Mike Nelson: M6, @eprjcts until 9 March

With a two foot wide path around the outside of a huge six foot high concrete dais dominating the main gallery space of the Heath Mill Lane building, it’s easy to be intimidated by M6, the Mike Nelson commission, at first experience.

Timur Novikov, 13 February – 21 April @ikongallery

This week sees Ikon launch the UK’s most comprehensive collection to date of the definitive works of Russia’s arguably most evocative contemporary artist, Timur Novikov. Until the end of April, Ikon plays host to the exhibition, co-curated by his step-daughter, mapping not only Novikov’s progressive career and artistic vision from the 1980s right through to his final works in the Noughties, but also tracing him and his contemporaries’ political and artistic ideologies, alongside visible representations of his decline in health.

International Project Space July screenings

A series of screenings accompanying Redmond Entwistle’s exhibition at International Project Space will present his previous feature Monuments (2010) alongside a number of seminal 16mm films which have informed his approach to filmmaking.

ALLOTMENT @mac_birmingham until 9th September

Far from being the favourite pastime of British granddads, of which Alan Titchmarsh is the poster boy, the ALLOTMENT project is a new initiative from mac designed to cultivate diverse, young artistic talent of all guises and help them flourish.

Area Culture Guide – February issue

February edition of Area Culture Guide is here and features:
Exhibitions at Ikon Gallery, The Public, Mead, New Art Gallery Walsall
Features: Made in the Jewellery Quarter, Hidden City, Valentines
Travel: Sligo and Dublin
Food: Kinnaree Thai
Fashion & Shopping: Sandford Jr, Valentine Gift Guide
Competitions: Lomography, Crufts

Read your issue here and look out for it in shops, bars, restaurants, hotels and visitor centres.

FOUR TRAGIC TALES ends 22/01/12 at mac

This is your last few days to see Stewart Easton’s digital prints that have been hand embroidered at mac, Birmingham. The show, curated by Trevor Pitt, closes on Sunday the 22nd January.

All the works in the exhibition derive from a set of illustrated picture-book stories by Easton, written about a group of fictional characters who inhabit a creative community. Each of The Four Tragic Tales is set in a mythical place where the main characters are blessed with youth, beauty and creativity, spending their days in the pursuit of music, theatre and the arts, until war descends upon them and brings a premature end to all.

Kismet Cafe & Arts Hub

Kismet is a cafe and arts hub project located in the heart of Digbeth Eastside, at club PST. Providing a space for emerging talent, the cafe allows artists to develop and flourish in their careers. Expressing creativity through a range of exhibitions such as family workshops, networking, music and film, each artist will display and sell their work within the cafe itself.

48SHEET – Collage Party 12.11.11

In April 2012 48SHEET will launch utilising 100 billboards across Birmingham to exhibit international, national and regional artists work within a unique urban exhibition. Before then, and leading up to the launch, a set of events and collaborations are taking place.

Happening this weekend is ‘Collage Party and artist talk by Elizabeth Rowe‘, 12-4pm, Saturday 12^th November 2011, Unit B, Park Street, Digbeth (opposite Selfridges).

Turn up. Tune in. Cut out. Collage Party invites you to cut up and stick down. Collage Party is about having conversations while you are making.

Materials are provided. DJ-ing is provided. Bring your own refreshments.

For more information: www.ec-arts.com follow @EC_Arts 

Dead Space?

A quiet corner of the soon-to-be demolished Birmingham Central Library will be transformed in a series of exhibitions conceived and curated by Claire Farrell of EC Arts called Dead Space?

Fierce and Flatpack

Various venues throughout Birmingham – 22 – 27 March