Workshops – Antonio Roberts

Tag archives: Workshops

Theremin Day

27Apr10

For the last month or so the fizzPOP team and Mr Underwood have been planning the awesomely awesome Theremin Day that took place at fizzPOP on Saturday 24th April.

The day kicked off with an optical theremin building workshop, which produced some very interesting sounds. One person described the noises produced as “lil creatures… being tortured by having light shone on them“. Decide for yourself:

The circuitry for all of the theremin were the same, but the housing for the device made them all that more interesting. I think Julia’s Apple Theremin wins some kind of award for most healthy looking theremin! More photos from the day:

After all of the noises we did a frantic de, then reconstruction for the evening performance featuring 8Bit Pete, Mr Underwood and Ms Hypnotique (all totally real names).

First up, 8Bit Pete treated us all to his own Thingamagoop optical theremin and even invited earlier workshop attendees to join in the performance

Mr Underwood then treated us to a rather hypnotic rendition of Steve Reich’s Pendulum Music using optical theremin and torches:

It’s definitely worth watching the whole 10 minute performance!

Finally, world renowned theremin player Ms Hypnotique treated us to a short history of the theremin, improvised compositions and performances of a few classics, including that Dr Who theme tune

Nikki has a few good videos of the performance on her Vimeo channel

I think the day was really a great success and I can definitely see a future workshop taking place and I’d really like to see Pendulum music being performed again somewhere. Well done to all involved in making this event happen!

Next up, the fizzPOP residency at The Lombard Method

Filed under Blog| Tagged bleep, fizzpop, mr underwood, ms hypnotique, noises, theremin, theremin day, Workshops, yummy apples | 1 Comment

antonioroberts.com launched!

11Aug08

As you may or may not know I do a bit of community work and workshop work. I’d usually document this on this website but I felt it deviated from my personal artwork a bit and I consider the hellocatfood name to be my artist persona, so for that reason I set up www.antonioroberts.com. It focuses completely on my community and education work and hopefully gives that side of my work a more professional feel. Go have a look-see!

Filed under Blog| Tagged antonio roberts, Education, new website, teaching, Workshops | No Comments

Digital Play

09Jun08

I attended the Digital Play course run by Playtrain recently. Even though there’s only so much you can learn in a single-day course this course really did give me a lot of ideas on what to do with multimedia in the workshop environment.

I know that sometimes the idea of introducing computers into teaching can seem daunting! Computers are pretty unstable, so add children and pressure into the mix and it’s a potential recipe for disaster! This course really did show me that multimedia doesn’t have to be all that confusing and some of the simplest technology can have the greatest effect.

Here’s one of the pieces I produced:

It’s not fancy, but for children, and even the people attending the workshop it was really really fun, and I think that’s one of the more important things about education and learning.

Filed under Blog| Tagged animation, course, Education, multimedia, playtrain, training, Workshops | No Comments

Thanks and praise to Flying Start

08Jun08

Last week myself and others were invited to talk to someone from Ofsted about the Flying Start course. For those who don’t already know what it is, here’s the blurb:

An accredited training scheme for artists – working in any art form – who want to gain workshop planning and delivery skills and experience of community arts and participatory arts work.

The inspector was very clear to note that whilst she was from Ofested that this wasn’t actually an inspection. In the five years the course had been running it was identified as an example of good practice* and she was here to get feedback for their website from people who were on the course.

Overall it was really great to talk to her, but I think the general consensus is that it’s a crime that this course wont be carrying on as there is nothing quite like it anywhere else. Sure, you could attend the MA in Community Arts at Staffs Uni, but there’s only so much studying you can do before being thrown into the workshop delivery world. In the three months of the course you really do learn not only how to deliver a workshop, but also a bit about finance, networking, project planning and self promotion, which is something I feel university doesn’t cover enough.

The course is obviously needed, so if anyone from Birmingham City Council is reading this, sort it out and get Flying Start back!

*I may have got the actual terminology wrong, but you get the idea.

Filed under Blog| Tagged bcc, birmigham city council, ofsted, training, Workshops | No Comments

Soapbox

22Mar08

Something that I saw some time ago on the artsjobs mailing list but forgot to post. It’ll be great for workshop deliverers and anyone else involved in learning (perhaps you, Bobbie?):

Supported by Black Country Creative Partnerships: Soapbox is an informal space where creative practitioners who work in learning can meet up with each other to:

question, ponder, debate and wonder

get inspired, irritated, encouraged, creative

connect up, catch up, talk through what’s up and simply meet up

Soapbox is a space for creative practitioners who work in learning to share and learn from each other in an open and honest way. It’s a space to reflect upon our own creative thinking and practice. It’s about us doing something for ourselves and it will run for as long as it proves useful to sufficient numbers of us to keep it going.

To suss out if it’s something for you, come along to our first session on:

TUESDAY 8TH APRIL (6.00-8.00pm)
Atticus Bar, 113/114 Three Shire Oak Road,
Bearwood, Birmingham, B67 5BT (Google map)

This session will be started by Noel Dunne, freelance producer and creative agent who’ll be exploring the question: ‘Do we know our own value?’