Amartey Golding and Joe Hartley In-Conversation

This is a blended event: 
- in-person at Castlefield Gallery
- online via zoom

Co-chaired by Amanda Braithwaite (Community Programmes Lead at ANEW) and Matthew Pendergast (Castlefield Gallery Curator and Head of Programmes).

This event brings together two artists who will be reflecting on their experiences and what they have learnt from recent projects centered around co-created artworks.

Amartey Golding is a British artist whose practice explores themes of masculinity, nationhood, violence and vulnerability. In 2023, Golding began working with groups of imprisoned men at HMP Altcourse in Fazakerley to make a suit of armour. The latest piece in his ongoing Chainmail series, Chainmail 4: Silent Knight (2025) was exhibited at FACT, Liverpool (23.5 – 8.10.2025). The exhibition was the final part of a multi-year project by FACT called Resolution, which looked at how art can affect public attitudes and influence decision-making in the justice system.

ANEW Way to Peel an Orange (03.08 – 19.11.2025) is Castlefield Gallery’s current exhibition of co-created work developed by Joe Hartley and the ANEW recovery community. Joe Hartley spent five months as artist in residence at ANEW (Tameside, Greater Manchester), a service for people in recovery from substance use. Guided by Hartley’s diverse approach to making as well as the skills possessed by the clients and staff a body of work emerged in the context of ANEW’s experienced and creative approach to recovery. Rooted in collaboration and creative exchange, the residency was an evolving journey of making and reflecting.

Join us to hear more about what it took to make the artworks produced by these projects. How valuing time spent together, and taking risks with openness and humour, fed into works which don’t just speak to the experiences of the people involved, but to us all and the wider world in which we find ourselves living in today.

Image: Amartey Golding, Resolution, 2025, FACT Gallery ©Rob Battersby.