“On the hill opposite are some great stone quarries. It is as though something tore the hill open and said “Here, you shall see not only smooth but the hard strong stuff that is inside too”’ Olive Schreiner

Haarlem Artspace is a multi functional artist-led space whose aim is to encourage practice and research into contemporary art created in a rural environment.
It offers dedicated studios for artists and writers in the inspiring and historic Grade II* listed Haarlem Mill building, situated in the town of Wirksworth, Derbyshire. There will also be flexible public spaces that will present an engaging and ambitious program of events and activities relating to landscape, the environment and ecology.

We’re looking for ambitious artists and writers, to further and develop their practices at Haarlem. They will be invited to participate in a program of exhibitions and events, which will explore and develop links with the Wirksworth Festival and the wider creative community. We will develop commissions, events, and a residency program, which will have on-going links with other studio groups, both national and international.Artists will be supported in the development of new work via a group critique program, optional tutoring, funding advice and support, alongside online representation.
Studio spaces are by application. To apply submit an expression of interest outlining why you’d like a space at Haarlem and how you would use it, include an artist statement, images and supporting links to: studios@haarlemartspace.co.uk

The Peak District is an area of outstanding natural beauty in the heart of England, and North Derbyshire. The Haarlem Mill building was the first ever coal powered mill significant in the Industrial revolution. Historic literary links include George Elliot, D.H.Lawrence, Daniel Defoe, Olive Schreiner, Eleanor Marx, and Friedrich Engels. Wirksworth is the setting for George Elliots fictional ‘Mill on the Floss’. Being restored to English Heritage standards, Haarlem Mill is a beautiful and inspiring place to work and develop artistic ideas
www.haarlemartspace.co.uk
studios@haarlemartspace.co.uk

Rhubaba Gallery and Studio is an artist-run organisation in Edinburgh that provides studio space for currently nineteen artists and an annual programme of exhibitions and events.

Rhubaba was founded in 2009 as a communal studio and project space. Established in response to a perceived gap in appropriate studio provision for recent graduates and through the desire to create a space dedicated to both the production and presentation of contemporary art, Rhubaba initially housed ten recent graduates from Edinburgh College of Art. During our first year we organised a series of exhibitions in temporary spaces around the city as well as with host venues further afield.

Rhubaba has continued to develop the programme and moved to Leith in 2010 to accommodate more studios and a permanent gallery space.

We are committed to generating a supportive workspace and a dynamic platform for local and international artists. Rhubaba aims to give early-career artists the opportunity to produce new work in a discursive environment, work collaboratively with other artist-led initiatives and explore wider debates in contemporary art, bringing exciting and challenging works to Scotland.

S1 Artspace is an artist-led organisation presenting an annual programme of contemporary exhibitions, commissions, screenings and events. S1 also provides studio space for contemporary artists at varying stages in their careers, from recent graduates to established artists working at an international level.

Founded in 1995 by a group of Sheffield-based artists seeking to create a sustainable studio environment in Sheffield City Centre, S1 Artspace has become a nationally recognised organisation, renowned for providing a platform for experimentation and for supporting the development of new work in a wide variety of media through artists’ residencies, commissions, and an annual studio holders’ exhibition. Over its sixteen year history, S1 Artspace has presented work by over 300 artists and accommodated over 100 artists.

In 2010, S1 Artspace moved to new larger premises to support a growing commitment to its international exhibition programme.

Through a dynamic and challenging gallery programme that brings together local, national and international artists, we aim to showcase the most exciting, innovative exhibitions and events that we can, working with the most outstanding recent graduates and emerging artists as well as more established practitioners and other artist-led initiatives.

The Royal Standard is dedicated to promoting exchange, dialogue and experimentation, providing a supportive and critically engaged environment to work in, and acting as a social hub for our studio membership of over 40 artists, as well as the wider cultural community. Our multi-purpose project space offers a testing ground for artists to push their ideas in new directions, and a setting for more spontaneous events and activity happening independently to the main gallery programme.

The Royal Standard was established in 2006 by four Liverpool-based artists in response to the need for a new artist-led organisation that would operate somewhere in between the city’s grass-roots DIY initiatives and the more established arts institutions. Originally housed in a former pub in Toxteth, in 2008 The Royal Standard undertook an ambitious relocation and expansion into a larger industrial space on the Northern periphery of the city centre, relaunching to acclaim for the 2008 Liverpool Biennial.

The Royal Standard is currently run by a team of four to six directors, with a new team appointed on a two-year rolling basis, enabling the organisation’s ideas and energy to remain fresh and continuing to offer opportunities to new groups of emerging artists.

"(...) The first part of this organisation’s name comes from its previous location – the Woodmill building, rundown former council offices in Bermondsey, southeast London, that, from 2009 to 2011, was home to a hundred artists, designers and filmmakers. (...)

During a short period of itinerancy, enforced by the end of the tenancy, the six original studio holders – Naomi Pearce, Stuart Middleton, Anna Baker, Angharad E. P. Williams, Richard Sides and Alastair Frazer – in liaison with their newly founded board of trustees spent many hours working out what the Woodmill should be (as well as searching for a new location – no former primary school, warehouse or empty retail unit was left unturned). The upshot of this was a decision to build the idea of constant flux into the organisation’s character. This resolution was not just a pragmatic one, but also one that resonated with the Woodmill’s desire for perpetual reinvention, for avoiding its own establishment and for eschewing any desire to become an institution with permanent footings. Happily ensconced, for now, in a former doctor’s surgery (which supplies the ‘GP’ part of the new name: ‘general practice’) – in which the old waiting room doubles as a shared studio and temporary exhibition and screening space (dinners, gigs and workshops are on the cards), with each of the doctor’s offices becoming private work digs, including a gratis residency studio – the Woodmill will move on again after one year. And it will voluntarily repeat this annual migration for the foreseeable future. Each time it moves, the Woodmill will evolve: it may become more popular; it will engage with more people; it may get written about more; the gallery footfall may increase; the space it occupies may be larger; it may move somewhere smaller. But by the nature of its instability, it won’t put down roots. It won’t be forced into an upward trajectory. Which, in a world dominated by the socioeconomic buzzwords of ‘growth’ and ‘development’, where artists are categorised as failures if they don’t move from the ‘emerging’ label to ‘midcareer’ or ‘established’, is a pretty grand ideal."

Oliver Basciano (2012), "Off-Space no 9: The Woodmill, London - Entering the Establishment"
online available at: http://artreview.com/features/off_space_no_9_woodmill_london/
(accessed 13 Sep 2013)