OpenHand OpenSpace

Apply to join us.

New affordable creative work space available now.

We have a single studio space of approx. 16 square metres, available from 1 June 2026. The studio has 24/7 access and costs £82.80pcm. Joining our studio community involves helping with the day to day running of the building and joining the charity’s activities for public benefit.

Open Hand Open Space (OHOS) currently provides ten artists studios, operates a public art gallery/project space and enjoys the support of a diverse community of associate artists and trustees.

The available studio is on the first floor of our studio building at 571 Oxford Road, Reading. All OHOS studios are in a shared building and include circulation space, which other artists can pass through to access their own spaces. Brock Keep is a publicly owned building and as such is occasionally open for visitors and open studio events.

If you’d like to join us, please email your application [email protected] by 30th May 2026.

For guidance on writing your application, please visit the link on our website, through our Linktree link in our bio 🔗

There will be an opportunity to view the studio on the 25th and 30th of May 2026. More details to be confirmed.

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From the OHOS Archives…

Images 1-5:
Graphics & Posters for a series of ‘Open Studio’ events during 1989 and 1990 featuring the studio members from this time

Image6:
At the back of the archive there includes this list of studio artists outlining their diverse and eclectic backgrounds

Images 7&8:
Some documentation. There seems to be little in terms of actual work from this time; more-so a record of how information was disseminated through the almost forgotten art of flyer and poster design. Most of these are printed out on A3 and at the time I’m sure it wasn’t predicted that a domestic scanner would be A4 (hence the misaligned efforts to stitch them together digitally).

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From the OHOS Archives…

‘PERFORMANCE ART’

Image 1:
A3 poster for an evening of Performance Art at OHOS on 03rd June 1989, featuring…

Max Eastley & Tim Hill
David Medalla & Brian Morgan.

What a bonkers night that must have been.

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FILMS FILMS FILMS FILMS FILMS

Image 2:
As part of Reading’s International Festival in 1989. In the archive it says: ‘Films chosen for their relevance to international issues, both documentary and fictional, were from Circles, Arts Council and Cinema of Women’. This was organised by Susan Taylor, a studio member at OHOS.

As part of the festival was ‘an exhibition of laminated photographic panels with text snd colour by Keith Piper, a young black artist working in Britain whose work covers issues of colonialism and racism’. Also organised by Susan Taylor.

There are no images of Piper’s work but it is mentioned in the line up of the festival (top left, Image 2). The artists and films is an impressive list including the likes of Valie Export, Jeanette IIJon, Julie Dash and the experimental feminist filmmaker, Sandra Lahire.

Image 3 shows an A4 handout found in the OHOS archives for Lahire’s film ‘Arrows’. More information on these artists can be found on sites like

Images 4 & 5:
Close up images of the programme. With an entry fee of what looks like £1 or 50p for concessions.

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From the OHOS Archives…

We are starting to dive into the paper archives of events, exhibitions, screenings, happenings and everything else in-between, that have lived in old school box files in the office for decades. Within these vaults lie the rich history of OHOS, it’s artists and collaborators.

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Here we go back to 1989.

‘LIVE ART’

Images 1-2:
A3 poster for ‘LIVE ART’, featuring:
Richard Layzell
Bobby Baker
Elsie Mitchell
Tim Brennan & Douglas Gordon

Image3:
Promotional postcard by Bobby Baker

Image 4:
Documentation