Locomotion Inspires Five Local Artists

4th January 2012

Categories: Visitor News

Something out of the ordinary is happening at Locomotion, the National Railway Museum at Shildon. A new exhibition, opening on January 16 2012, will showcase the work of five local artists inspired by the role of the museum and its collections.

Local artists adopted the brief to create original work, responding to the vehicles on display at Locomotion and to its remarkable role as a centre for developing heritage skills and rail restoration techniques. Tish Bloom, Carolyn Corfield, Vera Hynes and Michael Kusz, collectively known as Cluster Arts, work in various media: sculpture, ceramics, painting and film.

On this occasion a guest artist, photographer Graeme Rowatt, joins them for their exhibition, Track Across Time, which opens on 16 January 2012. It is hoped that a venture such as this will add a further dimension to the visitor experience as well as demonstrating the cultural ties that link the museum and contemporary artists within its region.

All the artists have been given access both to the collections and workshop on site and even materials discarded during the restoration processes. The Heritage Skills Initiative at Locomotion aims to pass on some of the North East’s specialist heritage skills to a new generation, to ensure that the region’s industrial history will be preserved for the future.

Supported by a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund under their ‘Skills for the Future’ programme, Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums and North of England Civic Trust have provided training placements in practical heritage engineering skills at venues across the region, including Locomotion.

Track Across Time opens at Locomotion, the National Railway Museum at Shildon, on January 16 and runs until March 4, 2012. 

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