News
Become a Friend of The Foundation
We have a long way to travel. Why not join us along the way on this interesting journey? We would love to hear your stories, ideas, and memories of Josef Herman’s work; the life and times in which he lived; what his legacy means to Ystradgynlais or how it can benefit the town and the surrounding area. This information may be included in our new digital community archive, uploaded to Tate Britain’s website or used to inform future project activities. Benefits of becoming a Friend Our annual membership year starts in August. Benefits include: Regular newsletters and information on events by email Friends will be offered discounted rates to workshops and lectures and will also be invited to private views of exhibitions. Invitations to family events and celebrations The AGM where you have the right to be nominated for office and vote for officers Helping us to achieve our goals in supporting the future development of the Foundation The challenge is to make the Foundation sustainable and to increase community use and participation. Membership is just £5 for an individual or £10 for a family (2 adults and 2 children under 16) per year. We need your help and support, so why not join the Friends of the Josef Herman Arts Foundation Cymru today? Friends of Josef Herman Foundation 520.68 KB Friends Leaflet Cyfeillion Sefydliad Josef Herman 636.66 KB Ffurflen...
Print Residency at The Curwen Studio 2016
Farewell Rock The last coal miners of South Wales An exhibition of new work by artist Hilary Powell Preview 18:00 – 20:30, 28 July 2016 Exhibition open 29 July – 23 August 2016* The Welfare, Brecon Road, Ystradgynlais, SA9 1JJ The exhibition will be opened by Wayne Thomas, South Wales General Secretary, National Union of Mineworkers. The preview will include a short film and presentation by Hilary Powell. The last coal miners of South Wales emerge from a drift mine in the Upper Swansea Valley. Hilary Powell documents these workingmen and the landscape and culture that surround them in a series of printed portraits. Farewell Rock is the band of sandstone that lies below the coal measures. Once reached it signals ‘a farewell to riches’ and the end of coal – fitting as the last open cast mines in the region are mothballed and the colliery faces an uncertain future. The exhibited work was produced through the Josef Herman Art Foundation Cymru’s Print Residency at The Curwen Studio, where Josef Herman produced many of his print works. Josef Herman was a Polish emigrant who settled in and portrayed the then thriving mining town of Ystradgynlais in the 1950s. Herman’s journal, ‘Notes from a Welsh Diary’, became a starting point for Hilary to examine the very different contemporary landscape of industrial decline and recovery. When a miner is injured the presence of coal dust in the wound creates blue scars. They call it ‘being mapped.’ These portraits are also maps – layered coalfaces produced through the processes of stone and offset lithography and printed using coal dust – an apt...
Special Raffle
This Special Raffle of works by artists Valerie Ganz and Mike Jones will be drawn at the launch of the ‘Friends of Josef Herman Foundation’ on 16th October 2015 at the Welfare, Ystradgynlais. Tickets are £5 and on sale from the Foundation. ...
Eisteddfod 2015
Cyhoeddodd Mererid Hopwood mai Menna Angharad sydd wedi ennill Gwobr Josef Herman Dewis Y Bobl yn Eisteddfod Maldwyn a’r Gororau 2015. Mae’r disgrifiad o waith Menna Angharad yn y Lle Celf yn dweud ei bod yn creu ‘portreadau eiconig o wrthrychau digon cyffredin’. Yn ail roedd Jason Chart Davies am ei emwaith papur ac arian, ac yn drydydd roedd ffotograffydd dewi Glyn Jones. Rhoddwyd Mererid teyrnged i’r diweddar artist a noddwr Sefydliad Josef Herman, Osi Rhys Osmond wrth wneud y cyhoeddiad yn y Lle Celf ar y maes yn Meifod. Hilary Osmond a Mererid Hopwood...Project Assistant Job Opportunity
Required: Project Assistant (Clerical & Administrative) Introduction The Josef Herman Art Foundation Cymru (JHAFC) is a registered charity. It was founded in 2002 to encourage the public appreciation of the visual arts by people of all ages, and to honour the artist Josef Herman and his legacy. In 2015 the JHAFC is entering into a one year funded programme supported by Arts Council England and is seeking a Project Assistant to support the programme. The annual programme will include: Administrating a new Friends subscription service enabling individuals/families to join the Foundation and increasing awareness of a range of activities through regular online newsletters. A new 30-day Printmaking residency, offered to an emerging Welsh artist to support their professional development, offering a training space in a professional printmaking studio to develop a new range of work, resulting in an exhibition in spring 2016. A new touring exhibition programme, utilising our collection and education pack. A quarterly lecture programme engaging Welsh artists and creative professionals discussing their work and interests in relation to Josef Herman’s work, life and times. A young person’s arts summer school, engaging 2 artists and offering 2 weeks of artist-led activities over 10 half-day workshops in Summer 2016 and aimed at children between the ages of 10 and 18. Further development of our National Eisteddfod programme, with a display area and exhibition, incorporating our People’s Choice Award and a new Arts trail. A range of artist-led community workshops, aimed at families and including activities leading up to May Day in 2016 and engaging 2 artists for a total of 10 days. Workshops will be based at The...Project Manager Job Opportunity
Josef Herman Foundation Project Manager Required Introduction The Josef Herman Art Foundation Cymru (JHAFC) is a registered charity. It was founded in 2002 to encourage, through exhibitions, the public appreciation of the visual arts by people of all ages, and to honour the artist Josef Herman and his legacy. In 2015 the JHAFC is entering into a one year funded programme supported by Arts Council England and is seeking a Project Manager to manage the programme. Fees: An annual fee of £15,600 (estimated at £15.00 per hour to a maximum limit of 960 hours annually (approximately 20hours a week) is available over the term of the Contract to deliver the tasks as stated in the Contract. Programme: The annual programme will include: A new Friends subscription service enabling individuals/families to join the Foundation and increasing awareness of a range of activities through regular online newsletters. A new 30-day Printmaking residency, offered to an emerging Welsh artist to support their professional development, offering a training space in a professional printmaking studio to develop a new range of work, resulting in an exhibition in spring 2016. A new touring exhibition programme, utilising our collection and education pack. A quarterly lecture programme engaging Welsh artists and creative professionals discussing their work and interests in relation to Josef Herman’s work, life and times. A young person’s arts summer school, engaging 2 artists and offering 2 weeks of artist-led activities over 10 half-day workshops in Summer 2016 and aimed at children between the ages of 10 and 18. Further development of our National Eisteddfod programme, with a display area and exhibition, incorporating our People’s...Rabab Ghazoul – Mining Josef Herman Project Artist
On Sunday 12 July, internationally renowned artist Rabab Ghazoul presented a participatory open rehearsal of song followed by a performance with Welsh choirs at The Welfare, Ystradgynlais, which brought to life the work of Polish émigré artist Josef Herman. Ghazoul, who is currently representing Iraq at the Venice Biennale 2015, has worked with the Josef Herman Art Foundation Cymru, Tate’s online selection of Herman’s sketches, and community members and groups from Ystradgynlais and the surrounding area as part of Mining Josef Herman – a project exploring the work and legacy of Herman through archives and digital learning. Mining Josef Herman is part of the Archives and Access project led by Tate and supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund. Herman’s writing and his journals provide a striking commentary to his visual work. His observations about poverty, injustice, the lives of working people, the landscape, community and the human condition, resonate as powerfully today as they did sixty years ago. Rabab has been working with local groups to open up the visual world of Herman’s work through his writings. Herman once said of the miners of Ystradgynlais: “But now and again one of them would sing, holding his head up to the sun.” The project culminated in THEN THERE COMES A CHAOS OF THINGS – a participatory open rehearsal of song between 2-5pm and performance at 6pm on Sunday 12th July at The Welfare, Ystradgynlais, with local choirs Cor y Gyrlais Male Voice Choir & Cwmtawe Community School B# Choir. The performance explored specially written vocal scores based on Herman’s texts, with three generations of singers working together to bring Josef...
Schools Project 2015
Young artists inspired by Josef Herman and their local landscape Photo:Ffion Roberts Drakley A new exhibition of young people’s artwork inspired by the internationally renowned artist Josef Herman opened this week at the Welfare Ystradgynlais with a celebratory event. Pupils from schools in Neath Port Talbot, Powys, Swansea and Carmarthenshire came together on 24th June to mark their achievements over the past two months as part of the Josef Herman Schools Project 2015 and to see each other’s creative work on show, including a wide variety of art forms from paper craft and book making to portraiture and three dimensional work. The Josef Herman Schools Project has been an annual event since 2000 and it is led by the Josef Herman Art Foundation Cymru. The project places artists in schools to work with pupils to develop their own artistic responses to the life, times and work of Polish-émigré artist Josef Herman, who lived in Ystradgynlais from 1944 to 1955. Herman’s time in Ystradgynlais greatly influenced his work, which is now held in many major collections around the world, including Tate and Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales. As part of the project the young people walked in Herman’s footsteps by visiting Ystradgynlais and viewing and sketching the valley, chapels, houses and studios where he once lived and worked. They also visited the Foundation’s collection of Herman prints and paintings on display in the Welfare Ystradgynlais. Back in the classroom they worked with a project artist to research Herman’s archive on the Tate website, explore his artistic techniques in depth and make their own artworks based on what they had...
Sarah Rhys, Artist in Residence
Sarah Rhys’s residency is a research and development Arts Council Wales funded project. She has been exploring Ystradgynlais and the surrounding area responding to the place and landscape through a deep mapping, responding and creating interventions with drawings, writings, photography and installations. She has also been exploring the relationship between human and landscape a theme that ran strongly through Josef Herman’s work, and the notions of dislocation, place, belonging and ‘hiraeth’. Her Exhibition opening and artist’s talk will be on Saturday May 16th at 6.30pm at The Welfare Ystradgynlais SA9 1JJ. Everyone...
Eisteddfod 2015
Unwaith eto “Newyddion da a ddaeth i’n Bro” oherwydd bod Sefydliad Josef Herman Cymru, sydd â’i ganolfan yn Ystradgynlais, yn cyfranogi yn yr Eisteddfod Genedlaethol eleni eto. Cynhelir yr Eisteddfod ym Meifod, Canolbarth Cymru. Mae’r Sefydliad wedi cyfranogi bob blwyddyn ers 2008 gan gynnig gwobr o £500 i enillydd y gystadleuaeth “Dewis y Bobl” ym mhabell Celf a Chrefft yr Eisteddfod. Mae hanes diddorol tu hwnt i bob enillydd a phleserus iawn yw, i ni fel ymddiriedolwyr, gefnogi arlunwyr...Facebook Posts
Did you see the Sky Arts programme on Josef Herman tonight? Don't worry if you missed it, as it will be shown on the big screen at Welfare Ystradgynlais on WEDNESDAY 31st May at 7pm.
We are delighted that Michael Sheen will be joining us for this screening!
Tate Britain Great British Walks
Presented by Gus Casely-Hayford
Episode 4 - Michael Sheen & Josef Herman
Last night we had a lovely evening at the BAFTA screening of Tate Britain's Great British Walks. Looking at Josef Herman's work and how Ystradgynlais inspired him. Its on Sky Arts tonight at 9pm!
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Don't forget this episode on Tuesday May 23 about Josef Herman and watch the programme the Foundation helped with. See Michael Sheen in Ystradgynlais and the Welfare.
Great evening listening to Swansea archivist, Kim Collins, talk about the diverse communities in Swansea. The exhibition will be on display at the Welfare for the next few weeks!