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BasementArtsProject is a concept, a venue and a way of life. We believe that art and culture should be built within communities and nurtured by those who will be most affected by its presence.
Calcify. Ruby Jean Waterhouse (2023)
Our programme deals with the removal of barriers within the community and is based around five pillars: Art as Entertainment, Education, Engagement & Employment and ultimately Empowerment.
Community Launch Day for Jacob’s ladder / ‘The Corner’ Pocket Sculpture Park (2022)
We are a phenomenological project in which lived experience is central to everything. We believe that acceptance and effective learning happens when people do not realise that it is happening.
Workshops ‘On The Corner’: Community stone carving workshops on ‘The Corner’ Pocket Sculpture Park (2023)
We also provide artists at the beginning of their career with exhibitions, experiences, opportunities, mentoring, and assistance in achieving their visions.
Some thoughts that we live by here at Basement…
“All cultures have, furthermore, an economic, social, and political base, and no culture can continue to live if its political destiny is not in its own hands. “Any political and social regime which destroys the self-determination of a people also destroys the creative power of that people.” When this has happened the culture of that people has been destroyed. And it is simply not true that the colonizers bring to the colonized a new culture to replace the old one, a culture not being something given to a people, but, on the contrary and by definition, something that they make themselves. Nor is it, in any case, in the nature of colonialism to wish or to permit such a degree of well-being among the colonized. The well-being of the colonized is desirable only insofar as this well-being enriches the dominant country, the necessity of which is simply to remain dominant.”
“The point of departure for a cultural policy in this sense is not a paternalistic welfare work, which attempts to bring culture to the man, which answers to the norm of the top, but a policy that is directed towards the activation of the culture at the grassroots of society: discovery of its own identity, participation therein, communication.”
Community Carving
Praise for BasementArtsProject . . .
“Hey Bruce,
I’m back in Budapest, but I wanted you to know I came by the pocket sculpture park to see Jacob’s Ladder.
I was really, really amazed at what you all pulled off, especially since last time I was there it was still in the planning stages.
I came by early Saturday morning, so I didn’t want to bother you and your family at home.
Anyway, my visit there was a highlight of my trip.
Again, what a fantastic realization of the concept you were planning.
Afterwards, I even went by the Leeds Minster just to see their Jacob’s Ladder glass etching that I found on my last trip there.
Keep up the good work”
“. . . this little-known gallery has become a cornerstone of the Leeds art scene through its display of weird and wonderful, solo and group exhibitions.”
“We are very privileged to have Basement Arts in South Leeds. You cannot imagine that it exists in what looks like an ordinary house in a area such as this. Very ambitious plans for the Jacob Ladder sculpture seemed unbelievable when I first heard about them. A sculpture here , not in town ? Interesting reading in the article of all the different kinds of people who have watched this project progress. Many other people would love to have had an opportunity to see any sculpture progressing. The experience has touched people’s lives in a way that no-one can predict. Thank you to all involved , changing lives in a different way.”
“Just to say, I love getting your email
I think what you’re doing is sensational. I’m sure it’s exhausting but knowing BasementArtsProject is alive and kicking makes my life better.”
“The lunchtime conversation was great,really friendly and welcoming. I really learnt a lot from the artist Dominic [Hopkinson],his passion really shone through. Such a gem of a place in Beeston,with such a fantastic concept, we are so lucky!”
“Thank you very much for the tour round and explanation of the Paul Walsh exhibition which I found both moving and thought provoking.
I think it is an excellent exhibition which works very well in the special atmosphere of BasementArtsProject .”
“Great space to present and see art; this long running project showcases local, national and international artists. Part of Leeds’ long artist history, this interesting venue is curated by someone who actually cares about creative expression, as a host who supports the artist vision.”
Loane Bobillier: Squaring The Circle (March 2023)
Paul Walsh: Mellifluous Arcana (March 2019)
Lou Hazelwood: Landscapes of The (Un)known (March 2020)
Michael Borkowsky & Emilie Telese: Desire & Alchemy (October 2018)
Sharon McDonagh: Resonate (2021)
ABOUT . . .
When BasementArtsProject first threw the kitchen door open to the public in April 2011 we got a big surprise; visitors.
Kimbal Quist Bumstead: This Is Our House (April 2011)
South Leeds is an area of major deprivation, economically in the lowest 1% of the country. It is low on aspiration with a limited take-up of places in further and higher education.
The area has many issues around homelessness, drug abuse, alcoholism and anti-social behaviour. BasementArtsProject was an experiment to see who from the local community would take up the offer of art events if they were provided.
With a local audience of 40% from the outset (60% wider art audience) the naysayers who said that there was no appetite were proved wrong. Ever since this point, BasementArtsProject has gone from strength-to-strength, widening the scale and scope of our projects for both artists and community alike.
Our work has spilled out of the kitchen door into the community via community centres, schools and the creation of ‘The Corner’ Pocket Sculpture Park.
Installing the ‘Have You Left Yet?’ exhibition by the Slit Collective; a group of recent graduates from University of Leeds and Leeds Arts University
At first, using the basement of a terraced property was a practical solution, but over the years it has become the cornerstone and foundation of an expanding practice that thrives through its interactions. Exhibiting at BasementArtsProject has become, mostly by chaotic accident, more than a gallery experience, it is about becoming part of a family, a real one that resides in and around a permanent art space. It is this approach that has allowed people without any prior knowledge of the arts to engage with our experimental programme of exhibitions, events and workshops.
In a non-judgemental, non-hierarchical space where people can talk about anything without fear or favour, the opinions expressed on art and a wide variety of subjects, are much more candid than in the usual white walled environment.
Dominic Hopkinson: A Study of Aperiodic Tiling with special reference to the 3rd dimension (April 2016)
The pandemic lockdowns of 2020/21 threw into stark relief the precarity of art engagement in areas like South Leeds.
Poverty is a massive barrier to people when it comes to cultural offerings, and a large proportion of our marginalised community does not access the art of the wider city.
Whilst the art-aware section of our audience maintained their communication with us via online projects during lockdown, the local audience lost contact as they generally do not access art via the internet.
Upon re-opening, our local audience had been reduced to one person. Everyone who came to that first post-lockdown exhibition came from the online art audience. The one thing that changed this situation was the completion of a project begun in the year before lockdown.
Jacob’s Ladder by Artist/Sculptor Keith Ackerman
This work is the centrepiece of a piece of abandoned land that BasementArtsProject has reclaimed, rejuvenated and recycled into ‘The Corner’ Pocket Sculpture Park
Jacob’s Ladder is a sculpture that BasementArtsProject had commissioned from the artist Keith Ackerman as part of the Yorkshire Sculpture International 2019.
After lockdown we were able to move the stone to its location opposite ‘The Basement’ on Tunstall Road, where we worked on it for an average of two days a week for a year. The land had previously been abandoned and had become a haven for drug abusers, fly tippers and alcoholics.
In our time spent working in the public realm we removed more than a tonne of rubbish and hazardous materials and were able to engage with the public about the process of creating a public sculpture. This project led to a resurgence of our local audience attending exhibitions at BasementArtsProject.
Since getting the 9ft, 7 tonne stone sculpture upright in July 2022 we have landscaped around it and the anti-social behaviour issues have never since returned. We have also used the land to run concerts and stone carving workshops. With our assistance the community have learnt some of the basics of direct carving in stone and over the course of a year have created their own benches in the process.
Samela Otoviç: Counterplay (July 2015)