Out and about #2
Well, I’ll get the two big things out the way: I’m on exhibition in Liverpool and images of me have been published in Vogue Runway!
Wearing Matty Bovan AW25 Collection
This has been my busiest six weeks in a very long time with so many amazing things all coming together. This blog post has the potential to be exceedingly long, but I’ll try keep it brisk.
A Year of Jude NOW SHOWING
12 months of playful collaboration with Casey Orr now on show!
Our images shot across The North, from Leeds to Liverpool, are being displayed as part of the Liverpool Independents Biennial. We have been supported by DuoVision Arts and Homotopia to exhibit these images, they also commissioned a site-specific photoshoot in Port Sunlight. Casey and I flexed our artistic muscles and decided to play around with the story of Orlando by Virginia Woolf. As with so much of our work, we explore gender and its expression by re-telling Orlando’s story in a Port Sunlight cottage.
The opening night was gorgeous to witness, so many people interested in our work, probing us for more information and expressing why they liked certain images. We even sold some prints, which was a welcome surprise to me!
I love working with Casey, it’s never a hardship and we have a laugh while making some pretty damn good images!
A Year of Jude now showing at The Boys Brigade Building, The Lyceum, CH62 4UJ.
https://independentsbiennial.com/events/casey-orr-and-jude-kershaw-a-year-of-jude/
They tried to put me on the cover of Vogue, but my legs were too long!
“This season’s manifestation was touched by the multidimensional weirdness of David Lynch’s female protagonists—surely that last look cherry print was for Twin Peaks’ Audrey Horne—and Nolan Miller’s mega-shouldered body of work as the costume designer for Dynasty. The collection was as layered as any Lynch character.”
A couple of months ago I modelled for York based designer Matty Bovans A/W 25 collection. Reflective of 80s eccentricity, Dynasty and the works of David Lynch, ‘THE FREIGHT TRAIN SHAKES THE HOUSE AT NIGHT’ was great fun modelling for. The collection has been published on Vogue Runway and can be viewed here: https://www.vogue.com/fashion-shows/fall-2025-ready-to-wear/matty-bovan/slideshow/collection#21.
BlackSkirts
In rehearsals, image Lizzie Coombes.
To commemorate 80 years since the end of WW2 in Europe I devised an intervention street performance commemorating local Anti-Fascists of the era. (I’m just writing this up for a post on my Creative Practice page of my website). I portrayed a ‘BlackSkirt’, a female Fascist of the 1930s, accompanied by a group representing the anti-fascist movement of Trade Unionists, Communists and Locals. These were played by Kit Marshall, Luc Gibbons and Jasmine Hale. The performance consisted of a series of tableaux moving through neighbourhoods previously hounded by Mosely’s British Union of Fascists. This accumulated into a rolling roadblock down Briggate where I was pelted with eggs and flour bombs. The performance was documented by Kit George. For more info, please check out the write up, when I’ve posted it lol.
Run of The Mill History becomes an Artist-led project
Finally, I’ve recruited some help to produce Run of The Mill! Our roster of events, workshops and social media content will be released soon. Until then I can happily announce Marisa Crane as Producer, Teddy Ndlovu as Assistant Producer, Jack McConnell as Online Lead and Lewis Fraser as Finance Officer. We will be supported by contributors on a project-by-project basis, the quality and quantity of our work will increase ten fold. I’m so excited to be working with such a strong team!
Watching, Reading, Listening
Before starting my MA this Autumn I am going over seminal essays to make sure I’m not lacking on the academic reading. I’ve been reading Who’s afraid of gender by Judith Butler, who highlights the use of ‘gender ideology’ as a scapegoat by the anti-intellectual political right. (Far more digestible than gender trouble!) The parallels between the fight against fascism in the 1930s and a lack of united resistance today were bitterly clear in my research for BlackSkirts. However, in this research I had the more enjoyable task of reading up on Albert Hunt, a Bradford based teacher who pioneered alternative theatre in The North. (My favourite of his work was the re-staging of The Russian Revolution in Bradford back in the 60s.)
I’m currently re-watching Mad Men, if there ever was a case made for smoking and drinking in excess, this is it. (I thought I saw Jon Hamm on the train to Liverpool, I was wrong.) My YouTube history shows I’ve consumed a lot of Mersey Beat, perhaps unsurprisingly, lectures on Anglo Saxon Women and a few April Marsh albums.
Events and Exhibitions I’ve been to:
Matty Bovan, ’Girl in Sunglasses’ Zine launch and exhibition, Village Bookstore
Independents Biennale, Port Sunlight
‘Bedrock’ (Liverpool Biennale), Tate Liverpool, Walker Art Gallery, Open Eye Gallery
Jonny Hannah, ‘Darktown Comes to Print Town’, UpCo Arts
Leeds Beckett University Degree Shows
Fashion Alliance North: Leeds Beckett University Fashion Show
Jeremy Deller X Charles Hazelwood, ‘The Bradford Progress’, Ilkley Moor and Bradford City Centre
Clare Hewitt ‘Everything in the forest is the forest’, Impressions Gallery
Them/There Cowboys, The Chemic Tavern
Sarah Roberts ‘Sick’, Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery
Ann Hamilton ‘We Will Sing’, Salts Mill
‘Eyes on us’, Project Space, University of Leeds
I’ve been to exploring Medieval Churches in the countryside, said hello to Jeremy Deller on Ilkley Moor and sat centre aisle at an industry leading fashion show. I cant possibly fit all that in this post, so feel free to check out my Insta for more!
Thanks for the reading, hopefully the next few weeks won’t be quite as manic!
Jude x
