The Fitzwilliam Museum has been selected for the national Museums at Night Connect! competition to win an evening with contemporary artist Alinah Azadeh.
Museums at Night takes place from Wednesday 13 - Saturday 16 May and Friday 30 - Saturday 31 October 2015. It is a biannual UK-wide festival where galleries and heritage sites throw open their doors after hours and put on special evening events. The Fitzwilliam is taking part this year on Fridays 15 May and 30 October.
For this October’s event 29 venues across the UK are all competing to win an evening with one of 6 artists: Luke Jerram, Davy & Kristin McGuire, Pure Evil, Yinka Shonibare, Gillian Wearing and Alinah Azadeh - with members of the public deciding upon the placement of artists by voting online.
The Fitzwilliam is 1 of 5 venues hoping to work with Alinah Azadeh. The successful venue will get a special art intervention on the theme of random acts of generosity. Working in a variety of mediums, from sculpture to performance art, Alinah’s creations involve the public in acts of gift, ritual and playful exchange. Her works are rooted in the disclosure of personal experiences. Linking to this, the Fitzwilliam will get the public to share their personal responses to works of art in the Museum. These could be a memory about a visit, a personal response, a piece of creative writing or poetry, or an artwork.
These creative gifts would be shared publicly at the October Museums at Night event and worked into Alinah’s art intervention. There will also be a video booth on the evening where visitors can share their own feelings and thoughts about art or history.
To help the Fitzwilliam make their proposal a reality, people voted for the Museum to win Alinah Azadeh online.
Voting begins at 11am on Friday 1 May and will stay open until Saturday 16 May.