Tessa Norton

I’m available for freelance communications consultancy and content work, especially for charities and arts and culture organisations.

Projects include: Arts & Culture Finance (Nesta), Yorkshire Sculpture International, Corridor 8, NYMAZ, Arts Marketing Association, The Modernist Society, Siobhan Davies Dance, BALTIC, Heavenly Records, Andy Holden. I’ve previously worked at Cecil Sharp House, the London School of Economics and various charities across everything from the environment to international development. From 2017-23 I was on the board at LUX, the artists’ film organisation.

If any of this sounds like something you’d like help with, get in touch.

Writing

My first book, which I co-edited with Bob Stanley, is Excavate: The Wonderful and Frightening World of The Fall (Faber, April 2021).  My essay is about alternative education, Beuys and Black Mountain College, as well as The Fall.

My second is top secret but in progress. Trust me.

I also write about art and all sorts, for various places, recently including The Wire, Tribune and Corridor 8.

Some quick links to my work:

• Interview with ex-Fall group House of All for The Wire
• Review of Zadie Xa for Burlington Contemporary
• Review of Jerwood FVU awards at Leeds Art Gallery
• An essay about time in the pandemic, for Tribune
• An accompanying short text for Sour Persimmons Chasm, an all-star group show at Andy Holden’s gallery Ex-Baldessarre
• A longer read – here’s an essay about “baby brain” and how I found its stupidity weirdly enriching, for Doggerland journal (99p ebook – also recommend the other essays)
• And an essay about Stacy from Wayne’s World and radical vulnerability in the Bad Vibes Club Reader

Press coverage

• Radio 4, Front Row, review of my work in Let The Song Hold Us at FACT Liverpool (“Just beautiful poetry.”)
• The Guardian, review of my work in Let The Song Hold Us at FACT Liverpool (“Norton’s conversational tone is soothing, but the content is probing, highlighting the discomfort generated by oppression over generations.”)
• Bookforum, review of Excavate! The Wonderful and Frightening World of The Fall by Sasha Frere-Jones: “I adore Excavate!, because it is the only Fall book that has the range of a Fall album, and we are two dozen books into the commentary at this point… my favorite expansion on Smith’s work is Tessa Norton’s essay about Smith as his own school of education, the vision of a man presenting a syllabus as rock songs (or vice versa).”
• Excavate! was the Louder Than War #1 Book of the year, and a Rough Trade, The Times, Mojo, Uncut, The Herald Book of the year.
  
  This is not a book about a rock band. This is not even a book about Mark E Smith. This is a book about The Fall group – or more precisely, their world.
  ‘To 50,000 Fall Fans: please buy this inspired & inspiring, profound & provocative, beautiful & bonkers Book of Revelations.’
  DAVID PEACE
  
  ‘Mind blowing . . . there is so much to enjoy in this brilliant book.’
  TIM BURGESS
  
  ‘A container sized treasure trove . . . I strongly advise you to buy it.’
  MAXINE PEAKE
  
  ‘The most wonderful, unashamedly intellectual, pretentious, ridiculous, exciting hymn to this incredible group.’
  ANDY MILLER, BACKLISTED