Programme

Programme by date

27 April to 12 May

Extraction: Projection

Framing The Penzance Convention and deepening exploration of the theme, The Exchange will present an exhibition of projected image work in the weeks leading up to the Convention, with support from LUMA Foundation. This exhibition is part of an eight-week programme of educational activities and artist-led events and discussions organised by The Exchange around the theme of extraction.

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Thursday 3 May

Talk by José Roca: Exploration, Extraction and Market

7.30pm, Thursday 3 May, free

The Exchange, Princes Street, Penzance

Guest curator José Roca talks about his screening programme Exploration, Extraction and Market for the Extraction: Projection exhibition at The Exchange, Monday 30 April to Saturday 5 May.

Friday 11 May

Talk by Daniel Muzyczuk and Agnieszka Pindera: Sugar in the Air

7.30pm, Friday 11 May, free

The Exchange, Princes Street, Penzance

Guest curators Daniel Muzyczuk and Agnieszka Pindera talk about their screening programme, Sugar in the Air, for the Extraction: Projection exhibition at The Exchange, Monday 7 to Saturday 12 May.

Thursday 17 May

The Penzance Convention opens with a keynote address by social historian Iain Boal, delivered in the Methodist Church in Chapel Street, Penzance. All welcome.

Keynote: Iain Boal

Drawn from Nature: Extraction, Commodity and Commons

Given in the Methodist Church on Chapel Street in Penzance, Iain Boal‘s keynote compared Cornwall and the northern California littoral as zones of extraction. It traced the legacies – environmental and social – of mining and fishing considered as industries tied into a globalised market, by drawing out the paradoxes of depletion and sustainability, of tourism and the heritage industry, of regional autonomy and centralised subsidy, of lived reality and the mythos of the far West.

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Registration and bar at The Exchange

5-7pm and 9-11pm, Thursday 17 May

The Exchange will be open for registration before and after the keynote.

Exploration, Extraction and Market

9pm-12.30am, Thursday 17 May
The Exchange, Princes Street, Penzance

Screening of José Roca’s film selection for the Extraction: Projection exhibition

Lecture on Nesting

Performance by Andy and Peter Holden
10.30pm, Thursday 17 May
The Exchange, Princes Street, Penzance
Free event, open to all

Andy Holden‘s work incorporates a wide variety of media and forms of presentation, from plaster, bronze and ceramic objects, to music, performance and large outdoor sculpture. Recent exhibitions include Pyramid Piece and Return of the Pyramid Piece for Art Now at Tate Britain and Chewy Cosmos Thingly Time at Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge.

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Friday 18 May

Friday field trips: each field trip offers different experiences and narratives in relation to the theme of extraction.

Newlyn fish auction

7am, Friday 18 May
Newlyn

Early risers meet Nick Howell by the Seamen’s mission, round the back of the green painted newsagents shed and the War Memorial. In case of problems phone Nick Howell: 07809609545

Registration

8.45-9.45am, Friday 18 May
The Exchange, Princes Street, Penzance

The Exchange will be open before the field trips for delegates who have not already registered.

Field Trips

9am – 5pm, Friday 18 May

From 9am buses depart from Penzance Bus Station (in front of the train station). Buses return delegates to Penzance Bus Station (in front of the train station) by 5pm.

Field trips led by Camborne School of Mines

Experts from Camborne School of Mines will lead field trips exploring aspects of Cornwall’s mineral mining history and current mining aspirations, including rare opportunities to visit disused mine workings and to learn about state-of-the-art technologies of extraction.

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The Invisibles

Artist Hadrian Pigott led this field trip with Marcus Perry of the St Just Mines Research Group. It started with an exploration of the spoil tips of Botallack on the north coast of the Penwith peninsula, where the uranium ore pitchblende was once mined, and included a visit to Rosevale Mine, led by Tony Bennett. The field trip group included scientists from Camborne School of Mines and the European Centre for the Environment and Human Health, who are working on the occurrence, distribution and effects of radon gas.

In his presentation at the Convention Hadrian Pigott gave an account of the field trip and went on to talk about the history of uranium, pitchblende and radium, and the extraction of these substances in Cornwall. His text is published here, with the images included in his presentation.

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The Story of NPK: Agriculture as Extraction

Beginning with the sun’s eternally extravagant glare beating down on the hunter gatherer’s primeval forest, and concluding with computerised food production systems dependent on globally sourced synthetic inputs, The Story of NPK: Agriculture as Extraction with Paul Chaney and Kenna Hernly of FIELDCLUB offers ‘a mind-boggling agrosophical examination revealing the changing dynamic of extraction in agricultural techniques from prehistory until today.’

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Extracting Creativity, workshop with Andrew Lanyon

Described by Andrew Lanyon as an exercise in ‘streaming and open cast as opposed to deep mining of the imagination’, this workshop grows out of his continuing experimentation with ways of accessing the imagination.

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Newlyn Fishing Industry – Stories of Extraction

For early risers this field trip starts at 7am with a visit to the fish auction at Newlyn, Penzance’s neighbour on Mounts Bay, followed by breakfast at the Fishermen’s Mission. Delegates who are going on to participate in other field trips are welcome to join this part of the tour, and those who just can’t get up for 7am can join the field trip after 9am.

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Coast to coast

For keen walkers this field trip offers a 10-mile walk from Gurnard’s Head to The Cornish Riviera via Love Lane and other places of interest, led by artist Billy Wynter and National Trust Countryside Manager and history enthusiast John Brookes.

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Delegates Dinner

6.30pm, Friday 18 May
Refectory of Penwith College

Dinner prepared by students on the catering course.

Private View at Tate St Ives

Evening, Friday 18 May

8pm Buses depart from Penwith College after dinner to take delegates to Private View of the Alex Katz exhibition at Tate St Ives.

9.30 and 10pm Buses depart from Tate St Ives to bring delegates back to Penzance.

Convention bar

Evening, Friday 18 May

PZ Gallery, Coinagehall Street, Penzance

Late bar at PZ Gallery for Convention delegates returning to Penzance.

Hedluv + Passman

Two Cornish rappers and a Casiotone
10.30pm, Friday 18 May
PZ Gallery, Coinagehall Street, Penzance
Free event, open to all

‘The best thing to come out of Cornwall since tin’, Cornish rappers Hedluv + Passman bring new life to the Cornish vernacular with songs such as Dreckly. 

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Saturday 19 May

Conference

9.30am – 6pm Saturday 19 May
The Exchange, Princes Street, Penzance

Conference presentations: field trip leaders’ reports and discussion of field trip experiences.

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Food boxes from Untitled

From 6.30pm, Saturday 19 May

Takeaway food boxes of cassoulet and vegetarian risotto on sale at Untitled restaurant on Abbey Street from 6.30pm.

Imbibe Drop-in / Networking evening

7.30 – 10.30pm, Saturday 19 May
CAZ, basement of The Exchange, New Street entrance opposite the Star Inn (ring buzzer for entry)
Refreshments
Free

Artist-led group Cornwall Autonomous Zone (CAZ) invites visitors to ‘imbibe’ a range of unusual beverages and soundscapes at this evening drop-in – an opportunity to talk to the artists who created CAZ and network with peers in a relaxed and informal atmosphere.

Screenings at The Exchange

7.30 – 10.30pm, Saturday 19 May
Free

Screening of films selected for the Extraction: Projection programme at The Exchange.

Museums at Night

8pm, Saturday 19 May – 8am, Sunday 20 May
Free

Newlyn Art Gallery’s contribution to the national Museums at Night celebrations includes extracting salt from sea water and the creation of an animation film. The Studio Café Bar will be open from 5pm until 12 midnight serving Margaritas and seafood.

Convention bar

6.30pm – midnight, Saturday 19 May

PZ Gallery, Coinagehall Street, Penzance

The bar at PZ Gallery will be open from the close of the conference at The Exchange and throughout the evening, screening silent archive films compiled by Awen Productions, with DJ set by Damnsonic Records.

Sunday 20 May

Conference

9.30am – 1pm, Sunday 20 May
The Exchange, Princes Street, Penzance

Presentations by artists and curators, reflecting on the processes by which artists draw meaning from history and site.

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Visit to Tremenheere Gardens

1.30 – 3.30pm, Sunday 20 May

A bus will be available for speakers and delegates who would like to visit Neil Armstrong’s gardens at Tremenheere, two miles from Penzance, between the villages of Gulval and Ludgvan. Places on the bus are limited and will be allocated first to speakers and visitors from more distant locations, thereafter on a first-come-first-served basis. The bus will return to Penzance station at 3.30pm.

Lunch

1.00pm, Sunday 20 May

Sandwich bags will be provided at the close of the conference.

Autumn 2012

Extraction: Projection on tour

Extending The Penzance Convention programme to outlying communities, selections of projected image work from the Extraction: Projection exhibition at The Exchange will tour to village halls in Cornwall in autumn 2012, in a scheme funded by FEAST in association with Electronic Village Galleries.