Convenience Gallery (Birkenhead, Merseyeside)  is a community, contemporary centered arts organisation focused on delivering accessible opportunities for our local communities to engage, create, develop, work in and be enriched through the arts. Taking art out into public spaces, not traditional environments, mental health settings and working with local people. We’re advocates and activists for artists fair pay, mental health & wellbeing and inclusion. We are a small team dedicated to championing arts, artists, and arts engagement. Always aiming to create high quality, diverse, educational and challenging programming. 

We achieve this through: 

1. Supporting people from all backgrounds and career stages. 

2. Developing creative pathways for our community to access. 

3. Placing our programming in community spaces to remove barriers.

4. Delivering high quality, diverse and experimental arts programming made predominantly alongside local Liverpool region creatives.  

5. Working in strategic partnerships to create links with great local and wider NW organisations with the aim to co-develop and deliver projects and programming that address inequalities and promote access, inclusion, wellbeing and skills building.  

We have supported people through paid, voluntary and free to access opportunities to lead and access workshops and exhibitions, co-building projects together. We've had 4000 people attend our programming since 2019, creating 60+ number paid opportunities, co-built 18 exhibits and installs, worked with 20+ artists to lead creative workshops and lead 4 creative & wellbeing courses for local young people. 

Entering our 4th year of delivery on this project, we’ve established a cultural outlet for our community in Merseyside. Engaging 4000 people across 2.5 years of programming. 

For more information on how to get involved contact: conveniencegallery@outlook.com 

Who we are; 

Andrew Shaw & Ryan Gauge

If you want to get in touch about getting involved, accessibility or for more information, please get in touch. Our email is conveniencegallery@outlook.com

Convenience History

Convenience Gallery CIC was Formed in May 2019 by friends Andrew Shaw and Ryan Gauge. Both were artists at this time struggling to find space and opportunities within the region they set up Convenience in Birkenhead Market to create a space to champion local art and develop a growing creative programme. Creating an open forum for input that invited people from the local community to shape what this programming would look like. 

What followed was several exhibitions, including Open Call #1, TV Babies Collective show, Joana de Oliveira Guerreiro solo show, Burst Our Bubble (LJMU 2019 Graduates show), and latterly Anatomy of Place, Dinu Li (As part of the Look Photo Biennial). Alongside these Convenience also hosted a series of free and affordable talks and workshops bringing a wide range of artists and researchers directly to the local community of Birkenhead and wider LCR.  Included in this series were: Jocelyn Allen, Claire Henderson, Lois Tierney, Rob Flynn, and from Manchester, Ash van Dyck & Ellie Brennan. As well as plenty more. In the October of 2019 Convenience hosted a lecture series in collaboration with LJMU, Bloom Building, John Hyatt's Dark Side Art Lab, called Thinking Out Loud. These invited lecturers from John Moores, to lead seminar style talks around their personal research topics.

From January 2020, we officially began our partnership with the Open Door charity, working collaboratively to shape a cultural offer for their progressive community cafe, bar, venue and mental health space Bloom Building. 

Throughout our extended tenure at Bloom, Convenience has co-build a number of site specific exhibitions, installations, performances, events, art parties, workshops and talks. These look place across our two cultural programmes: the short lived 2020 “The future is…” programme that was unfortunately halted due to the Covid-19 pandemic and then the 2021-2022 “In Cahoots” creative programming. During this time Convenience has cemented its ethos of community collaboration and setting contemporary arts in not traditional spaces. Artists featured these programs were and will be;Joana de Oliveira Guerreiro, Max Mallender, Ben Lunt, Elle Bulger, Claire Henderson, Steven Forge, Georgemma Hunt, Josie Tothill, Shonagh Short, Fletcher Downie, Luke Beach, Narrisa, Corrine, Jon Edgley, Patrick Rodger, Angelo Madonna, Reece Gritthish, Ellie Towers, Mathew Lomas, Paddy Gould, Roxy Topia, Dan Chan, Nil00. 

Convenience during 2020-21 co-build the Horizons educational arts project focused on providing experimental arts education for young people aged 14-18 in LCR. Artists involved with these two educational programmes were: 

Convenience were commissioned by Open Door Charity to create a number of specific creative projects for people with Personality Disorders (Aesthetics) and for families who have experienced inter family conflict (challenging Love) artists involved with the two programme were:  CG also worked alongside Open Door for a summer programme of arts workshops for young people with Autism Spectrum Condition (HAZE).

Email Address: conveniencegallery@outlook.com