REEL: Dyke Hands
London-based curatorial collaboration Languid Hands (Rabz Lansiquot and Imani Mason Jordan) presents a group show of short films by black lesbians.
Selected from an international open call, REEL: Dyke Hands features works made by artists from the USA, UK, Trinidad & Tobago and Botswana, and spans filmic approaches includes moving image, narrative, mockumentary, essay film and archival assemblage.
Among the nine artists is Leila Weefur, whose essay-film Tillage & Fury explores the eco-geography of rice cultivation and the life cycle of flies. Meanwhile Munesu Mukombe’s introspective work Everything Happens Under The Sun interweaves poetry, musical theatre, abstract imagery, and sound design to chronicle the artist’s personal encounters with isolation and alienation.
198 Contemporary Arts & Learning, London 198.org.uk
Stones from a Gentle Place
This solo exhibition by artist and a-n member Susan Hughes follows the artist’s experience of bioluminescence while swimming in the sea at night. Her work explores the ways in which humans throughout history have made sense of natural phenomena, the stories associated with such occurrences, and the physical and cognitive effects on the body.
Hughes’ practice combines video, audio, sculpture and installation. In Stones from a Gentle Place the artist plays with psychedelic and ambient lights, colours, materials and sounds in otherwise dark rooms, to examine the mechanics and significance of storytelling in Irish culture.
Until 16 March 2024, CCA Derry~Londonderry ccadld.org
Nurture
Caroline Walker’s paintings depict women at work in circumstances ranging from the domestic scenarios of her own lived experience to more detached encounters in shops, cafés, offices or hotels.
Offering glimpses into the lives of women, her work quietly reveals moments of often invisible female labour.
The new body of work presented in Nurture focuses onto the rhythms, routines and everyday intimacies of family life. Oil sketches, ink drawings and oil paintings reflect the women that Walker has encountered in a new phase of her life as a parent, including nursery school and swimming teachers, health workers and the artist’s own mother.
16 March – 1 June 2024, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh inglebygallery.com
False Note
Freya Dooley, a member of a-n’s Artists Council, presents a solo exhibition of interconnected works that explore themes of replacement, communication and connection.
Dooley’s multi-disciplinary practice encompasses sound, moving-image, writing and performance. Often rooted in close-range observations, her work’s semi-fictional narratives and layered soundtracks relate to the artist’s interest in harmonies and tensions between personal and collective experiences, with a particular interest in structures of work and domestic living.
The narratives in False Note explore miscommunications, untruths, insincerity, and inconsistencies, with a soundtrack informed by Dooley’s recent research in Rome in post-synchronised sound and sonic artifice in Italian cinema.
7 March – 26 May 2024, Site Gallery, Sheffield sitegallery.org
Acts of Resistance: Photography, Feminisms and the Art of Protest
Bringing together 16 international artists and collectives who use photography beyond traditional modes of protest photography, this exhibition explores approaches to feminist practice which have emerged over the past decade.
Common concerns found across countries and regions include intersectionality, transnational solidarity, and the use of social media and digital technology as a tool for activism.
Works reflect key events such as the global ‘Me Too’ movement, anti-rape protests in Bangladesh, and those that continue in Iran in response to the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, after her arrest for not following the country’s strict female dress code.
8 March – 9 June 2024, South London Gallery, London southlondongallery.org
Manchester Open
Manchester Open 2024 features the work of artists from all boroughs of Greater Manchester, and showcases media including painting, embroidery, photography, ceramics, collage, textiles and video.
Among the numerous a-n members taking part is Salford-based Naomi Harwin, whose electric blue sculpture A daily attempt to stay grounded #1 is based on memories of architectural forms and imagined spaces. Harwin is shortlisted for one of Manchester Open’s prizes – Castlefield Gallery: Artist Professional Development Award – that will be announced on 4 March.
Until 28 April 2024, Home, Manchester homemcr.org
Top image: Freya Dooley, False Note
