| All in: london-fringe |
What's in a name? Launching LondonFestivalFringe.com The www.londonbridgefestival.com domain works for the Festival, but it doesn't for the London Fringe. Had to explain to quite a few people recently that the Festival was over but the Fringe continues through the year in London. The word Fringe needs to be in the domain name. So, registered www.londonfestivalfringe.com, and will move content from the Festival site to this site. Should launch in a few days. London Festival Fringe has the three words that covers most of what we're trying to do. It can cover the small festivals that go on in the city, as well as the fringe events that take place. August 05 in london-fringe It's hard to get an audience to a fringe event Meeting at FringeReport last night was well attended. Quite a few people were enthusiastic about the idea of the London Fringe. What it comes down to is that they need to promote their events. Performers have little time to promote their shows at fringe events. They usually get friends and family and acquaintances to come along. What they need is another audience, people who hear about the show and want to see it for what it is, not because they know somebody in it. It's hard to get the message out to this 'new' audience. As P T Barnum said, 'Something terrible happens when there is no promotion .. Nothing.' August 04 in london-fringe Art is the expression of an idea to an audience .. The artist is skilled in the medium she chooses to express her idea. It doesn't matter what is shown, so long as it has an audience. The bad art will disappear, and the good art will survive. Art has a message, it may be trivial or important, and what decides this is the audience. There are ways of engaging an audience from the subtle to the sensational. What makes great art is the emotion felt by the audience. Art is about discovering things you did not see before. All these ideas in art - these words, images, objects, film - are a way of looking at our world. We choose our way, and art helps us make that choice. Art has, in its expression, values, beliefs, stories, metaphors, symbols, ways of thinking. As a way of thinking, it provides us with a vocabulary to do so. It's a vocabulary that we use to be part of a group. We need to have a similar vocabulary to share with others. Our experiences change as art adds new words and ideas to our existing vocabulary. The artist is skilled in the medium she chooses to express her idea. It doesn't matter what is shown, so long as it has an audience. The bad art will disappear, and the good art will survive. Art has a message, it may be trivial or important, and what decides this is the audience. There are ways of engaging an audience from the subtle to the sensational. What makes great art is the emotion felt by the audience. Art is about discovering things you did not see before. All these ideas in art - these words, images, objects, film - are a way of looking at our world. We choose our way, and art helps us make that choice. Art has, in its expression, values, beliefs, stories, metaphors, symbols, ways of thinking. As a way of thinking, it provides us with a vocabulary to do so. It's a vocabulary that we use to be part of a group. We need to have a similar vocabulary to share with others. Our experiences change as art adds new words and ideas to our existing vocabulary. Perhaps the first London Fringe artist.. William Blake ..  Blake, (1757 -1827), wasn't recognised in his lifetime. And he only ever lived in London. His ideas about the world influenced countless others, filmmakers, writers, artists.He was an "English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age. His prophetic poetry has been said to form "what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the English language". His visual artistry has led one modern critic to proclaim him "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced". Although he only once journeyed farther than a day's walk outside London during his lifetime, he produced a diverse and symbolically rich corpus, which embraced 'imagination' as "the body of God", or 'Human existence itself'." From wikipedia August 02 in london-fringe The Spirit of the Fringe ..  .. is a bare stage, Frank Sinatra singing New York, New York from a CD player, a simple costume, lights and a small audience. Tanya Sleeman performing burlesque at Nolias Gallery last night. August 01 in london-fringeIPhone application in development .. We've got to move with the times. Your phone is with you all the time. It will, not too long in the future, become your primary means of receiving information. We're developing an iPhone application that tracks news and reviews for shows at the London Fringe. It will also list Fringe venues and tell you a little about them. Anyone who promotes their shows through the Fringe website, will have their show information available on the iPhone application. Reviews will need to be submitted to the website as well for them to appear on the iPhone. Apple takes a while to approve these apps so it will be some time before release. Will need to write apps for other mobile devices, too. August 01 in london-fringe There is a bridge that spans the River Thames called London Bridge.. It stretches from the City of London in the north, one square mile of buildings with offices that contain people in suits who transfer money across wires and call it a day's work, to the area of Southwark in the south, where people live and connect in useful ways and make things. This bridge has a 2000 year history and is famous around the world. It is also a boring bridge. The only feature worth writing about is that, at night, both sides of the bridge are lit up with a strip of bright red light. This makes it attractive. In the day, it goes back to being boring again, and the only reason you might want to use it is to actually cross the river. If you don't know it, this was the bridge that was sold to the Americans, the one in the film, Mary Poppins, and the one that desperately needs to be redesigned for the 21st Century. The area on both north and south sides of the bridge is interesting. For now, let's talk about the area to the south, Southwark. It is the old and the new London, a London that has a heart and a character. It's easy to talk about, to visit, to walk through, to enjoy, to spend time in. In the 19th century, the area was known for its brothels and theatres, as well as bull and bear baiting, activities not permitted across the river in the City itself. But, that's another story. Now, the people are diverse, styles are numerous, history is everywhere. There are arches, cobbled streets, new buildings, cafes, restaurants, pubs, courtyards, street views, river views, birds-eye views, run-down warehouses, shopping centres, a bus station, train stations, the river bus, dog-and-duck tours, theatres, horror stories, Shakespeare. This is the area Dickens wrote about. And so did Chaucer and Johnson and Marlowe. There are people living, working, visiting; thousands of tourists each day, even more thousands of commuters. They walk past Cross Bones graveyard, the only unconsecrated graveyard in the country - a plot of ground that was set aside four hundred years ago to bury 'single women' - a euphemism for prostitutes. They were called 'Winchester Geese' because they were licensed by the Bishop of Winchester. Perhaps, some of them were buried with dignity. The area is a fine place to live and work and a great place to be entertained. So in the late summer of 2008 a few people got together and talked about running a Festival there, the London Bridge Festival. Well, the Festival happened over a couple of weeks in July 2009, and after the Press Launch which was a clever mix of artistic chaos and order, but more about that later, we realised we could establish the London Fringe. This is that story. It stretches from the City of London in the north, one square mile of buildings with offices that contain people in suits who transfer money across wires and call it a day's work, to the area of Southwark in the south, where people live and connect in useful ways and make things. July 31 in london-fringeThis bridge has a 2000 year history and is famous around the world. It is also a boring bridge. The only feature worth writing about is that, at night, both sides of the bridge are lit up with a strip of bright red light. This makes it attractive. In the day, it goes back to being boring again, and the only reason you might want to use it is to actually cross the river. If you don't know it, this was the bridge that was sold to the Americans, the one in the film, Mary Poppins, and the one that desperately needs to be redesigned for the 21st Century. The area on both north and south sides of the bridge is interesting. For now, let's talk about the area to the south, Southwark. It is the old and the new London, a London that has a heart and a character. It's easy to talk about, to visit, to walk through, to enjoy, to spend time in. In the 19th century, the area was known for its brothels and theatres, as well as bull and bear baiting, activities not permitted across the river in the City itself. But, that's another story. Now, the people are diverse, styles are numerous, history is everywhere. There are arches, cobbled streets, new buildings, cafes, restaurants, pubs, courtyards, street views, river views, birds-eye views, run-down warehouses, shopping centres, a bus station, train stations, the river bus, dog-and-duck tours, theatres, horror stories, Shakespeare. This is the area Dickens wrote about. And so did Chaucer and Johnson and Marlowe. There are people living, working, visiting; thousands of tourists each day, even more thousands of commuters. They walk past Cross Bones graveyard, the only unconsecrated graveyard in the country - a plot of ground that was set aside four hundred years ago to bury 'single women' - a euphemism for prostitutes. They were called 'Winchester Geese' because they were licensed by the Bishop of Winchester. Perhaps, some of them were buried with dignity. The area is a fine place to live and work and a great place to be entertained. So in the late summer of 2008 a few people got together and talked about running a Festival there, the London Bridge Festival. Well, the Festival happened over a couple of weeks in July 2009, and after the Press Launch which was a clever mix of artistic chaos and order, but more about that later, we realised we could establish the London Fringe. This is that story. Do we need the London Fringe? Heck, London's got it all, it's got theatre and music and painting and dance, it's got the restaurants and the people, the streets, the river and bridges, the history and politics. It doesn't need a Fringe. All that art stuff is going to go on anyway. It's going to happen in the small venues, and the big venues and the venues in between. It's going to happen in the theatres, galleries, streets, it'll happen whether you're there or not. And the media will talk about it. They'll say where it happened, write about it, and forget about it. So why bother putting it all together? Why create a brand, the London Fringe, something that people will recognise, something that the performer can say she 'did', something that can be remembered. Why give out London Fringe awards to the best artists and performers in a competition, something they can be proud of? Why create a place for people to go to, somewhere they can say they saw a performance, an event? We don't need a London Fringe. Let's carry on the way we've been doing for years now, do stuff and forget. July 30 in london-fringe |
| Please note that as circumstances change details on the above may also change without notice. |
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| July 2009 Festival | ||||
| London Fringe Music Award night, July 24, bands | ||||
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| London Fringe 48Hr Short Film entries | ||||
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RT @LondonFestival: New blog post: IPhone application in development .. http://bit.ly/4Fx2Ww iphone_jedi July 31 @LondonFestival looking forward to see you tonight 7.30 pm ThinkSync Films Screening at the Roxy Bar & Screen, SE1 petite_a July 29 @LondonFestival why islington it should be in LB we have the Roxy and shortwave cinemas? quinbisset July 27 |
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| Times Saturday review: "It seems there is nothing not being attempted during the ambitious, two-week run of the first London Bridge Festival, a would-be attempt at the capital's version of the Edinburgh Fringe. Comedy, film, art, dance, music - you name it, it's happening. That might suggest that the quality control knob has been torn off and tossed into the Thames - happily, it hasn't. Drawing heavily on the historic locale, there will be plays at the Rose Theatre, Bankside (home to early works by Shakespeare and Marlowe), the Southwark Playhouse, and the wonderful Old Operating Theatre, a museum that does what it says on the tin, housing the oldest operating Theatre in London. It's well worth getting along to see something as well as the shows, the locations are a knockout. Various venues, London Bridge. " |
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