Laura Mansfield is a writer and researcher living in Manchester.

She has written on a variety of artists work for AN Magazine (2006), Situations Papers (2006), Spike Island Gallery (2007), Arty Magazine (2007) and Circa (2008).

In 2006 she produced and edited the publication Spike Island Journal 2 Currency and Exchange, an international exchange of texts exploring notions of local and global identity between the writers Axel Lapp (Berlin), Eddie Chambers (Bristol), Charlie Danby (London) and Yane Calovski (Skopje).

For the past year Laura has been working in close collaboration with the artist Daphne Wright. She has delivered papers on Wright’s work at the International Conference of Death, Dying and Disposal (University of Bath 2007) and The National Gallery of Ireland (2008).

Laura has further worked on curatorial projects including Intervention/Decoration Frome 2008 and Oh Dreamland, Greatstone 2007. She is part of the artist collective Club Shepway (www.clubshepway.com) and has been an instrumental member of this summer’s Folkestone Fringe curating events alongside the International Sculpture Triennial, Folkestone (www.folkestonefringe.com)

Laura is studying an MA in Cultural and Critical Theory at Birkbeck College University of London.


Marie-Anne McQuay is a curator currently based in Bristol where she works on Spike Island’s Residency, Associate and Exhibition Programmes. She has initiated numerous exhibitions for the galleries at Spike Island, including Working Things Out (2007) a group show with new work by Milo Brennan, Richard Forster, Sara MacKillop, Sophie Macpherson, Haroon Mirza, Jonathan Owen and Andy Wake, and Craig Mulholland’s solo show Grandes et Petites Machines (2008). She has independently written on the work of artists who co-opt differing modes of participation and collaboration in their practices, including projects by Ian Forsyth & Jane Pollard and Dias & Riedweg. She is currently Guest Editor of Leisure Centre, an idiosyncratically themed publication initiated and produced by artist and writer Rosemary Shirley. The Gothic Edition of Lesiure Centre will be available mid October 2008 and will feature image and text works by Sovay Berriman, Brin Frost, Fiona Jardine, Craig Mulholland and Elizabeth Price.