Playworld

25 July–21 September 2014

NN, Number Nine Guildhall Road, Northampton, NN1 1DP

Opening night: 25 July 2014, 6pm.

Playworld is a group exhibition featuring artists working with roller derby, football, other sports, games and their subcultures. Sports and pursuits have rules that govern them, becoming their own microcosms, but the cultures spawned by them bleed out into the rest of reality.

Roller derby encourages empowering alter egos through skate names and personas. The real world is left outside; all that matters is what happens on the track. Ellie Harrison (aka Ch£apSkate), an artist and skater with Glasgow Roller Derby, established the National Museum of Roller Derby (NMRD) during her residency at Glasgow Women's Library in 2012. The two Northamptonshire roller derby leagues, the Shoetown Slayers and Vendetta Vixens, have helped select the exhibits from the NMRD as well as contributing their own items. Many of the exhibits illustrate the grass roots and creative nature of the sport and the impact it has had on the lives of the skaters.

Jamie Shovlin's new body of work follows the Leicestershire Under 16s football team, the Anstey Swifts. NN will be screening Shovlin’s first film from this, his new series. Phillip Marsden, meanwhile, turns computer games from his youth into the subject matter for tattoo art. Zelda, Streetfighter and Super Mario all feature in his ink drawings.

Role Playing Games are being created during this exhibition, in which players adhere to their internal logic. Entire worlds with complex infrastructure and altered metaphysics exist through shared consent. Other games and sports will also be present in the show.

Opening night: Friday 25 July 2014, 6pm–8pm. All welcome.

Opening times:

Wednesday–Saturday 11am–6pm

Sunday 2pm–5pm

T: 01604 638944

E: info@nncontemporaryart.org

W: www.nncontemporaryart.org