A landmark building in Leeds city centre has been given a new lease of life as a major new art space focusing on creativity, innovation and experimentation. The Tetley brewery was a source of civic and industrial pride in the city for 189 years until it was closed by its owners 2011. But following a £1.5 million refurbishment, and under the leadership of artist-led organisation Project Space Leeds (PSL), the building re-opened this weekend as The Tetley, a centre for contemporary art and learning.
Set in the middle of razed ground and illuminated by a red neon sign, the imposing art deco building functions as post-industrial, project-based art rather than a more conventional exhibition space. On the launch weekend the atmosphere was that of a buzzing, inclusive, community-based event, with screen-printing workshops, a busy bar and an engaged, agitprop crowd getting lively with the questions put to philosopher Nina Power, author of One-Dimensional Woman, whose talk When We Say ‘Work’, What Do We Mean? When We Say ‘Worker’, Who Do We Not Not Mean offered a topical contemporary slant to the question of the changing context of waged and unwaged work.
Art and labour
Power’s talk was part of a series of public discussions and events curated by Emma Rushton and Derek Tyman under the title Fear Of The Surplus. Via a hand-crafted stage with a kitsch, Victoriana aesthetic, emblazoned in fancy fonts with slogans including ‘All art is quite useless’ and ‘The best is the most economical’, the talks provide a context for a programme of speakers to give perspectives on art and labour.
The landmark building itself, meanwhile, provides its own fascinating perspectives on the relationship between art and labour. The focal point is the caged lift, no longer in operation, and a circular staircase that winds up three storeys, acting as a viewing space over the main gallery space. On the first floor, the galleries that lead off the corridor are filled with curated artefacts from the former brewery that draw understated attention to heritage details: the huge gilt letters that formed the Tetley sign have been stacked; a quiet notice informs the viewer that these, far from being objects weighted with age and history, date, at the very earliest, from the 1980s. Other exhibits include a manpower study on computers in the office, a portrait of Tetley’s ninth head brewer James B Seabrook, who, we are informed, had “an unusually keen palate and ‘nose’ for beer”, and a 1970s advertising poster of two duellists in frilly shirts accompanied by the slogan ‘A man can get attached to Tetley’s.’ These insights into a so recently vanished local industry gently acknowledge a sense of loss and have a poignant fascination.
Art and ideas
On the next floor, the Board Room (which is available for hire) is as imposing a space as anyone looking for symbols of industrial swank might wish for. The long table, fully set for a twelve-course dinner, is flanked by corporate portraits that demonstrate the might of the leaders of the brewing dynasty.
Other doors conceal studio spaces. The Tetley’s first open studio residency artist James Clarkson is creating new work that explores Tetley’s social history via objects he has found on site. The residency will include regular ‘open studio’ slots where visitors can see the project evolve, before the finished work is exhibited in the gallery from 10 January 2014.
Cerebral rather than strikingly visual, The Tetley’s opening project seemed like a softly-softly approach designed to focus the attention of the visitors on the potential of the fascinating building as a space where art can be created and ideas disseminated. Project Space Leeds had a long, fruitful occupancy at Whitehall Waterfront from 2006 until its move to The Tetley, where it has been granted a ten-year residency. Run by artists Kerry Harker and Pippa Hale, who is also director of the Northern Art Prize, PSL has an impressive track record of innovative contemporary art shows, many with a focus on artists and art practice from the north of England. It will be very interesting to see how it utilises the great potential of The Tetley.
The Tetley, Hunslet Road, Leeds, LS10 1JQ.
Emma Rushton and Derek Tyman’s Fear Of The Surplus continues to 12 January 2014; James Clarkson’s Open Studio Residency continues to 23 December 2013 and will be followed by an exhibition, 10 January – 16 February 2014. For more information about the opening prgramme, ‘A New Reality Part 1’, see thetetley.org
More on a-n.co.uk
Project Space Leeds: “It’s all there for the taking” – Gillian Nicol met The Tetley’s co-directors Pippa Hale and Kerry Harker back in February 2013.
A New Reality: The Tetley announces inaugural programme – preview of the opening programme.
Graduate interview: James Clarkson
