La Tabacalera - (unfinished post)

La Tabacalera is and old tobbaco factory turned into an Arts/Community space in the Lavapies neighbourhood. On first impression, it seems like a disused building being squatted in,  but the site is actually funded by the Spanish ministry of Culture, and has a lot of events on offer. All in one day, you'll come across drawing and wood workshops, theatre, cinema and live music. It's a great way to spend a day and only spend a few euros.

The courtyard. The wall art is done by the same person who did the Bussey building in London, whose name I can't remember.



showing signs of the old tobacco factory, a pretty interesting site when you can see the whole thing



One of my personal favourites. A room bearing nothing but these strange creatures sprawled out on the wall

The concert venue duting daytime, great space but bad acoustics

A painting of the "rocking granny", who also has a statue in her name in the city



the wood workshop, a nice area with tools for sharing provided you bring your own wood. On this day, however, it was being used as a conference room for people who wanted to change the wooorld/  



One of the portrait drawing sessions, where volunteers sit down for 15 minutes

Here's something I wasn't expecting. One Sunday, we were having beers in the couryard, waiting for the music to start. I went off for a quick toilet break, and for a moment I thought I'd accidentally walked into the ladies. As I stumbled into this room, I saw a woman naked, rolling around in mud, in front of an audience of about fifty people. Being a crafty art student, it didn't take me long to realise that this was a bit of what I call performance art.

the show went on for a while until this masked man appeared from the audience, to help push the performance to the next level. You can't see in this photo, but at this point the woman was casually having a piss, as the audience looked on

and the grand finale. taking a dump.

up

and away. The audience were clearly impressed as the room went from completely quiet to a roar of shouts and clapping. Having forgotten why I'd originally left our table, and why I was here alone, I returned to our group of italians and tried explaining in broken spanish what I had just seen. They were not impressed

yeh fam

the music venue at night

little boy listening to drum n bass, what goes through your mind?
one of the nice things about madrid is that you'll often see people of all ages out at the same time, and the age barrier doesn't seem to be big issue