This blog follows and explores my Artist Residency at the Bond in Birmingham. THe residency is for a year and I will be creating a body of work, living and working on site and exhibitng along the way.
Had a good long bike ride along the canal taking photos as I went. On recommendation of a canal boat driver (I don’t know the correct term for a driver of canal boats, maybe someone can enlighten me please) I set off out, away from Birmingham to see the area where the canal meets the famous spaghetti junction. It was quite remarkable to see the negative shapes that are made by the combination of canal bridges and road and rail bridges. I returned later by a somewhat circuitous route with wobbly legs. The shame of it all is that people of all ages and sizes were overtaking me as if I was in reverse. I then spent some time in the studio making a couple of prints from drawings that I made yesterday, one I’m happy with the other is a little disappointing, I’ll let you decide which is which. I’m now going to spend the next 2 hours drawing and some paperwork.
My experimental print was still drying, maybe I should have used normal acrylic instead of the golden open brand. Because I’d taped it to the glass printing sheet it meant I couldn’t produce any new prints so it forced me to start painting the canvases that i’d prepared the other week. I started by underpainting areas, they look nothing special at the moment but given time and many layers they should be ok. Ill try to upload an image of each layer that I make to show the process to anyone interested.
I am an artist, painter based in Derbyshire. My work explores identity and sense of place in the environment.
