Programme highlights in July

There’s no summer break for us, as we continue in July with a packed programme of events, exhibitions and films. Here are some of the highlights to look forward to…

We’re pleased to be screening Hitchcock’s The Lodger, accompanied by live music (broadcast by satellite from London) from multi-award winning composer Nitin Sawhney and the London Symphony Orchestra on Sat 21 July. And we’re welcoming Pout on Tour back this month, with two of the best films from this year’s BFI London Lesbian and Gay film festival, plus a new title Romeos chosen especially for the tour.

Documentary fans can enjoy a selection of factual films exploring diverse subjects: first up, screening from Fri 6 July, is Marina Abramović: The Artist is Present, which follows the performance artist as she prepares for a major new retrospective of her work. Nostalgia for the Light is a poetic and reflective meditation on time and distance set in the Atacama Desert, where female relatives of Pinochet’s victims are searching for remains of their loved ones, and astronomers are peering deep into the cosmos to uncover the origins of life – see it from Fri 13 July. Later in the month, from Fri 27 July, enjoy the award-winning Searching for Sugarman, which tells the enthralling story of a forgotten musician who becomes a cult figure.
New additions to our film programme for July include The Hunter a powerful psychological thriller starring Willem Dafoe as a mercenary on a hunt for the last Tasmanian tiger, which is screening from Fri 6 July; Silent Souls, a beautifully shot meditation on life and death, which follows Miron and his best fried Aist who set out on a road trip across Russia following the death of Miron’s wife; and In Your Hands, an intense thriller by Lola Doillon about a female surgeon (played by Kristin Scott Thomas) who it pitted against a man with a long standing grudge against her, which screens from Fri 20 July.

Our current exhibition Stanya Kahn: It’s Cool, I’m Good continues across our 3 galleries. If you haven’t yet seen it, don’t miss this first UK solo show of the LA-based artist which presents a selection of her darkly humorous video works, and drawings. In our Café & Bar look out for a new Cornerhouse Project from Manchester based photographic artist Liz Lock. The exhibition brings together a selection of images that Lock has taken over the years, together with found images. The images are paired, putting glamour model shots, and lapdancing scenes alongside black and white photographs of zoo animals for instance. Lock invites us to create our own meanings and narratives between these pairings.

Also this month we’ve got some great events taking place as part of our Creative Industries Programme. Creative Lunch is an opportunity for emerging artists looking to make their own theatre or performance work. Run by the Library Theatre company these informal sessions offer the opportunity to share ideas and best practice. This month’s session, on Sat 21 July, will offer a practical guide to funding your projects. Taking place on the same day (but later in the afternoon, so you can attend both if you want to!) is the latest edition of our popular Show & Tell events, that bring together artists and designers from Manchester who make lightning-quick presentations about a current project, experiment or source of inspiration.

And remember you can sign up to our weekly e-newsletter to keep up to date with our busy programme of films, events and exhibitions.