January

“They should all hate me for what I've done, but everyone loves me for it & it’s driving me crazy”

As the Iraqis mark a grim anniversary, we look at how the Iraq War is represented in books, TV and film. Ten years since the start of the invasion of Iraq. It hardly seems like…

It is a landscape so varied that it is a celluloid dream

One photography exhibition and 100 images allow you to get out of the city – for a moment, at least. Sometimes, living and working in the city, I forget just how powerful a good landscape…

"I wanted to capture people's stories in the place where I found them"

An art show at The Lowry turns the tables on gallery goers – and puts them in the frame. As a theatre and arts reviewer throughout my working life, I must have been to The…

The city was the hive, its mills swarming with workers

Take a tour of Manchester with us and find out why the Manchester bee is everywhere: on buildings, bridges and even bins.  I was once sitting in a cafe in Withington, south Manchester, and a…

The grandiose decay of the Albert Hall forms a scene-stealing backdrop to Barba’s film

Rosa Barba uses Manchester’s derelict Albert Hall as the backdrop to her new film – but is it a case of architecture over art? Pity the poor projector. In most art installations it is hidden…

The story is the statement, but the way it is told elevates it to art, deepening its strangeness.

Chinese Arts Centre’s latest contemporary art exhibition showcases the quiet, complex work of a rising star. Take a seat in front of Chinese artist Ma Qiusha’s best known work, From No. 4 Pingyuanli to No….

You begin to wonder what's real and what's not.

Don’t expect any easy answers in this old masters-inspired exhibition at Abbot Hall. Uwe Wittwer is an intriguing sort of an artist. He appropriates old masters – think Gainsborough and Hogarth – fuses them with…

Forget London. Manchester's theatre-going audience is the biggest & smartest in the country

Manchester Theatre Awards kick-starts the cultural year with its shortlist announcement. There are few who’d argue with the idea theatre lovers in Manchester have never had it so good. From new playwrights and a whole…