hullywoodicons

Busy day tuesday…

| Quentin Budworth

The day started well with a meeting and great coffee with the irrepressible Freddie Garland. Plans are afoot to bring the Hullywood Icons to life in the autumn, then Thieving Harry’s near the Marina for a cuppa, chance meeting with the remarkable John Moss who runs C4DI and is on the board for City of Culture, chatting about all things 2017, the spirit of Hull, secularism in the middle east, cycling and the press coverage for the Made in Hull event. Message received from Hullywood Tweeter Emma Palmer about feature on the I website, talk  scheduled for 1-30.

Meet up with Darren Squires to talk about the ‘Iconoclast’ Cocktail for the opening event, we do Darren’s photo shoot, then on into town to see the blade, quick meeting at the BBC, then a quick dash to PC world interrupted by 2 phone interviews. The scheduled one for I website and the Withernsea Gazette polar opposites of the media spectrum in terms of outlook and audience. Give up on finding a little take around computer as I have to get back to Queens Gardens to photograph Richard Vergette a playwright and actor who I was at college with many moons ago.

Back to Beverley to babysit my 2 year old grandson Azrael for a couple of hours, chill out watching CBeebies, thankful that my phone has died hours ago. This is just a normal day in Hullywood.

Pictured below the ‘Iconclast’ cocktail created by Darren Squires for the Hullywood Exhibition Opening event on Febuary 17th at Hip Gallery book your tickets here:
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Feedback for Hullywood Icons

| Quentin Budworth

visitors-book

I’m asking for feedback and comments for the website and evaluation work for the Hullywood Icons. Please comment on the online, projection and participation elements of the project. Comments can be long or short. If you are a Hullywood Icon and would like to say how your involvement in the project has been that would also be lovely. If you want to comment on how I worked with you as an artist that would also be appreciated. Emails to quentinbudworth@yahoo.com or comment on this blog post.

Trainspotting

| Quentin Budworth

The door opens to a flat in a state of great disrepair near Pearson Park, I am greeted by a smiling Sarah Jayne Curry who says I’ve been playing with coffee, her arms are stained brown with it, we go upstairs and make this picture …

bazsarah_trainspottingfinal
Trainspotting is a 1996 British black comedy drama film directed by Danny Boyle, and starring Ewan McGregor, Ewen Bremner, Jonny Lee Miller, Kevin McKidd, Robert Carlyle and Kelly Macdonald in her acting debut. Based on the novel of the same name by Irvine Welsh, the film was released in the United Kingdom on 23 February 1996.

The Academy Award nominated screenplay by John Hodge follows a group of heroin addicts in a late 1980s economically depressed area of Edinburgh and their passage through life. Beyond drug addiction, other themes in the film are exploration of the urban poverty and squalor in “culturally rich” Edinburgh.

The film has been ranked 10th by the British Film Institute (BFI) in its list of Top 100 British films of all time. In 2004 the film was voted the best Scottish film of all time in a general public poll.

With thanks to Barry Weldon for his digital edit on the final image.

 

 

Today we are in the Daily Telegraph

| Quentin Budworth

Hull turns to Hullywood as iconic film scenes recreated on Humber

Jim Wardlaw as Tom Hanks in Castaway for Hullywood
Jim Wardlaw as Tom Hanks in Castaway CREDIT: QUENTIN BUDWORTH

 

 

It may lack the glamour and sunshine of Los Angeles, but that has not stopped hardy Hull residents using the city’s landmarks to recreate famous movie scenes in celebration of its 2017 status as UK City of Culture.

Braving biting North Sea winds rather than paparazzi, local film buffs have temporarily turned the Yorkshire port into Hullywood.

Well known scenes recreated for the Hullywood Icons project include Tom Hanks appearance in the film Castaway recreated under the Humber Bridge by Jim Wardlaw.

Quentin Budworth, the photographer behind the project, said: “Poor old Jim, it was freezing on the day we did the shoot.”

'Ursula Andress' in hte shadow of the Humber Bridge
The celebrated arrival of Ursula Andress in Dr No – recreated in the shadow of the Humber Bridge CREDIT: QUENTIN BUDWORTH

Other pictures include a recreation of Ursula Andress’ bikini-clad emergence from the balmy waters of the Caribbean, transplanted to Hessle Foreshore on the banks of the estuary.

A huge firework display and the opening of a city-wide installation signalled the start of Hull’s tenure as UK City of Culture on New Year’s Day.

Lucy Joy as Ann Darrow (Fay Wray) in a recreation of King Kong for the Hullywood Icons project
Lucy Joy as Ann Darrow (Fay Wray) in a recreation of King Kong for the Hullywood Icons project CREDIT: QUENTIN BUDWORTH

Organisers of the hundreds of events planned for Hull in 2017 have said they are ready to welcome visitors from around the world as well as include all of the Yorkshire city’s 250,000 residents saying: “The stage is set, we’re ready for showtime”.

Hull is the second city to be given UK City Culture status, following Derry-Londonderry in 2013.

The city was selected in 2013 amid some surprise, from a shortlist which included Dundee, Leicester and Swansea Bay.

Organisers of Hull 2017 and local politicians have explicitly linked the cultural plans for the year with the economic transformation of the city, symbolised by the £300 million investment by German tech firm Siemens in an offshore wind manufacturing plant at Alexandra Dock.

Stephen Brady, council leader, has said more than £1bn of investment has flowed into the city since the UK City of Culture announcement, including £100m of capital investment in the cultural and visitor infrastructure.

Day 3 of Projections Silver Street

| Quentin Budworth

The crowds were amazing, we had a fantastic and enthusiastic response. We couldn’t access the first floor offices to draw the curtains so we had some gaps in the projection surfaces but we’re hoping we can remedy this tomorrow. We want it to be brilliant and will relocate if we can’t draw the curtains. This is after all is Hullywood and stars must shine!

Zebedee Budworth’s musical ‘Score of Scores’ had people dancing in the street not a small thing on New Years Day and opening night… Pete Massey Director, Yorkshire & The Humber at the Arts Council  mentioned the music as being fantastic.

At 4.pm on New years Day I released the Hullywood Icons film into the Twittersphere and Facebook realms with a digital release.

At 4:21 The Hull Daily Mail shared it on their website. You can read the article and see the film here . Please note the article incorrectly states that there are 40 Hullywood icons there are in fact over 120.

At 11:42 the Hullywood film release tweet was retweeted and the Hullywood Icons film was shared by Darren Henley Chief Executive of the Arts Council Arts Council leaving me feeling deeply honoured and supported. Delighted he is a Hullywood Icons fan.

Hurray for Hullywood Yorkshire Post Boxing Day Article By Alexandra Wood

| Quentin Budworth

Here is the Boxing Day Article By Alex Wood  quoted in full there is a also a link to the online version as well.

Stars of the screen are recreated as Hull looks set to be on a roll with City of Culture in the spotlight’

Project says hooray for Hullywood!

If Ursula Andress had surfaced in Hull…

BY the rocky Khyber Pass in East Park on a dank December day, Richard Hall is stripping off to become Wolverine – the mutant superhero of Marvel Comics. ADVERTISING inRead invented by Teads Suitably muscled he looks the part, along with a set of rapier-like claws – made out of cereal boxes. Recreating The Wild One on Hessle Road Mr Hall admits to being nervous, having in earlier life, struggled with his body image. But after the quickest of shoots – photographer Quentin Budworth has to rush off and meet “Marilyn Monroe” in under half an hour – he is glowing. “I feel a real weight lifted off,” he says. Budworth’s delightfully quirky Hullywood Icons project will be a highlight of the opening event to UK City of Culture 2017. A runaway success, the artist started out with the intention of inviting a few dozen people to dress up as their favourite Hollywood characters, against instantly recognisable city landmarks. But the calls kept coming in, and he now looks to top 100, with over 300 people, adults and kids, taking part. There’s been everything from the 37-year-old mother-of-two recreating the iconic moment in film history when Ursula Andress stepped out of the water in Dr No – except she was in front of the Humber Bridge – to a leather-clad mob (The Wild Ones) doing their best to look menacing outside Rayners pub on Hessle Road. “Marilyn Monroe” is Lucy Lines, looking splendid in a plunging halterneck dress and silver stilettos, who comes with partner Mike, who admits he “normally stands in the corner quietly watching.” The shoot in Kingston Square is for The Seven Year Itch – a cinch for blonde Ms Lines, who does vintage pin up modelling as a sideline – while Mike plays the part of Tim Ewell. Ms Lins said: “We’ve had a naff 2016, I think Hull really needs to celebrate 2017. I’m a massive fan. Quentin has given an opportunity for people to take part, you don’t get a chance to do that every day.” As part of the seven-day opening event, which starts on January 1, called Made In Hull, Budworth will be touring Hessle Road and Spring Bank in a Land Rover projecting the images against buildings to a specially composed Score of Scores, before coming back into the city centre for the last hour. To me, it seems the project has shades of a dressing game, rather like the cartoon Mr Benn. In this case people meet Budworth, briefly discuss how they want to pose, there’s a short adventure – the posing in the park certainly takes the dogwalkers by surprise – before they reenter their ordinary lives. Budworth said: “The idea was I wanted to use Hull as a playground and play with the people of Hull and this was a good way of doing it. “This is showbiz, creative and fun – people instantly see what they get from it. “I really want it to come from them. I want them to take ownership of it. It is a co-authored piece. It is not wrapped up in art speak. It is a dead simple concept.” Budworth discovered what it was like to be on the other side of the camera when he appeared as The Hunchback of Notre Dame (medieval costume, pointy shoes, hump made from rucked up woolly jumper) at the city’s Holy Trinity Church, the only long shot in the whole sequence.“It was a bit weird, but good,” he said. Later in January, Budworth is taking the Icons to Beverley Minster, St Mary’s and the Guildhall, and after that to Bridlington. He is having an exhibition from February 7 to April 2 at the Hull International Photography Gallery in Princes Quay, and there will be a print-on-demand book. For more visit hullywoodicons.com.

Read more at: http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/what-s-on/cinema/hooray-for-hullywood-1-8303464

Close Encounters of the Third Kind

| Quentin Budworth

Doug Peters asked me if he could recreate a scene from Close Encounters of the Third Kind and play one of the aliens, only briefly glimpsed at the end of the film he’s very poorly so it took a tremendous effort on his part to don the mask and walk into his garden but the results I think are well worth it.
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Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a 1977 American science fiction film written and directed by Steven Spielberg, and starring Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, Bob Balaban, and Cary Guffey. It tells the story of Roy Neary, an everyday blue-collar worker in Indiana, whose life changes after an encounter with an unidentified flying object (UFO).