Hooray my exhibition at the Dome in Buxton is up and running.
We put most of the work up on THursday after a slow start. The previous artist had left the board in a sorry state with a load of velcro pads to be peeled and scraped off. This took a while and brought a lot of the paint off. we decided to re-paint the boards and bought some paint from focus and without thinking started to applyit liberally, unfortunately it didn't seem to be the colour it promised on the tin. Instead of a brilliant white it resembled a mushroom colour. So off to the shop again for a replacement. We finally got the boards into a hanging shape but we had taken almost 3 hours getting there.
The work went up quite easily though and we were really pleased with the way the two different works seem to complement each other. Marc's work is fine art photography of the inside of a historically important building in Buxton and my paintings are of a sense of place within the landscape of derbyshire. When we put up the exhibition it was the first time we had seen each others actual work. I think that both the collections of work marry together perfectly to make a very coherent and strong exhibition.
I met up with the lady that is running the commission from the Cavendish group and she was ecstatic about the exhibition, which is fantastic news. we all get together on Tuesday for a private view with the members of the Cavendish group and guests.
It has been a really enjoyable commission. Marc is a great guy to be working with and the people from the Cavendish and the University of Derby are all lovely people. We take the exhibition to the University of Derby in Derby in April 2009. I still have more work to make for that exhibition as there is around 5 times more space to fill at that venue.
It seems like such a long time since winning the commissioned exhibition though only a few months in reality. time has moved on fairly slowly, thankfully, as I've only just managed to get the work done on time, and some of that is still not dry.
But the last 2 weeks have gone by witha blur and little to show for it in the cold light of day. I planned to do some of the administrative elements over this last weekend but unfortunately my son was ill and all thoughts of anything else ceased to matter.
Today was catch up day, I've collected the paintings from the studio, written my artist statement, cards, etc, etc, etc.
It was great to hear of the success of some of my fellow artists at Harrington Mill studios who have been shortlisted for and won prizes in open competitions recently. Well Done!
I'm in a bit of a predicament at the moment. I have totally run out of acrylic paint and oil paint but really don't have any available cash at the moment so I am still waiting for my materials bdget to come in, hopefully, fingers crossed that will be soon and I can get on with some more art.
I managed to get into the studio on Friday, eager to get on with my latest work only to find that they were still extremely wet. In a way this was a good thing as it forced me to finish off some unfinished work that had been around for a while.
I install my first exhibition as part of the Cavendish commission this week. I pu the work up in the Dome at Buxton on Thursday and Friday and the exhibition runs from Monday the 24th November through until the 8th December. All the work I need is finished and and I am ready for the installation. I just need to print some labels and Artist statements and that should be it.
To be honest I wasn't very enthused about creating some work today, I had very little sleep last night as a result of my little boy who had a rough night. The prospect of being creative was just a little too tiring to think about. But time is precious at the moment and I need to get in the studio at every available chance.
At first I avoided being creative, I chose the mundane jobs that needed to be done, cleaning, putting things away and paperwork until I could no longer put off the inevitable, I had to make a start on those blank canvases. I have been preparing them for the last week and researching my influences and ideas. I always have a small element of fear about making those first tentative marks that are crucial to the direction of the painting but today was quicker and less fearful than usual, maybe it's a result of tiredness or perhaps I am becoming more confident in the methodologies I am using.
Today's outcome was very pleasing, it is early days with these new paintings and I am sure they will be a whole lot different when the paint is dry and they lose that lustrous gloss of freshly applied paint, but I felt a warm glow, a feeling of satisfaction when I flicked of the light and left them in the studio to dry.
I was asked today to sort out some images of work that I felt best represents me and I am also in the process of producing a digital portfolio of my work. It is such a hard thing to do, I know that choosing all the images that I prefer is probably not a wise thing to do. I often find that other people have different views to me but how do you go about selecting images that represent your work as an artist? Is it a wise thing to ask other peoples opinions? Any suggestions would be greatly received…
I had an interesting chat with one of my studio colleagues on Wednesday, we were talking about our art in general and things we are doing at the moment.
My studio friend was telling me how she does teaching part time and how she makes work part time alongside the teacheing, she spoke about how she had to keep the two quite seperate and it took a different way of thinking to mentally switch from one to the other. But the one thing that interested me was how she was able to do so many diverse things at the same time.
I realised that I am able to work on many paintings at the same time without any difficulty but they are all olong the same theme. I am working on some work for a commission that was a result of my degree show work so I am still continuing along the same ideas e.t.c as I have for the last 3 years at University.
This made me ask myself if I was capable at the moment of working on different paintings at the same time with different themes/styles/ideas, I've never had to. University gave me a purpose to steer for and I suppose in a way detereds me from experimentatiion in other areas. My aim in the next few months is to start some new work about different things and see If I can continue with these multiple themes/ideas. I think it will be quite interesting to see the results.The first part of my commission work is exhibited in 3 weeks time and then in April. I do have more work to make for the April show but I have plenty of time to have a go at something different, although at the moment I;m not quite sure what different is….I'll keep you posted
