FORMAT24 Presents

Marking FORMAT’s 20th Anniversary, the FORMAT24 Presents Programme features six exhibitions taking place across Derby and the East Midlands.

Overview

In Derby’s Cultural Hub QUAD, the festival welcomes curator Peggy Sue Amison’s exciting exhibition Future Tense – Living the Future Now. Awarded the FORMAT23 Open Call award, this exhibition draws on the varied experiences of ten international artists to engage audiences in a space of frequencies that collectively communicate different channels of contemplation, considering new understandings of time, but also how image surface can be interpreted as communal space to be questioned and dissected. Alongside this exhibition, in QUAD’s Gallery Two, Jubilee City: Derby Punk in the 1970s is showcased. Drawing on the archive of local artist Aaron Williamson, whilst also incorporating ephemera and documents arising from a call-out to individuals who were active on Derby’s punk scene between 1976 – 1979. In QUAD’s Extra Gallery Spaces, the work of three UK based artists will be presented, selected from the Future Now open call-in partnership with LCB Depot, Leicester. 

Over at The Orangery in Derby’s Arboretum Park, see Supnaa: Dreams of Our Fathers, an exhibition by photographer Anand Chhabra which attempts to tell the story of his parents and their migration from India to the UK c1960s–to present day, and their hopes of a ‘new life’ together with early Punjabi migrants who arrived ‘en masse’ to the UK. This is a subject that remains largely untold photographically. 

Carrying on the program throughout the East Midlands – over in their neighboring city Leicester, two further exhibitions are held. At LCB Depot, local and international artists selected from the Future Now open call will be showcasing their works, and on Leicester’s famous Granby Street, the portraits of local city residents created by artist Khatun as a culmination of the Picturing High Streets Leicester’s Residency will be exhibited.