As part of Birmingham Weekender
Bullring
Saturday 28 August, 2021. 12:00 – 17:00
Sunday 29 August, 2021. 12:00 – 16:00
Birmingham 2021
This pop-up version of the show filled the gap left by GAP when it occupied a high profile vacant shop unit in the Bullring shopping centre during Birmingham’s Weekender Festival. It was an exciting opportunity to draw a new crowd to the show, people who had come into the city centre to visit the shops not an art event. We used our vinyl cutter from The Steps Series to help dress our shop window and we rolled up the shutter to welcome in approaching 1000 visitors across the two days. Western withdrawals from Afghanistan, recent floods and fires around the world plus Paralympic Games and continued conflict in Yemen provided some of the themes, as did health and vaccinations, billionaire astronauts and struggles in the retail and distribution industries. We wove Birmingham focused statistics through the show, so visitors would see themselves, their friends and families represented regularly and tried to leven the mood with our ususal sprinkling of humour.
We enjoyed having a proper shop counter to work from. It was also great to meet and chat with lots of interested and engaged new audience members.
Credits
Installed by: Jake Oldershaw, Lexia Tomlinson, Sipho Ndlovu and James Yarker
Performed by: Sipho Ndlovu, Jake Oldershaw, Lexia Tomlinson
Research: Craig Stephens
Administration: Lucy Bird
Executive Producer: Roisin Caffrey