We at the Grinning Idiot Comedy Club are well aware that the performing Arts are not the only arts available to Man, Lady, Mouse or Kitten. Newcastle Upon Tyne has a wealth of Museums and Art galleries to feast your brains upon. So read on below, fill your brain with Art, science and historical information then pop down the grinning idiot and have a laugh.
Centre for Life
http://www.life.org.uk/
The Centre for Life is a science centre located in the city centre of Newcastle upon Tyne, England. It is an educational charity which aims to promote greater interest and engagement in science as well as supporting scientific research. The complex contains an exhibition space, medical clinics, research laboratories used by Newcastle University, offices and lab space for biotechnology companies and a conference centre.
The complex encloses Times Square, where several entertainment venues and bars are found, as well as ample space for outdoor events. Times Square is located close to Newcastle Central railway station. The variety of events attract many tourists as well as local people. In the winter months, Times Square is host to an open-air ice rink and during major sporting events such as The Football World Cup a big screen is installed to display televised matches. The square is often used for promotional purposes by various companies and corporations, for example the Qashqai Urban Challenge in 2007 and the BBC "Blast!" tour.
The Centre was officially opened by The Queen in 2000 and offers an annual programme of exhibitions, lectures, workshops and family events with over 200,000 visitors every year.
The Science Centre's permanent exhibition focuses on different aspects of human life; its origins, adaptation to extreme environments, as well as some of the challenges humanity may face in the future. Every summer a major temporary exhibition is hosted, usually a touring exhibition such as "Myths and Monsters" from the Natural History Museum , or "Grossology". During the winter months, smaller scale exhibitions are hosted, either on loan from other museums or created in-house.
As well as the exhibitions, The Science Centre contains shows throughout the year. The "Life Theatre" hosts live science demonstrations linked to the main exhibition, and "The Dome" is unique in the North-East of England, for its 360° domed ceiling and immersive projections. The shows are created and presented in-house, with many of the staff holding science-related degrees, some even to Ph.D. level. Though the grinning idiot must stress to point out, qualifications do not technically mean intelligence; they just mean you were a student, and that potentially means that you just got drunk for three years and fell randomly into a 2:2 (and I speak directly from personal experience).
As well as workshops on-site, the Centre for Life also operates an Outreach Programme. Scientists from the Centre visit schools who do not otherwise have access to laboratories or science equipment, often in impoverished or extremely rural areas.
A variety of educational activities are also open to the public. There is a bi-monthly "Science Club" for adults with young children, and a free lecture series aimed at adults.
The Newcastle Fertility Centre was established in 1991 at the RVI, later moving to the Centre for Life and officially opened by Professor Lord Robert Winston on 22 February 2000. As well as treating infertile couples, it carries out research and development into new fertility treatments.
Scientists based at The Centre for Life are the first people in Europe - and only the second in the world - to get a license for stem cell research on human embryos. The license will allow work on new treatments for conditions including diabetes, Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease.
Discovery Museum
Discovery Museum is a science museum and local history museum situated in Blandford Square in Newcastle upon Tyne. It displays many exhibits of local history, including Turbinia, the 34 metre long ship built by Charles Algernon Parsons to test the advantages of using the steam turbine to power ships. It also features examples of Joseph Swan's early lightbulbs which were invented on Tyneside.
It houses the regimental museum for the 15/19th King’s Royal Hussars and the Northumberland Hussars, exploring the human side of 200 years of life in the army. It is a "hands-on" museum designed to interest both children and adults.
It is one of the biggest free museums in North East England, and in 2006 was winner of the North East's Best Family Experience award at the North East England Tourism Awards. It is managed by Tyne and Wear Museums and sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.
The Discovery Museum started life in 1934 as the Municipal Museum of Science and Industry. The collections were housed in a temporary pavilion built for the 1929 North East Coast Exhibition in Exhibition Park, Newcastle. This was the first UK science museum outside London.
The collections and displays grew for another forty years, until the temporary pavilion could no longer meet the Museum's needs. In 1978, the Museum was re-located to Blandford House, the former Co-operative Wholesale Society Headquarters for the Northern Region. Designed by Oliver, Leeson and Wood, this magnificent 1899 building had been the distribution centre for over 100 Co-op stores across the region, and contained extensive warehouse space and offices.
In 1993 the Museum was re-launched as Discovery Museum. Ongoing refurbishment has brought many new displays in recent years. This includes the spectacular transfer of Turbinia, in 1994, from her old home in Exhibition Park through the streets of Newcastle to the new entrance hall at Discovery.
In 2004 the £13 million redevelopment of the Museum was complete and the following year the venue attracted 450,000 visitors. Though when I asked them if they could spot me 20 quid for a few bevies they simply looked the other way and began whistling, still they're all welcome down the good old Grinning Idiot comedy club.
The Hancock Museum
The Hancock Museum is a museum of natural history in Newcastle upon Tyne. It is located next to the Great North Road, on the campus of Newcastle University. The museum and all of its collections are owned by the Natural History Society of Northumbria but is now managed by Tyne and Wear Museums on behalf of Newcastle University.
The museum opened on its current site in 1884 after the collection of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Newcastle (founded 1793) outgrew its small museum, located on Westgate Road, which opened in 1834. It was re-named in the 1890s, after the local Victorian naturalists, Albany and John Hancock. In 1959 the Natural History Society agreed with the University of Newcastle for the University to care for the building and collections, and since 1992 the University have contracted Tyne & Wear Museums to manage the Museum under a Service Level Agreement.
Refurbishment / Great North Museum Project
Great North Museum Project logoAs of 23 April 2006, the museum has been closed and will not reopen until early 2009. It is being completely refurbished and extended as part of the Great North Museum Project. It will include new displays on natural history and geology, Ancient Egypt and Ancient Greece, Romans and Hadrian's Wall, World Cultures and Pre-history. It will also include an interactive study zone, an under 5's space and a digital Planetarium, as well as new learning facilities, a new temporary exhibition space and a study garden. The new museum will house not only the Hancock Museum collections, but also those of the University's Museum of Antiquities, Hatton Gallery and Shefton Museum.
The Great North Museum project is a partnership between Newcastle University, Tyne & Wear Museums, Newcastle City Council, the Natural History Society of Northumbria and the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne.
The Great North Museum project has been made possible with funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund, TyneWear Partnership, One NorthEast, the European Regional Development Fund, Newcastle University, Newcastle City Council, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, the Wolfson Foundation and The Northern Rock Foundation, as well as numerous other trusts and foundations.
The Hancock Museum also boasts the Grinning Idiot's favourite warning sign in Newcastle- The largely ignored "Don't climb on the Rhino", right next to the highly lifelike Rhino statue outside, that does unfortunately scream out "Climb on me" to all an sundry.
Hatton Gallery
The Hatton Gallery is Newcastle University's art exhibition gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.
The Hatton Gallery was founded in 1925, by the King Edward VII School of Art, Armstrong College, Durham University (Newcastle University's Department of Fine Art), in honour of Richard George Hatton, a professor at the School of Art.
In 1997 the University authorities voted to close down the gallery, but a widespread public campaign against the closure, leading to a £250,000 donation by Dame Catherine Cookson, ensured the survival of the gallery.
As part of the Great North Museum project, the gallery will be collected within the Hancock Museum.
The permanent collection comprises over 3,500 works, some dating back to the 14th century. These works of art include paintings, sculptures, prints and drawings. It houses the Merzbarn - the only surviving Merz construction by Kurt Schwitters - as well as works by Francis Bacon, Victor Pasmore, William Roberts and Paolo di Giovanni.
Laing Art Gallery
The Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle Upon Tyne is located on New Bridge Street. It was opened in 1904 and is now managed by Tyne and Wear Museums and sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. In front of the gallery is the Blue Carpet.
The gallery holds oil paintings, watercolours and Newcastle silver. Newcastle was the greatest glass producer in the world c 1800 and enamelled glasses by William Beilby are on display along with ceramics (including Maling pottery), and ontemporary work by up and coming artists. It has a programme of regularly-changing exhibitions and is free entry.
The gallery boasts an extensive collection of paintings by John Martin, including the dramatic "The destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah", as well as important works by Sir Joshua Reynolds, Burne-Jones ("Laus Veneris", Holman Hunt ("Isabella and the Pot of Basil"), Ben Nicholson and others. There is also an extensive collection of 18th and 19th century watercolours and drawings, including work by Turner, Cotman etc.
It is a little known fact that Grinning Idiot regular MC and compere "Dan Willis" has actually exhibited at the Laing, indeed someone even bought his picture. Aged 9, he'll never forget his "Diplodocus in Ink", because primarily it only had 3 legs, Willis felt he'd peaked too early in his art career and thus retired on a 100% record.
Literary and Philosophical Society of Newcastle upon Tyne
The front of the Literary and Philosophical Society building in NewcastleThe Literary and Philosophical Society of Newcastle Upon Tyne (or the Lit & Phil as it is popularly known) is a historical library in Newcastle upon Tyne, England and the largest independent library outside London[citation needed]. The library is still available for both lending (to members) and for free as a reference library.
Founded in 1793 as a 'conversation club' by the Reverend William Turner and others - more than fifty years before the London Library - the annual subscription was originally one guinea. The Lit and Phil library contained works in French, Spanish, German and Latin; its contacts were international, and its members debated a wide range of issues. However religion and politics were prohibited.
The list of lecturers is a roll-call of the 19th and 20th century intelligentsia. George Stephenson showed his miner's lamp there, and in 1879, when Joseph Swan demonstrated his electric light bulbs, the Lit and Phil building became the first public building to be so illuminated.
The Society received in 1800 the country's first specimens of the wombat and the duck-billed platypus from John Hunter, Governor of New South Wales and honorary member of the Lit and Phil.
Between 1822 and 1825 a new building was created for the Society on Westgate Road. The new building was designed by John Green, a local architect. The building is still in use today, with many original features including iron-work second floor galleries.
Notable members
J. Thomas Looney, William George Armstrong, 1st Baron Armstrong
John James Audubon, Thomas Bewick, Sid Chaplin, John Dobson
Ruth Dodds, Richard Grainger, Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey
James Losh, Harriet Martineau, Robert Stephenson
Joseph Wilson Swan, Neil Tennant, Elizabeth Spence Watson
Robert Spence Watson
The Lit & Phil houses over 150,000 books and a large comprehensive music library. A wide selection of current fiction and non-fiction can be found alongside historical collections covering every field of interest.
Museum of Antiquities
The Museum of Antiquities is an archaeological museum at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, England which opened in 1960.
The museum is jointly run by the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne and the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. It is the main archaeology museum in north east England. It covers the history of the region, especially Hadrian's Wall and the Roman period in general. It includes a full-scale reconstruction of the 3rd century temple dedicated to the Roman god Mithras at Carrawburgh. Overall, the period from early prehistory to the 17th century is covered. The University's memorobilia shop is also located inside.
As part of the Great North Museum Project the museum, along with Shefton Museum is to be moved to the Hancock Museum. On 19 April 2008 the museum closed in preparation for the relocation to the newly renovated Hancock Museum, which should reopen in 2009.
Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art
A View of the Baltic Arts CentreThe Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art (BALTIC) is an international centre for contemporary art located on the south bank of the River Tyne alongside the Gateshead Millennium Bridge in Gateshead, North East England. 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.
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 Lottery Fund, BALTIC opened to the public at midnight on Saturday 13 July 2002. The inaugural exhibition, B.OPEN, featured work by Chris Burden, Carsten Holler, Julian Opie, Jaume Plensa and Jane & Louise Wilson and attracted over 35,000 visitors in the first week.
Publicly BALTICS’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, he oversaw the building of the gallery and witnessed the first one millionth visitor 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 who was only with the organisation for one year. Snoddy was succeeded as Director by Peter Doroshenko 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.
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, Sam Taylor-Wood, Antony Gormley, Ed and Nancy Kienholz and Spencer Tunick. BALTIC remains 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 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 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 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. The photograph entitled Klara and Edda belly-dancing (which, along with the rest of the installation, is part of the Sir Elton John Photograhy 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.
Beamish Museum
In basic celeration of a childhood where my Uncles and Aunties had no idea what to do with me at the weekend but take me to Beamish, I've decided to give a slightly expanded section to what is rumoured to be one of Europes top museums. I suggest spending the day in 1913 and the evening in the Grinning Idiot Comedy Club.
Beamish, The North of England Open Air Museum is an open air museum located at Beamish, near the town of Stanley, County Durham, England.
Beamish’s guiding principle is to show what life was like in urbanised North East England at the climax of industrialisation in the early 20th century — much of the restoration and interpretation is specific to 1913 — together with portions of countryside under influence of the Industrial Revolution in 1825. On its 300 acre (120 hectare) estate it utilises a mixture of translocated, original and replica buildings, a huge collection of artifacts, working vehicles and equipment, costumed interpreters, and livestock.
Beamish is the first English museum to be financed and administered by a consortium of County Councils (Cleveland, Durham, Northumberland and Tyne and Wear) and it was the first regional open air museum in England. The museum was first proposed in 1958 and the collections were established on the Beamish site in 1970 under director Frank Atkinson (b. 1924). Atkinson, concerned to preserve the customs, traditions and ways of speech of the region before it was too late, adopted a policy of "unselective collecting"— "you offer it to us and we will collect it."
The first exhibition was held in Beamish Hall in 1971 and the present site was opened to visitors for the first time in 1972 with the first translocated buildings (the railway station and colliery winding engine) being erected the following year. For some years the museum has been 96% self-funding, mainly from admission charges.
Since 1986 visitors have entered the museum through an entrance arch formed by a steam hammer, across a former opencast mining site and through a converted stable block (from Greencroft, near Lanchester, County Durham).
Reenactors creating a period street scene at the museum.The town area, officially opened in 1985, depicts chiefly Victorian buildings in an evolved urban setting of 1913. These include the Annfield Plain Co-Operative Store (with operating cash carrier system); a terrace of professionals’ houses (from Gateshead), "occupied" by a music teacher, dentist's surgery and family home, and solicitor’s office; a pub (the Sun Inn from Bishop Auckland); town stables and carriage shed (utilising iron roof trusses from Fleetwood) housing an extensive collection of horse-drawn vehicles; a branch office of the Sunderland Daily Echo; a stationer’s and printshop; a sweet shop and manufactory; a garage; a branch of Barclays Bank (using components from Southport and Gateshead); and a masonic temple (from Sunderland). There is a bandstand (from Gateshead) in a public park, together with drinking fountains and other examples of street furniture.
During the winter season, the town is the only area of the museum with buildings open to the public. Future plans for the town include a shopping arcade; dispensing chemist (using fittings from Stockton-on-Tees); and fire and police stations and other municipal buildings. The museum also has the components of an early cinema, and of a gasworks from Milnthorpe.
A typical North Eastern Railway station is reconstructed on the edge of the town. The station building itself came from Rowley just a few miles from Beamish, along with a signal box from Carr House East, near Consett, a goods shed from Alnwick and coal drops from West Boldon.
It is dominated by the Regional Museums Store of 2002 (externally disguised as "Beamish Waggon and Iron Works, estd 1857"), shared with Tyne and Wear Museums. This houses, amongst other things, railway rolling stock and other vehicles; a large marine diesel engine by William Doxford & Sons of Pallion, Sunderland (1977); and several boats including the Tyne wherry (a traditional local type of lighter) Elswick No. 2 (1930). There is a viewing window, but the store is only open at selected times and for special tours, which can be arranged through the museum. Adjacent is an events field and fair ground.
The Westoe Netty has been reconstructed near the railway station, replicating its original location in Westoe, South Shields.
Reconstructed pitworks buildings showing winding gearIn view of the impact the history of coal mining has had on its region, the museum has major collections in this area. Exhibits on site include a coal mine where it is possible to take an underground tour of the museum's Mahogany Drift Mine which is an original feature of the site. The colliery is dominated by the regularly-steamed 1855 vertical winding engine (from a local pit), screens (from Gateshead), and waste tip. There are a number of industrial steam locomotives (including rare examples by Stephen Lewin, from Seaham, and Black, Hawthorn & Co.) and very many chaldron wagons (the region’s traditional type of colliery railway rolling stock, which became a symbol of Beamish). There is usually a pit pony on site and the museum has a significant collection of safety lamps. The surrounding village includes miners' cottages from Hetton-le-Hole, the Wesleyan Methodist chapel from Pit Hill, and East Stanley Board School (which has led to a special relationship between the museum and the successor primary school). Evidence can be seen of traditional pastimes such as pigeon racing and quoits.
This farm complex, preserved in situ, was rebuilt in the mid-nineteenth century as a model farm incorporating a horse mill and a steam-powered threshing mill. It is a base for some of the museum’s agricultural activities.
The eastern side of the museum site is based around the original Pockerley Manor farm, a 15th century foundation with a domestic wing of c.1720. The surrounding farmlands have been returned to a post-Enclosure landscape with ridge and furrow divided into smaller fields by traditional riven oak fencing, and the land worked and grazed by traditional breeds.
Through this scene passes a pack pony track and the "new" wooden and Pockerley Waggonways serving a (replica) coal pit with horse-worked winding gin.
It is intended to expand this area by restoration of an existing watermill on the Beamish Burn (River Team) (where there are also remains of forges) and development of a rural community including re-erection of St Helen’s Church from Eston in Cleveland.
A tram and a bus transporting passengers to various parts of the museumThe museum contains much of transport interest, and the size of its site makes good visitor transportation a necessity.
In the railway station yard there is a variety of wagons on display. Under the footbridge (from Crook) the line extends to the far end of the town, a distance of ¼ mile. The line used to connect to the colliery sidings until 1991 when it was lifted so that the tram line could be extended. Regular steam operation ceased in 1995 due to the lack of permanently available working locomotives. From the nearby Bowes Railway, Andrew Barclay locomotives No. 22 and W.S.T. have made visits in recent years. The museum’s restored North Eastern Railway coach was moved to the Tanfield Railway, also nearby.
NER 876 at Beamish, 2001 Resident locomotives include NER Class C1 freight engine No. 876 (British Railways Class J21 No. 65033), built at Gateshead in 1889. After lying out of use since 1984 it was moved to the North Norfolk Railway for restoration and returned to steam in 2007. The museum also formerly operated its Hawthorn Leslie industrial engine No. 14.
Replica Steam Elephant locomotive, Pockerley WaggonwayIn 1999 Beamish opened the Pockerley Waggonway, recreating a railway at the transition from wagonway to steam railway in 1825. There is a short length of track, and the locomotives are housed and maintained in a "great shed" inspired by lost buildings from Timothy Hackworth’s Shildon railway works and incorporating some material from Robert Stephenson and Company’s Newcastle works.
Visitors to the museum can ride in an unsprung carriage behind one of three replica steam locomotives on the railway.
George Stephenson's Locomotion No 1 designed for the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1825 and recreated in 1975
John Buddle and William Chapman's Steam Elephant designed for Wallsend Colliery in 1815 and recreated in 2002 (based largely on material in Beamish archives).
William Hedley's Puffing Billy designed for Wylam Colliery in 1813 and recreated in 2006.
Following creation of the Pockerley Waggonway, the museum went back a chapter in railway history to create a horse-worked wooden waggonway.
Beamish is home to half a dozen electric trams, some of which operate daily on the track which makes a circuit of the museum site forming an important element of the visitor transportation system. The open-top cars tend to be used in the summer months.
Other large exhibits collected by the museum include a tracked steam shovel, and a coal drop from Seaham Harbour.
In 2001 a new-build Regional Resource Centre (accessible to visitors by appointment) opened on the site to provide accommodation for the museum’s core collections of smaller items. These include over 300,000 historic photographs; printed books and ephemera; and oral history recordings. The object collections cover the museum’s specialities. These include quilts; "clippy mats" (rag rugs); Trade union banners; floorcloth; advertising (including archives from United Biscuits and Rowntree's); locally-made pottery; folk art; and occupational costume. Much of the collection is viewable online and the arts of quilting, rug making and cookery in the local traditions are demonstrated at the museum.
The site has been used as the backdrop for many film and television productions, particularly Catherine Cookson dramas produced by Tyne Tees Television. Some of the children’s television series Supergran was shot here.
In responding to criticism that it trades on nostalgia the museum is unapologetic: a former director has written "As individuals and communities we have a deep need and desire to understand ourselves in time." It can also demonstrate its benefit to the contemporary local economy. Beamish was influential on the Black Country Living Museum, Blists Hill Victorian Town and, in the view of museologist Kenneth Hudson, more widely in the museum community and is a significant educational resource locally.
And there you have it, not only do we at the Grinning Idiot want you to come to our Newcastle Comedy club, but we also want to feed your brain. Go to a museum and then pop down our Comedy Club at Retreat @ St Dominics for a laugh. |
