Newcastle – Attaya Projects

Press Release – Newcastle’s Innovative Attaya Projects Is Among the Best of the North.

Lalya — Mon, 08 Jun 2015 07:38:21 +0000

Newcastle’s cutting-edge organisation Attaya Projects has been chosen for the 2015 Hannah Directory.

The Hannah Directory, now in its third year, highlights people and organisations doing great things in the north of England.

Attaya Projects has been chosen to represent Newcastle upon Tyne. Attaya Projects is a collaborative digital media arts practice that creates beautiful experiences for a variety of audiences through interactive art installations; and designs bespoke products for the creative industries and the public sector. Attaya also provides expert consulting in digital innovation and promotes local community empowerment through the creative use of open technology.

Each project is taken on by a tailored team of world-class experts. Their pool of collaborators is both local and international, as well as diverse and interdisciplinary: It is distributed across 4 continents, inclusive, and with expertise in areas such as community engagement, sound art, architecture, electronics, programming, video, photography, engineering, glass and textile.

Attaya’s clients include various festivals such as the Durham Brass Festival and Thinking Digital, as well as arts and community organisations, individual artists, schools, universities, and European Union programmes.

“I’m delighted that Attaya Projects are involved in Hannah Directory this year,” says Andrew Wilson, who co-ordinates the Directory. “Attaya Projects is currently involved with an exciting cutting-edge collaboration with Canadian sound-artist Jessica Thompson from Toronto who is doing an art residency at ISIS Arts in Newcastle. The project explores sonic notation, borderlines, social changes in urban areas and big data.”

Urban mapping artists Jessica Thompson, Lalya Gaye and Jessica Dolby reading the Hannah Directory in a café in Newcastle

The 2015 Directory features more than fifty people and organisations in Barrow-in-Furness, Calder Valley, Huddersfield, Halifax, Hull, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, North Tyneside, Ossett, Otley, Preston, Salford, Sheffield, Stockport, Wakefield, York as well as Newcastle upon Tyne.

It includes fun, fascinating and innovative activities in fields including the arts, music, business and social organisation, and celebrates the possibility of cooperation between people and places in England’s north for the common good.

Each organisation contributing to the 2015 Hannah Directory is having a small celebration to mark the launch. Attaya Projects will contribute with an open studio afternoon and as one of Newcastle’s pick-up location for the Directory.

“It’s great to be part of this year’s Directory,” said Lalya Gaye of Attaya Projects. “We think that the North of England is an exciting region to work and live in. The way that the Directory celebrates this and creates connections between people who love this region is brilliant and we’re very happy to be part of it.”

Notes

Hannah Directory is named after an inspirational figure from the north of England, Hannah Mitchell (1872–1956), a suffragette and rebel who tried to create ‘beauty in civic life’ in her work on public libraries, parks and gardens.

For more information or comment on Hannah Directory, contact directory organiser Andrew Wilson on andrew@foldup.org.

Website: hannahfestival.com
Twitter: @hannahfestival
Facebook: Hannah festival

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‘Borderline Newcastle’ by Locative Sound Artist Jessica Thompson

Lalya — Wed, 03 Jun 2015 13:55:36 +0000

Jessica Thompson – one of our favourite Canadian artists – is currently doing a residency at ISIS Arts in Newcastle, during which she is exploring sonic notation, borderlines, gentrification and big data.

This project called ‘Borderline’ is supported by Attaya Projects in the form of myself (Lalya), working on it with Jessica. The two of us – both having worked with soundscapes and urban space throughout the years – are identifying borderlines during times of social and economic change that manifest themselves sonically. Alistair MacDonald from Makerspace Newcastle is also participating in the tech side of the project by helping producing interactive sound maps.

Jessica is giving a talk tonight at ISIS Arts HQ at 6pm, which will be followed by a sound walk through the city centre. Free entry! There will be biscuits!

Jessica’s practice investigates spatial and social conditions within urban environments through interactive artworks situated at the intersection of sound, performance and mobile technologies. Her current research investigates the ways that sound reveals spatial and social conditions within cities, and how mobile technologies complicate our relationship to place, territory and community.

Her work has shown in exhibitions and festivals such as ISEA (San Jose, Dubai), the Conflux Festival (New York), Thinking Metropolis (Copenhagen), (in) visible Cities (Winnipeg), Beyond/In Western New York (Buffalo), NIME (Oslo), Audible Edifices (Hong Kong), Artists’ Walks (New York), Locus Sonus (Aix-en-Provence) and Fluid States-Fluid Sounds (Copenhagen), as well as publications such as Canadian Art, c Magazine, Acoustic Territories, the Leonardo Music Journal, and numerous art, design and technology blogs.

She is an Assistant Professor in Hybrid Practice at the University of Waterloo in the Department of Fine Art and the Stratford Campus.

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2ND MENTORING DAY AT SHIFT

Lalya — Wed, 13 Nov 2013 10:38:37 +0000

Another great day of mentoring young creative graduates at the Shift programme!

Shift is an internship programme for young creatives, organised by Newcastle-based Studio Precept. It involves a wide variety of mentors from the industry, to advise the interns and give them practical skills through focused workshops.

Attaya director Lalya (well that’s me writing this post anyway, init) is one of the expert mentors recruited for the programme, where she’s holding a series of workshops and seminars about design for digital interactions in 3D physical space in general, and urban interaction design in particular.

This session was open to the public and ended with presentations of group projects, which ranged from interactive furniture to street art for the elderlies. Great fun!

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100 Things That Have Happened Today – Northern Design Festival

Lalya — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 15:08:52 +0000

(Instructions for the event held by Andrew Wilson on ‘creative uses of mobile phones in the arts and social sector’. The event is part of Attaya Projects’ showcase for Northern Design Festival, at B&D Studios.)

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Spotlight on Jonathan West – Northern Design Festival

Lalya — Sun, 13 Oct 2013 14:09:28 +0000

This Monday, it’s Jonathan West‘s turn to take over the spotlight at Attaya Projects showcase at Northern Design Festival! Jonathan is a Gateshead-based artist who subverts objects to create uncanny sculptures. He is interested in making technology perform tasks it was never meant to!

Jonathan will be showing the following pieces between 14-16th October:

Gigglebox, 2013 – sees the meeting of a fan motor, a laughter track and a feather set together in an infinite loop.

Untitled (Ponytail), 2013 – made of human hair and stretched PVC the piece is reminiscent of a hunter’s trophy.

Untitled (pink), 2013 – sees pure abstract form and a queer sensibility come together in a clinical mash-up.

Pop by to see his work as well as the rest of the showcase! We’ll also display some of the outcome of our DIY workshop from Saturday. Oh how much fun Saturday was!

Time: 14-16th October
Location: B&D Studios, 3rd Floor, Commercial Union House, Pilgrim Street, NE1 6QE Newcastle upon Tyne
Entrance: Free!

Find out more about Jonathan’s work at jonathanlloydwest.com

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