Visual Artist Tanya Raabe makes work around the theme of body image. Her blog concentrates on 'Revealing Culture: HeadOn' - an artwork and piece of research exploring identity, disability culture, in contemporary portraiture and the nude.

EXTRA EXTRA! Live Portrait sitting Tate Modern

8 September 2011

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I Know you've been missing me on DAO! Been busy Launching the exhibition at solihull arts complex that went really well......everyone is loving the artworks. hope youve had time to take a peek. the whole project is on its own blog. http://revealingcultureheadon.wordpress.com/ and just updated my website with lots of great new films and artworks on from the project. Ceck it out too. http://www.tanyaraabe.co.uk/headon.html If you want to catchup on my work spanning the last 20 yrs...

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Revealing Culture:HeadOn - exhibition coming soon

9 May 2011

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Revealing Culture: HeadOn – Portraits of the Untold My new and exciting, formidable collection of contemporary portraits of distinguished characters from an ever evolving Disability Culture will be launched at Solihull Arts Complex from 27th June -13th August 2011 You will finally get to see the fruits of my brushstrokes and paint as these portraits have emerged dressed and nude, from the enigmatic portal portrait happenings in Tate Modern, Tate Liverpool and Wolverhampton Art Gallery....

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Tanya on her recent successes... and Raspberry Ripple

4 February 2011

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I'm totally absorbed by my paintings in my studio, just now, thinking, eating and living colour in lucious oils good enough to eat. Since Christmas I've worked on eight of the new portraits and I'm getting quite excited with the results while getting addicted to Radio 4's Womans Hour, which is the next media show that I'm aspiring to be on. I'm addicted to the afternoon plays and You and Yours with Peter Wight who I would like to paint. Last November he received an Ability Media...

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DaDaFest International 2010 portraits and more...

6 December 2010

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I've just had the craziest of times lately... what with doing a live portrait sitting of Sir William Laurence in Wolverhampton art Gallery... and it being filmed by Art Council England as a showcase study soon to be posted on the ACE website. Then being interviewed on BBC's The Culture Show by Mat Fraser posing nude as I created a paint-drawing of him... to being awarded an Ability Media International award 2010 in the Visual Arts... where is it all going? Let me start with Sir William's...

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Liz Carr poses for Tanya Raabe as part of Revealing Culture at Tate Liverpool

19 October 2010

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Liz Carr was a brilliant sitter and had great stories to tell about her travels around the world, her ever entertaining life, her family and her wedding plans for this November... good look girl... looking forward to hearing a million and one funny stories... Liz said this about her portrait sitting at Tate Liverpool: "Tanya dragged me up to the Tate Liverpool to do my portrait. As someone who now lives in London, this was initially a little annoying, but as I sat there and Tanya began to...

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Tanya Raabe makes some more paintings... Revealing Culture: HeadOn

29 July 2010

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Its still all go in the world of Revealing Culture HeadOn... now where have I got up to. Well... the charismatic Tom Shakespeare sat for his portrait in Tate Modern earlier this month and what a great day it was. When we opened the doors for the public, they came in waves joining us in strange, sometimes challenging conversations about how we manage life, pain and struggle. This lead to more artistic debates about composition, line, colour and structure... It was quite surreal at times as we...

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Tanya Raabe has been running around the country with Paint!!!

8 June 2010

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I know I've been amiss and not keeping you all up to date with my Revealing Culture expeditions... well I've been trying to slow down with my roaming around the country running this and that workshop... it just keeps on going... ha... loving it!!!!! Well I am settling into some serious painting in between running Life Drawing sessions in Manchester with Full Circle Arts and in Shrewsbury with DASh. The Nude: Re:Dressed was a life drawing day exploring the notion and composition of a...

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Tanya Raabe animates some drawings from the tour of Fittings and talks some more about Revealing Culture

22 April 2010

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The Making of 'Raspberry The Rehearsal', an animation made out of the drawings and sounds of the rehearsal, is finished and now on YouTube... I'm so getting into this techi netting think!!! This artwork is touring with Raspberry by Fittings NOW....so book your tickets .....its a fab show! After sleeping for a few days and regaining my youthfull looks.... mmm... I'm touring with the show and running workshops on the themes of Raspberry, Perfection and Perfectability... which one are you? Look...

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Tanya Raabe is looking for your ‘Public’s Choice' portrait to be made during DaDa International 2010.

13 April 2010

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Vote for your ‘Public’s Choice' portrait to be created by me in a public sitting in Tate Modern during DaDa International 2010. Revealing Culture:HeadOn is an artwork and piece of research exploring identity, body image and disability culture, in contemporary portraiture and the nude. I am delving into public art collections on display in Tate Liverpool and Tate Modern to devise a visionary portrait of disability culture, while creating ten new portraits of disabled cultural...

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Tanya Raabe blogs her first rehearsal with Raspberry - the new production from Fittings Multimedia Arts

27 March 2010

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As associate artist in residence I've just spent a fascinating four days watching and drawing the rehearsal of 'Raspberry' - a co-production between Fittings Multimedia Arts, Sounds of Progress and the Tron Theatre, Glasgow. "'Oi Oi! In a small wee town where tin was shaped and forged, a blacksmith had a daughter not quite the trim. Rita was a bit different." "Now as far as the blacksmith was concerned this was a cosmic joke too far, so he set about changing things. Coz tin was...

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Vote for The Public's Choice sports portrait

1 March 2010

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  'The Public’s  Choice' is a chance for you to nominate either a disabled sports personality, or a disabled athlete or a disabled sports person, to have their portrait painted as part of the Revealing Culture: Head On collection. The criteria for your nominated person is that they identify themselves as a disabled person - you must state: Why you have nominated this person - What has this person done to develop disability sports within disability culture. Email me your nomination to...

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Tanya Raabe blogs more 'live sittings' at Tate Liverpool and Tate Modern

1 March 2010

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I’ve now portrayed another three disabled cultural figures in the last two weeks. Its been such a busy time I’ve not got around to telling you all about it, so here goes! Sir Bert Massie made an interesting sitter and he had a lot of disability triumph stories to tell... how he got the law changed so that wheelchair users can now use black cabs when you need to. It's still easier said than done, as now we have to work on getting the cab drivers to let us in the cabs! And...

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Tanya Raabe offers an update on her gallery research as part of Revealing Culture:Head On

25 February 2010

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I've spent 2 days mooching around the galleries in Tate Liverpool and am picking up some interesting comments from the public reguarding the representation of disability culture. Comments suggest that some members of the public feel representation already exists in the artworks on display. Some young people had strong opinions about how disabled people are seen in the artworks on display. They talked about the 'Dwarf on a Table' and 'Ghost' as being disabling. They felt that the texts alongside...

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Tanya Raabe blogs her Tate Modern sitting with Deb Williams

25 February 2010

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I'm back!!!! been on a bit of a journey... Debs Williams was my next sitting in Tate Modern and she was a brilliant subject with a great disability cultural history to tell. This included her talking about her storytelling within her theatre company 'Reality Productions' and how she felt about where the female nude sits in art... Having not previously asked Debs to pose nude for me... I don't know why I didn't ask her.....she says she would have considered it. It struck us both that when...

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Tanya Raabe writes about the Tate Modern sitting with Sophie Morgan, as part of her project 'Revealing Culture: Head On'

1 February 2010

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Well, the event of drawing Sophie Morgan in Tate Modern was certainly an experience never to be forgotten. I was a little nervous to begin with, at the thought of the public watching me creating my drawings in graphite and acrylic paint. As I strained to reach the top of my drawing board with my paintbrush and ink dropper, the audience were mesmerised. People joined me in drawing this spectacle. The day before I was wandering round the galleries researching artworks that depict disability in...

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Tanya Raabe makes her first research visit to Tate Liverpool as part of Revealing Culture:HeadOn

27 January 2010

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Busy, busy, busy... I think I’m running behind myself at the mo! Last week Michele Taylor came to my home studio in Shropshire and posed for her portrait nude. A first for her. Michele said ‘It was a rare moment of joined-upness for me - body, emotions, intellect all congruent, all out there, all accepted and welcomed.’ I always feel moved as an artist and as a disabled woman when I’m sharing my womanhood, disability experiences and life with like-minded people. Michele...

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