have seen him raffle myself in Win an Artist For a Day, attempt to sell his social identity, leave a giant sculpture in Oxford town centre, stage a guerrilla-style exhibition in London job centres and organise philosophical football chants at an Oxford United match.

Many of Preston's recent projects have taken place in public spaces, where he leaves objects behind for onlookers to engage with and question. The objects are often accompanied by a piece of written text, which is underpinned by the interplay of fact and fiction in order to blur the boundary between reality and make-believe, parodying, to some degree, the world of commercial advertising, the media and national governments, who continually blur the lines between what is real and what is fantasy.

Quentin Budworth is a socially engaged lens based artist and musician he studied Art History at Leicester Polytechnic specialising in film and photography then went on to study for a PGCE in communications at Huddersfield University and an MA in theatre and film at Sheffield University. Quentin set up street theatre company The Grinnigogs in 1985 and toured the UK, Europe and Japan for 20 years performing feats of strength, stupidity and skill, fire-eating, escapology, stilt-walking and playing medieval music to amused, bemused and mostly entertained audiences including the Queen. In 1995 Quentin set up the now legendary world music dance band Celtarabia and has taken their unique sound to most festivals in the UK and Europe.

From 2000-2010 Quentin was a lead artist for Creative Partnerships in Hull working on arts projects in over 80 schools in the city. In 2006 Quentin undertook training with the UK Film Council directing two award winning short films for them Sticky (2006) and Show and Spell (2007). In 2009 Quentin worked with pupils from Maybury Primary School, to create the Local Heroes exhibition at Hull's Maritime Museum a photographic and film exhibition part of the award winning Campaign! Make an Impact project with Hull Museum Education and the British Library. In 2014/15 created The Changing Face Of Hull an exhibition that celebrated the people of Hull and engaged a mass audience. In 2015 Quentin authored The Stranger's Tale Exhibition and told the stories of refugees arriving and living in Hull.

People wanting to find out more about the Hullywood Icons project should go to: https://hullywoodicons.com/blog.

Chris Hees

BAFTA winning, Oscar nominated animation Producer who runs Hull and London based Production Company Bridge Way Films, creating powerful work that holds people and place at their heart. A huge advocate of Hull, Chris is on the City of Culture 2017 board, runs Hull's BFI Film Academy and aims to use his company to bridge the gap between both the industries in London and the Humber region. Chris is working with Alex Twiston-Davies an experienced Hull-based filmmaker who for the last five years and Mew Lab Animation a collective talent of Beverly born Director Shaun Clark and Kim Noce, both graduates of The National Film and Television School who now specialise in creating Animation content for Films.

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