I remembered my password!!

Helllooooo
finally remembered how to log onto the blog. I agree with you guys Tuesday went really really well!! I'm excited. Im free all weekend more or less apart from Saturday evening... let me know cool kids... hydeout hugs x x x x

Updates!!

I agree with all of the above! It was really good.

I think that's be an excellent idea to get together over the weekend to go through all the completed postcards and make a note of people's proposals.

We should also get together a mailing list ASAP.

I posted a sort of 'thank you' bulletin on myspace this morning and commented some of the people who came down - hyde park heat, art market, that sort of thing.

Have also set up a myspace group, just called 'hydeout', and I can make you all admins as soon as you've joined.

I checked the email earlier (hope that's ok) and got rid of all the myspace spam - i've changed the setting now so we shouldn't get them any more. I'll also reply to Faye cos I work with her at the pub!

I'm really excited about what we could do there. 6 people in a lecture I went to this afternoon saw the flyer over my shoulder and all gave me their email addresses to add to the mailing list - lots seem interested in a photography exhibition of some kind!

I'll bring along stuff to sort out the money at the weekend too. I'm free any time apart from 6pm onwards on Saturday evening.

Good work team! xx

Open Meeting Success

I think last night went really well and would just like to say a big thank you to everyone for making it happen so smoothly! Well done to jess and tasha for giving that rousing speech and getting our main points across. It was good to hear other people's views and it seemed like they responded well - it was a welcoming atmosphere and encouraged people to get involved. Also, thanks to Nico for making the soup - everyone seemed to really like it, even if it was quite difficult to get out of the cups.. maybe we should get some spoons next time? Though, i went down there this morning and the soup has made the room smell pretty funky! also, thanks to Callum for sorting the postcards out for us. it was a good way for people to get involved. some really interesting people turned up and it sounds like there'll be a lot of interest in and around the area, so fingers crossed it'll keep the momentum going..

Anyway, is everyone up for a meeting this weekend to look through the postcards? We can collate the feedback and then formulate some ideas straight away or we can always communicate through the blog over christmas and plan for our first exhibition..

Get back to me when you can and let me know about availability so i can organise a meeting.. over and out, hydeOuters! ciao, x

Spends

hello hydeouters (as we've affectionately been named by the Hyde Park Unity Day people on the myspace)

Just a note about money - if you have spent/will be spending anything for this Tuesday's meeting (photocopying, stuff to make the soup with, wine, cups etc) then can you keep a note of it or a receipt or something and pass it on to me (if that's ok with everyone - I think I kind of made myself treasurer!) so we can make sure cost gets split evenly.

It also might be a bit premature to say so, but for a potential Arts Council application in the future we need to have all financial records, even if it is only small amounts.

Much love xx

Monday meeting and rival bashing!

good evening all.

with the meeting coming up on tuesday, i think we should have a group meeting to settle any last issues and make sure everyone is on the same page. the rival gallery on ash grove is having their opening night tomorrow (monday) night at 6pm so we could maybe go down and check it out, then back to mine to talk tuesday. i promise to get the key sorted tomorrow! i know i should have sorted it out ages ago but ignorance is bliss..
can everyone get back to me as to whether they can make it? text me or post on here.
i also need to know peoples availabilty on tuesday - meeting is at 7 so i'll need help making mulled wine and soup, putting up the postcards and general tidying and stuff.

thanking you.

i don't want to overcomplicate things but i just had a thought for tuesday- does anyone own/have access to a polaroid camera? it could add another dimension to the postcard display thing, if we could get some pictures of the event/ of people pissing about/ or of people making stuff (we could have a load of plasticine or something)

(or we could just have some single use cameras?)

good work on flyer

see you soon

Progress

Big thank you to Callum for putting so much effort into sorting the flyers out! i think we're all agreed they look pretty awesome!

Also, a big thank you to Tasha for getting the myspace and facebook group/events up so fast. they look great!

i have about 350 flyers at my house for distribution so the next few days will be important in trying to get them out and about. callum has taken a bunch to give to his coursemates etc, so if i could get some to the rest of you guys then we can get them to the people who'll be interested - most likely the guys on your courses etc...

We'll need to sort out the postcards for tuesday so if anyone knows where we can get some decent card then we can sort it out sooner rather than later - just post up here and keep us all up to date. Thanks everyone, we're finally getting somewhere..

Flyer design

Hope you don't mind me posting it up here so the others can see - here is the lovely flyer design!

don't worry!

guys don't worry! it has to be a GOOD THING that other people are doing a similar thing: lets see it as an opportunity. The whole point of this experiment is that we don't know what form its going to take yet. Hey maybe there'll be opportunities for collaboration as a pose to competition. And if not, whats better than a bit of healthy competetition to motivate us? We've got an awesome space thats probably better suited to a gallery than theirs. I suggest we go there on monday and invite them to our meeting on the tuesday. lets just proceed as planned. Are we making a facebook group as well?

re: Bad News

FUCK!

i guess we'll just have to go round there with baseball bats and smash the place up... maybe not. we can only hope they don't have many people turn up. we'll have to really hit the college and uni common rooms hard so we get the best thats out there.at the end of the day, i think we'll have a lot of interest in ours and if we ask everyone we know to come then ours will surely look much better.. but fuck thats pretty annoying!

Bad News

Bad bad news guys.

This little event invite just popped up on facebook.

It looks like they're basically doing exactly the same as us, and their meeting is the day before!! Noooo! What should we do? Is there anything we can do?

Update on design of flyer/posters

Ive sent the write-up that nico has done to my mate callum, who has also had some really good ideas in relation to the design of it and to printing them for as cheap as possible.

Firstly, he proposed the idea of using the flyer as an actual object to be used to bring the ideas, proposals and responses together and then to be put up to physically fill the space - something like what Tasha has suggested in pegging up the ideas across the walls or actually stuck on for all to see. we touched on it in a few of the meetings but i really think it would be a cool way for people to share their thoughts and bounce ideas off each other. also, it would actually mean that something will be created on the night.. I think the idea is to have the main advertisement on the front with our name, purpose, contact etc and then on the back we'd have a pretty simple application sheet with a line for their name, maybe age, expertise (i.e. painter, sculpter, performer etc) and contact details. they can fill it in on the night or bring along their copy and it will already be done...

Secondly in relation to costs, he suggested buying some white card stock in bulk which we can then simply run through the photocopier.. i think this sounds the most feasible method of printing for now. who knows, if we get a grant then we can splash out on fancier flyers..?

Thanks for all the posts yesterday. i like the hydeout design jess and tash did! though, i randomly typed both trapdoor and hydeout in google today and worryingly there were quite a few hydeout's already. spelt in that way as well.. though, they seemed to be mostly american hip hop groups so we may not need to worry. was just thinking in terms of the myspace site etc..

yes tasha i think thats a good idea, nice and simple as well. and jess i like the logo design. good work.

Tashjess Fun...ideas

Titles

Also, boring admin note (i'm sorry!) - can we all put titles on our blog posts - it's just that going by past experience it makes it so much easier, if we ever need to go back and find a post, to just browse down the titles on archive list rather than have to trawl through all of them again!

Cheers dudes xx

Getting their ideas - Postcards and Pegs

I was having a think after the meeting last night, about how we can get people to give us their details and ideas in a more creative way, and came up with something simple but which might be pretty effective. What if we strung up lines (like just string or something) with lots of little pegs or paperclips or whatever across one wall of the gallery, or even from wall to wall. On these strings could be lots of those blank postcards that are really cheap to buy. Then we could provide pens and stuff so that before people leave they can take a postcard, put contact details and their ideas on one side, then a drawing or diagram, or words or whatever they want on the other side, and hang it back up on one of the.
It sounds pretty cheesy (and looks well lame in that picture above!) but I think it'd be good in getting people moving around the space, maybe looking at each others pictures etc, plus we can keep all the cards, and if, like jess was saying, we wanted to compile them etc it would be easy to do. They'd also be really easy to just put into a file or something so that people's contacts and ideas are readily available, rather than a big piece of canvas or paper that might be a bit unwieldy.

Anyway, massive post! Sorry to ramble. What are thoughts on this? x

Good work nico, i really like it! - though, we may have to change the address to '7' Chesnut avenue ; )

I think if we get that info off to Callum today, he said he could get it done pretty quickly. ready for this tuesday perhaps..

At last things are coming together!

Here is my proposed layout for the flyer and poster. Please post any ideas for amendments/ changes as soon as possible so we can have it finalised asap. The blog only seems to let you have one size of font but i envisage the first two lines to be larger than the rest and the list of musicians, sculptors etc... and the last line in brackets, to be smaller than the rest.




THE TRAPDOOR/HYDEOUT
Is Calling all Artists!
and creative people…
…musicians, sculptors, painters, film makers, players, makers, do-ers, teachers, listeners, performers, craftspeople, photographers, imaginers, creators, printers, drawers, thinkers…

The Trapdoor/Hydeout is a new place in your locality with lots of exciting possibilities!
We want to see what you want to do.
Opportunities for anyone to exhibit, perform, create.
Get involved in your local community!
Come to an open meeting on Tuesday 27th November at 7:00pm
At 8 Chestnut Avenue, Hyde Park, to see the space and find out more (and have some soup!).
Bring ideas, proposals, your imagination, yourselves!
(if you can't make it, or for general enquiries/interest, email .........@googlemail.com)



Also here is an extensive list of possible activities for the space:

Installation
Sculpture
Photography
Paintings
Print
Drawings
Any Craft
Temporary Work
Happenings
Performance
Theatre
Music- experimental, open mic, bands
Poetry
Stuff you can sell, stuff you cant
stuff miving outside of the gallery into the streets
interactive, participatory exhibitions
opportunities for creativity
workshops
collaborative projects
community projects

please add to this list

Also at some point soon we need to get the PA system that we have been donated from Carlas house

I'm getting excited boys and girls this is gonna be fun!

Im scheduling a meeting for this wednesday either at my house or the pub because its now three weeks since we've all been together to discuss the gallery. Its getting to quite a critical stage now cos if we dont decide things soon, we wont have time to organise the initial opening and in turn build up a network of artists etc.. I really need you all to contact me either on here on facebook or my phone so that i can find a time that suits us all. Im going to be really busy in the next 3 weeks so i dont have a massive amount of time to chase people up.

look forward to hopefully seeing you all on wednesday. cheers, Gray. x

yeah i can do tomorrow night, thats weds, or thursday. lets get some solid ideas down for this open day or whatever it is called, and also i think we should plan and write a short bit of writing saying what we are about- what we aim to do etc. graeme maybe you can do a ring around to organise the meeting cos everyone might not look at the blog.

i too like the name "TrapDoor" its got an quirky not too serious element to it which is attractive, it describes our underground situation, and we could say 'the trapdoor is open'...or even 'theres something down there'...

Yeah..i would agree that we should adorn our ninja clothes and sweat bands and embark on a mission to make the basement good!! I'm generally free most of the time, but i'm volunteering at the film festival this year and i've got quite a lot of shifts at really annoying times!! like for example wednesday night - but im here to get involved whenever! i'll find out when my other shifts are tommorrow and get it sorted!! can't wait for it to start working - so lets get going yeah...huh...yeah....

p.s i quite like 'trapdoor' for a name???! - someone mentioned it tuther night! xxxxxx

alright peeps! I think you'd all agree that we need to get our arses in gear if we want to have this drop-in sesh later this month..

We need to finally agree on a name, which it seems at the moment might well be the 'HYDEOUT' but this is a democracy so until we have a majority im not confirming anything. once this is agreed, we can go ahead and recruit someone to design and produce a nice little advertiser, which we can cunningly place around hyde park.
I'll also need help with decorating and cleaning the place out - im going to get some more paint brushes and rollers tomorrow or wednesday - im thinking wednesday eve for some decorating?And we need to figure out some way of lighting the place! ikea anyone?!
I also think we all really need to think about what we want out of the drop in session because if we leave it even slightly ambiguous up until the day we have it, it could turn out pretty shit.

The sooner we sort this all out the easier it will be and im sure you all, like myself, will have a lot of work on in the next few weeks so i really dont think we want to be stressing about this as well as our degree!

please get back to me a.s.a.p. about availability and times etc so i can organise it (though i'll probably see most of you tonight at the bonfire and fireworks!). Cheers team. Gray. x