“The View from the Shore”

After the Amsterdam trip, time just flew. It was a time to get the exhibition together, finish two large seascapes, do some promotion, help out with Bude Arts and Music and Summer Festival organising and say goodbye to our beloved Bongo.

We’ve had the bongo for 8 years! and had some great little trips in it, so with lots of memories it was hard to say goodbye, but although still an amazing workhorse, it drank fuel and was getting a little rusty around the edges. I was also concerned about getting my artwork around.  A new vehicle depended on being able to get my largest latest piece in the back. At 150cm x 110 cm, we managed to find the perfect car, what we were looking for a BIG little car ( if that makes sense?!)

The exhibition date was set for 28th April – 16th May and I needed to be uber organised as I was leaving for Italy the day after it opened. Excitement ensued when I was contacted by a gallery in Plymouth to take my work. It did suddenly take the pressure off a little having put so much into this one exhibition.

Friends Jane and Hannah helped me hang all 26 pieces in around 2 hours.  Definately getting the hang of this now. It looked fabulous and lots of people came to the private viewing.  I had some lovely pieces written in the Barefoot Cornwall Art Blog and Cornish Guardian and feedback was incredible.  My style is definately developing and with a trip to Italy painting green and a weekend booked for Abstract at the Newlyn Art School, my art practice looks set to be challenged over the coming months… Bring it on!

“The View from the Shore” title piece

Summer Puddles

Me in full flow!

Gorse in morning sunshine

Don, who helped so much xx

Midnight sparkle

Frisky

Mingling

Blustery

Paintings for sale

Hercules Storm inspired

Willoughby Gallery, Castle Bude

On returning from my Italy trip.  Read more about it here…..     I’d sold 6 pieces and 2 prints, with the large title piece selling just afterwards. A great result.

 

 

 

Sea Gazing…. Wave watching and Surfing with a Paintbrush

Mother nature and the storms stripped the beaches of sand ,ancient petrified forests have been exposed along the coast, as well as the fibre optic cabling and items lost overboard years ago are appearing on the strand line. In the 90’s a container of Lego was lost overboard off Lands End. It has been turning up all along the coast after all this time and people are posting their finds onto Lego Lost at Sea, a facebook page. There have been endless opportunities for beach cleans, but it looks like the last of the storm surges are over.

Solitary boot washed up on fresh banks of sand

Mountains of plastic at what we now call Crap Cove

Beach walks had been limited to rock hopping and walking the made up paths. But mother nature is truly wonderful and in just a week,sand  has been brought in by gentle surf by the bucket load and finally we can walk miles of sand at low tide.

Wave watching 1

Wave watching 2, Sand coming in

Rockhopping and beachcombing

I can now stand and sea g aze without beingin danger of being swept of my feet, have time to analyse and take in the movement of the waves instead of being blown away. Two months ago it was impossible to focus or keep up with the frenetic movement of such a huge body of water.

I have two large paintings to finish for my exhibition, “The View from the Shore”  Not intentionally leaving the biggest until last, it’s more a case of space as they take up a lot of room, but now the pressure is on to get them completed.

Not enough room to move, work in progress.

I often get totally absorbed into the painting process, but with this one really started to feel the rhythm of the sea, movement and sound as I moved the brush around creating the wave shapes. I felt immersed in it, imagining I was experiencing what a surfer does, except I had a paintbrush and no surfboard. On reflection, it probably had a lot to do with memory of spending so much time wave watching over the past few months, but hey I still like to think I was surfing my own wave.

“Sea Gazing” Finished. 140cm x 110 cm Acrylic on canvas

 

Beauty in the Contrast. A tale of two sculptors

While running the risk of seriously offending William Peers, I love the juxtaposition of two discoveries yesterday from the world of sculpture.

The first was on the walk at high tide.  Someone had chosen this rock to do their own free balancing stone sculptures, all lined up looking out to sea.  On their own not that impressive, but as a group, they added something unique. I looked up rock balancing and discovered there were four forms.

• Pure balance – each rock in near-point balance
• Counterbalance – lower rocks depend on the weight of upper rocks to maintain balance
• Balanced stacking – rocks lain flat upon each other to great height
• Free style – mixture of the two above; may include arches and sandstone.

Like mini statues looking out to sea.

Only two stacks remain . Going…

Going…

Gone!

The second discovery was a video on local sculptor William Peers. Not many people will have heard of him or know of him locally, but his work is internationally known

I was lucky enough to visit his workshop a few years ago when he was doing a project, 100 days making one sculpture a day out of marble. Through friend Jane, a local headteacher at the school his children attended, he was allowing people to go and see them before they went off to the bright lights of an upmarket gallery in London.

These bigger pieces leave me speechless and I have tried to find adjectives to describe his work, but none give enough meaning or weight to how they make me feel, so watch this short film made for an upcoming exhibition and decide for yourself.

http://vimeo.com/87886863

 

 

Goodbye Winter and Works in Progress

On the 1st March, St Davids Day, it does feel like spring is here with lighter days, blue skies and new shoots.

But what a winter’s weather!. No cold spells, but plenty of wind and rain and sea watching became an obsession. High tides and winds mean the sea often breached the coastal strip.  The damage was sad to see but the power of mother nature provided some exhilarating moments and opportunity to capture some dramatic photographs.

Crooklets, Feb 2nd 2014

Crooklets, Feb 2 2014

Crooklets, Feb 2nd 2014

Storm damaged beach huts removed before the next storm

Painting en plein air, alla prima was a great experience (see prev post.Painting Hercules. ) and this method carried on in the studio painting two large canvas’s which are waiting to be stretched and then finished and one nearly there still on the easel.

Work in Progress on the Easel

Work in Progress waiting to be stretched and finished

Sitting on the Steps at Middle Beach, Bude 20 x 15cm

Crooklets, Night colours