35 Summers…
So, sometime in 2022, Paul from Oriel Colwyn (a super lovely photography gallery in Colwyn Bay, North Wales) came to me with the idea of them hosting a retrospective exhibition of my music related work. And that show opened in October of the same year, carrying on until January 2023 when we had a lovely closing party which saw Mike Badger and I playing records throughout the afternoon and lots of boss people coming down to buy prints directly off the wall. We’d talked about selling prints from the exhibition and I opted for selling the ones directly off the wall , complete with drawing pin holes, once the show was over and giving the takings to charity. So, after spending a small fortune on posting the photographs out, we cleared just over 2k which was split 50/50 between a local food bank in Conwy, called Bags of Love, and to the gallery itself to fund future shows. So thank you everyone who came along and bought a print. And of course everybody who just came along, especially the coach load who came down on the last day.
And then once the show ended, I started to get loads of people asking me about when the show was coming to Liverpool and I had various options offered to me. Some were great but it wouldn’t work in the way it needed to be displayed, some just wouldn't work and one was perfect. So I went with that one, as it was steered by someone who really believed in it but the venue owners were a different kettle of fish. In fact, they were a kettle of clowns and they pulled the whole thing after we’d spent a couple of months working on it and a Liverpool 35 Summers exhibition got put on hold, my work went through the roof with everything from Eurovision to The Open, and I started writing a book (no laughing at the back now). But there’s no reason why 35 Summers can’t be a little bit longer (like 36 or 37) and things are already in the pipeline with more news to come soon, with the first instalment being a mini version of 35 Summers opening in Germany next month! More news on that soon. 35 Summers and counting…
