19th December 2009 and I’m stood in my bedroom digging out t-shirts and shorts from the bottom of the wardrobe to pack. Meanwhile outside, Christmas lights are twinkling on the front of the neighbour’s houses. Fast forward 48 hours and we’d arrived, warm air hitting my face as we stepped off the plane. Orlando International Airport, Florida. It was a world away from the freezing winter of the UK. The first few days were spent touring around the local theme parks and towns – Universal Studios, Epcot, and Seaworld. Although it was busy with other jetsetters, it was wicked. Particularly…
Author: Tom Haynes
3/5 Back in 2008, three years after the original “Twilight” book captured the imaginations of teenage girls across the world, stars were aligning. Seventeen year old Kristen Stewart had been cast in the role of Bella Swan, whilst British actor Robert Pattinson was revealed to play Edward Cullen. On a relatively small budget of $37 million dollars, no one could have predicted the furore that would follow. Fast forward four years, and the franchise has hit the stratosphere, grossing over 3 billion dollars, with cast members featured on the front of every tabloid. Breaking Dawn Part 2, the final instalment…
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As a literary genre, Gothic fiction is often classified as combining elements of horror and romance, as well as other features including melodrama and parody. Popular in the late 18th-early 19th century, many critics agree that it originated with the release of Horace Walpole’s 1764 novel “The Castle of Otranto”. Featuring the character Manfred, a lord of a castle, and the inexplicable death of his son Conrad before his wedding, it inspired Clara Reeve’s “The Old English Baron”, and set the tone for many canonised works that followed it. Anne Radcliffe is often credited with developing the “explained supernatural” element…
As part of Creative Corner, every week SEREN will look at the life of a famous artist. This week we turn to Roy Lichtenstein. ———— Roy Lichtenstein was born in New York on October 27th 1923. The son of upper class Jewish parents, he first became interested in art at school, where he took drawing up as a hobby. In his youth he would visit the Apollo Theater in Harlem, drawing portraits of the Jazz musicians that performed. Lichtenstein left New York to study art at Ohio State University. His studies became disrupted however by the Second World War, where…
As part of Creative Corner, every week SEREN will look at the life of a famous artist. This week we turn to Lucian Freud. ———— Freud was born in Berlin on 8th December 1922, a grandson of famed neurologist Sigmund Freud. Alongside his Jewish parents, Freud moved to London in 1933 to escape the rise of Nazism, which would later take over the country during the Second World War. He studied briefly at London’s Central School of Art, before continuing his studies at the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing, Dedham, and later Goldsmith’s College from 42-43. The same…
As part of Creative Corner, every week SEREN will look at the life of a famous artist. This week we turn to Tracey Emin. ————- Emin was born a twin on 3rd July 1963, in Croydon, London. She grew up in Margate, where her father owned the town’s Hotel International. When the business failed, the family suffered a severe decline in their standard of living. This harsh upbringing, including her rape at the age of 13, and abortion at 18, would later become an influence on her artwork, which is usually autobiographical and confessional. Emin studied fashion at the Medway…
As part of Creative Corner, every week SEREN will look at the life of a famous artist. This week we turn to L.S Lowry. ——- Laurence Stephen Lowry was born on November 1st, 1887 in Stretford, Lancashire, where his childhood was said to be difficult .He made few friends at school, and struggled to connect with his parents. They envied their friends ‘three splendid daughters’, as oppose to their ‘one clumsy boy’. 1905 saw Lowry securing a place at the Manchester Municipal College of Art, where he studied under the celebrated French Impressionist Pierre Adolphe Valette. In 1909, due to…
Dripping with gothic imagery, Rupert Sanders take on the classic tale is beautiful, but not the fairest of them all. Universal Pictures, May 2012. Score: 3.5/5 In 2011, Universal Pictures announced the production of a revamped version of the 1812 fairy tale ‘Snow White’. One year later, at an astronomical budget of $170,000,000, the finished product has been released. Dark, crisp, and haunting, it bears little resemblance to Disney’s merry take on the tale. The story begins by illustrating the birth of Snow White (Kristen Stewart). With lips red as blood, skin white as snow, and hair black as a…
The Olympic Torch entered the streets of Bangor at 17:39 yesterday, to legions of cheers from students, and locals, who lined the footpaths. It’s arrival was part of a five day tour of Wales, which included travelling through major areas such as Cardiff, Aberystwyth, Bangor, and Anglesey, before being carried up Snowdon, and progressing into England today. It was carried into the city by sixty one year old Malcolm Jones from Tremadog, a keen mountain runner who has completed all 37 Snowdon Mountain International Races since they began in 1975. Many Bangor University staff and students also became torch bearers…
Motorists across the UK have been advised to take extra care whilst driving following a spate of cold weather during the first half of February. The MET Office have issued several severe weather warnings across England and Wales since the beginning of the month, and drivers are now being advised to drive carefully as snow and rain freezes into ice at night. Ice is likely to cause problems on roads and pavements across the country, with southeast Wales and England being particularly affected. Fog patches are also likely to form throughout the cold snap, adding to disruptive travel across the…
Pontio, Bangor University’s new, £40 Million Arts and Innovation Centre has appointed its first Artistic Director. Elen Ap Robert graduated in Music from the University of Sheffield, before spending six years working as a professional opera singer. She has also worked as a music therapist, specialising in supporting children with learning and communication difficulties in Gwynedd, Ynys Mon, and Conwy. Robert’s responsibilities as Artistic Director will include developing a range of arts based activities for a variety of audiences, as well as using the arts to develop links between the university and the community. Speaking of her new position,…
August 1999. You’d always know a bank holiday weekend getaway had begun, when the first few raindrops had started streaking across the car windscreen. Twenty minutes later, and we’d grind to a halt behind an eight mile tailback of cars, caravans, and trailers on the M6. My brother would barely be visible on the seat to my left, buried beneath an avalanche of camping equipment we couldn’t fit in the boot. It was obvious he was still alive though – we’d hear him screaming ‘Dad I need a wee!’ every five minutes. My Mum meanwhile would be staring out of…
A breakthrough in CGI Animation, ‘Toy Story’ is as entertaining as it is innovative. Anticipation has swirled around Walt Disney’s latest release, ‘Toy Story’, for a long time prior to its debut in cinemas. Not only is it Pixar’s first full length feature film, but also the first to be created entirely from CGI Animation. However, despite the magnificence of its technological advances, it is the other elements of the film that make it truly special. The story follows the life of Woody, a pull-string cowboy doll voiced by Tom Hanks (Sleepless in Seattle, Forrest Gump). Alongside the fellow toys,…