SPARK #37: Loitering With Intent

What secrets does the city landscape hold? What is the stuff that makes Manchester, and how does Manchester shape us? This tour will share stories collected by psychogeographical collective The LRM (Loiterers Resistance Movement), with a particular focus on tales of resistance, creativity, community and the more-than-human. LRM tours blend fact, fiction and serendipity with performance, critical insights, personal histories and a little bit of enchantment to offer alternative visions of Manchester. Expect a mix of poetry, polemic, folklore and local history, with active participation, questions and contradictions encouraged.

Our walk together will last approximately two hours, with plenty of time afterwards for more questions and conversations. It will be at a slow pace on urban streets, mostly pavements. If you have any specific access needs or anything that would help you to participate please get in touch and we will do our best.

Meeting point is the pebble outside the Bridgewater Hall at 11am. The walk will end at 1pm at the People's History Museum and its excellent Open Kitchen cafe.

Morag Rose is a walking artist-activist-academic based in Salford. In 2006 she founded The LRM (Loiterers Resistance Movement), a psychogeographical collective who believe “there is magic in the Mancunian rain” and “The streets belong to everyone”. On the First Sunday of every month they meet for a wander of some sort, exploring Manchester using a range of creative and critical tools. Morag is also a senior lecturer at The University of Liverpool and her research focuses on public space, access and equality, and walking as a creative, cultural and political act. Morag has presented, performed and published her work widely. Her first book The Feminist Art of Walking is published by Pluto this October. 
http://www.thelrm.org/morag-rose

SPARK
The SPARK network was set up by Castlefield Gallery in 2022 to facilitate a Greater Manchester/North West-based network of artists wanting to intervene in the climate crisis. The gallery initiated SPARK in response to the high demand for places on the 2021/22 SUSTAIN programme focussed on low carbon artmaking. 

SPARK #37 follows SPARK sessions at Manchester Art Gallery, Rogue, The Birley (Preston), Eccles Friends Meeting House, Manchester Museum, AIR Gallery, Paradise Works, Editional Studio, Cadishead and Little Woolden Moss, Gallery Oldham, the John Rylands Library, Dunham Massey, Lindow Moss, Castlefield Viaduct, Gallery Oldham, The Atkinson, Castlefield Gallery and Ancoats Central Retail Park; and a 2023-24 group exhibition and events programme at Rogue Studios.

Castlefield Gallery continues to provide admin and co-ordination support via its Artist Environmental Lead, Jane Lawson.
https://www.instagram.com/sparkartistsnetwork/

Image: Morag Rose