BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

This article refers to BALTIC, the arts centre in the United Kingdom. For other uses, see Baltic (disambiguation).

The Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art (BALTIC) is an international centre for contemporary art

Contemporary art

Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...

located on the south bank of the River Tyne

River Tyne

The River Tyne is a river in North East England in Great Britain. It is formed by the confluence of two rivers: the North Tyne and the South Tyne. These two rivers converge at Warden Rock near Hexham in Northumberland at a place dubbed 'The Meeting of the Waters'.The North Tyne rises on the...

alongside the Gateshead Millennium Bridge

Gateshead Millennium Bridge

The Gateshead Millennium Bridge is a pedestrian and cyclist tilt bridge spanning the River Tyne in England between Gateshead's Quays arts quarter on the south bank, and the Quayside of Newcastle upon Tyne on the north bank. The award-winning structure was conceived and designed by architects...

in Gateshead

Gateshead

Gateshead is a town in Tyne and Wear, England and is the main settlement in the Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead. Historically a part of County Durham, it lies on the southern bank of the River Tyne opposite Newcastle upon Tyne and together they form the urban core of Tyneside...

, North East England

North East England

North East England is one of the nine official regions of England. It covers Northumberland, County Durham, Tyne and Wear, and Teesside . The only cities in the region are Durham, Newcastle upon Tyne and Sunderland...

, United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

. It presents a constantly changing programme of exhibitions and events, and is a world leader in the presentation, commissioning and communication of contemporary visual art.

Reception

Publicly Baltic’s profile has been considered rocky and despite its youth it has experienced three directorial changes and has fallen foul to much public gossip and speculation. The founding director, Sune Nordgren was appointed in 1997 and was integral in Baltic's pre-launch period, having overseen the building of the gallery and witnessed the first one million visitors through the doors. After almost six years, Nordgren left to take up a new post as founding Director of the National Museum for Art, Architecture and Design, Oslo, Norway. He was briefly succeeded by Stephen Snoddy

Stephen Snoddy

Stephen Snoddy is a Curator and Gallery Director. Stephen Snoddy was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland in 1959 and he trained as a painter at Belfast College of Art where he graduated in 1983 with an MA in Fine Art....

who was only with the organisation for one year. Snoddy was succeeded as Director by Peter Doroshenko

Peter Doroshenko

Peter Doroshenko is the Executive Director at the Dallas Contemporary, Texas, United States.- Life and career :...

in 2005, who approached the challenge with plans to increase visitor numbers and resolve the financial situation. Doroshenko organized several exhibitions during his time at the BALTIC, including 'Spank the Monkey.' In November 2007, Doroshenko left the gallery to head up the Pinchuk Art Centre in Kiev, Ukraine. Since 2008 the director has been Godfrey Worsdale, founding director of the Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art

Mima

Mima may refer to:places* Mima District, Tokushima in Tokushima Prefecture, Japan* Mima, Tokushima, town in Mima District* Mima, Ehime, town in the Kitauwa District, Ehime, Japan* Mima , ward in Tanzania...

.

BALTIC has in only five years welcomed more than 2.5 millions visitors, with an additional 1 million virtually in the last year alone through its websites, webcasts, podcasts and Library and Archive facility. BALTIC has exhibited nearly 200 artists from 24 countries, including Anish Kapoor

Anish Kapoor

Anish Kapoor CBE RA is a British sculptor of Indian birth. Born in Mumbai , Kapoor has lived and worked in London since the early 1970s when he moved to study art, first at the Hornsey College of Art and later at the Chelsea School of Art and Design.He represented Britain in the XLIV Venice...

, Sam Taylor-Wood

Sam Taylor-Wood

Samantha "Sam" Taylor-Wood OBE , born Samantha Taylor, is an English filmmaker, photographer, and visual artist. Her directorial feature film debut came in 2009 with Nowhere Boy, a film based on the childhood experiences of The Beatles songwriter and singer John Lennon...

, Antony Gormley

Antony Gormley

Antony Mark David Gormley OBE RA is a British sculptor. His best known works include the Angel of the North, a public sculpture in the North of England, commissioned in 1995 and erected in February 1998, Another Place on Crosby Beach near Liverpool, and Event Horizon, a multi-part site...

, Lev Manovich

Lev Manovich

Lev Manovich is an author of new media books, professor of Visual Arts, University of California, San Diego, U.S. and European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland, where he teaches new media art and theory, software studies, and digital humanities...

, Ed and Nancy Kienholz

Edward Kienholz

Edward Kienholz was an American installation artist whose work was highly critical of aspects of modern life. From 1972 onwards, he assembled much of his artwork in close collaboration with his artistic partner and wife, Nancy Reddin Kienholz...

and Spencer Tunick

Spencer Tunick

Spencer Tunick is an American photographer. Tunick is best known for organizing large-scale nude shoots. Since 1994 he has photographed over 75 human installations around the world.-Biography:...

. BALTIC has commissioned over 30 new works, enabling it to support established and emerging artists.

In the summer of 2007 Baltic celebrated its fifth birthday with a Beryl Cook

Beryl Cook

Beryl Cook, OBE was an English artist best known for comical paintings of people she encountered in her home city. She had no formal training and did not take up painting until middle age.- Early life :...

exhibition and the opening of Quay, a new Learning and Community Centre within the gallery. This new resource, created following a donation of £500,000 by Rootstein Hopkins Foundation

Adel Rootstein

Adel Rootstein was a British mannequin designer responsible for premium designs that are sold worldwide.-Early life:Rootstein was born in Warmbaths, South Africa in 1930. She married the industrial designer Richard Hopkins...

enables BALTIC to widen its education remit to work both on and off site, encouraging more people, young and old, to interact and experience contemporary art ‘up close and personal’. Each year BALTIC provides formal education for over 10,000 school children, during nearly 400 sessions ranging from art clubs, photography courses, artist talks and artist-led workshops.

On 20 September 2007 BALTIC management contacted Northumbria Police

Northumbria Police

Northumbria Police is the territorial police force responsible for policing the areas of Northumberland and Tyne and Wear in North East England. The service is the sixth largest police force in England and Wales. The current Chief Constable is Sue Sim who was appointed by Northumbria Police...

for advice regarding whether or not a photograph should be displayed as part of the Thanksgiving installation, a forthcoming exhibition by American photographer Nan Goldin

Nan Goldin

Nancy "Nan" Goldin is an American photographer.-Life and work:Goldin was born in Washington, D.C., and grew up in the Boston, Massachusetts suburb of Lexington, to middle class Jewish parents whose ideas, moderately liberal and progressive, were put to the test when on April 12, 1965 their eldest...

. The photograph entitled Klara and Edda belly-dancing (which, along with the rest of the installation, is part of the Sir Elton John

Elton John

Sir Elton Hercules John, CBE, Hon DMus is an English rock singer-songwriter, composer, pianist and occasional actor...

Photography Collection) features two naked young girls and had previously been exhibited around the world without objections. The installation, which had been scheduled for a four-month exhibition, opened with the remaining photographs but closed after just nine days at the request of the owner.

In 2011 the Baltic is to be the venue for the Turner Prize

Turner Prize

The Turner Prize, named after the painter J. M. W. Turner, is an annual prize presented to a British visual artist under the age of 50. Awarding the prize is organised by the Tate gallery and staged at Tate Britain. Since its beginnings in 1984 it has become the United Kingdom's most publicised...

, this would be the first time the event has been held outside of a London or Liverpool Tate in its 25 years.

Building

The Baltic Flour Mill was built by the Rank Hovis company to a late-1930s design by architects Gelder and Kitchen

Sir (William) Albert Gelder

Sir Alfred Gelder was a British architect and Liberal politician.-Family and education:Gelder was born in the village of North Cave in the East Riding of Yorkshire, the son of William Gelder, a joiner and wheelwright who later became a timber merchant. Although christened William after his...

and completed in 1950 . It was extended in 1957 by the addition of an animal feed mill. The mill was closed in 1981.
It was one of a number of mills located along the banks of the Tyne, all of which, due to their size, were prominent local landmarks. As of October 2011, the Spillers mill just downstream from the Baltic on the north bank of the river is in the process of being demolished. Another large mill was owned by the CWS and was located just upstream of Dunston Staithes. The site of this mill and the adjacent CWS soap works is now occupied by a housing estate.

Dominic Williams of Ellis Williams Architects won an architectural competition in the mid 1990s to convert the 1950s Baltic Flour Mill into a centre for art. After ten years in the planning and a capital investment of £50m, including £33.4m from the Arts Council

Arts Council England

Arts Council England was formed in 1994 when the Arts Council of Great Britain was divided into three separate bodies for England, Scotland and Wales. It is a non-departmental public body of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport...

Lottery Fund, BALTIC opened to the public at midnight on Saturday 13 July 2002. The inaugural exhibition, B.OPEN, featured work by Chris Burden

Chris Burden

Christopher "Chris" Burden is an American artist working in performance, sculpture, and installation art.-Education:Burden studied for his B.A...

, Carsten Holler

Carsten Höller

Carsten Höller is a German artist. He lives and works in Farsta, Stockholm, in Sweden. Today, he also shares a house in Ghana with colleague Marcel Odenbach.-Early life and education:...

, Julian Opie

Julian Opie

Julian Opie is a visual artist, and one of the New British Sculpture movement.-Life and work:Julian Opie was raised in Oxford, England, where he attended the Dragon School and Magdalen College School. He attended Goldsmith's School of Art in London from 1979-82...

, Jaume Plensa

Jaume Plensa

Jaime Plensa is an Spanish artist and sculptor.-Biography:Plensa was born at Barcelona. Plensa studied art in his home city, in the "Llotja" School and in the Escuela Superior de Bellas Artes de San Jorge....

and Jane & Louise Wilson and attracted over 35,000 visitors in the first week.

External links

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