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One year on ... what a wonderful evening ... thank you to everyone who popped in on Friday night for the opening of our Modern Rustic exhibition. Hard to believe it's been a year! Thank you Peter Clarke for the images - there were lots more but we're not sure you would thank us for posting them!
2 October - 24 December 2015 As our lives become increasingly overrun with technology we feel a strong urge to get back to nature, rebelling against the order and precision that dominates. We’re tempted to bring the outdoors inside with natural materials and handcrafted pieces as the autumn colours announce the end of summer. Our latest show evokes the ancient crafts of our ancestors given a twist to ensure they fit snugly into our modern world. Winter walks through our ancient woodlands collecting nature’s treasures with Jane Bevan and Charlotte Duckworth; roasting chestnuts by the fireside with Simon Bushell, and Duncan Pass telling stories, drawing inspiration from the old to present to the now. Drawing skills are seen as fundamental to good design and often are more than a means to an end: check out the intricate details in Louisa Crispin’s nature drawings. Caroline Gregson loves the idea that she can draw with the willow, resulting in what appears to be a 3D sketch. Myer Halliday has an on-going love of abstract mark making, the quality of line and the way in which it interacts with the materials he works with. Catherine Hicks gathers her ideas in a sketchbook as she wanders the hills around her studio. But it’s not all countryside and nature: Alan Richmond’s paintings are heavily influenced by the abandoned boats and buildings found in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. For Emma McFarline it’s the marks, textures and colours found in urban graffiti that she uses to create her vibrant collection of jewellery. According to Sophie Stamp, disassembling an old piece of machinery is like exposing a treasure trove bursting with unusual shapes and elegant forms, from which to draw inspiration. This is simply a small insight into the selection of treasures in our Autumn Show. Check out the website for more information about our artists but better still pop into the Gallery for a sensory treat - join us for the opening party on Friday 2nd October from 6-8pm.
Curiouser and curiouser, Boo and the Angel bring whimsical to the Gallery: mixed media pieces using papier-mâché, stitch, paper and found objects. Mary Johnson is “standing up for earwigs and brussels sprouts, rusting wheelbarrows and decay, as integral parts of the landscape” with her slip decorated earthenware ceramics made at her studio in Derbyshire using traditional craft skills, applied in contemporary and unusual ways. Chris Moss has taken a little time away from the Yorkshire Sculpture Park to bring a selection of her little wire birds: wrens, robins, sparrows, blackbirds and thrushes, and Simon Griffiths comes straight from his solo show at David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation Gallery in Surrey.
Wooden birds, wire birds, ceramic birds and painted birds, stitched birds and woven birds. Silver bees, graphite bees, etched bees and painted bees. Woodlice, ants, ladybirds and beetles, butterflies and moths. Beetles, Bugs and Birds in Artichoke Gallery from 1 July to 26 September 2015 includes: Painting: Darren Woodhead, Matt Underwood, Kate Osborne, Boo and the Angel, Liz Moys, Rachel Everitt, Louisa Crispin, Jessica Albert, Martin Woodcock, Annie Soudain, Felicity Flutter, Roger Hill, Kate Penoyre, Helen Baines Sculpture: Peter Clarke, Lucy Williams, Chris Moss, Simon Griffiths, Vicki Atkinson, Midori Takaki, Jeff Soan, Laurance Simon, Guy Bird Ceramics: Sarah Rickard, Mary Johnson, Julie Ayton, Marion Brandis, Jonathan Chiswell Jones, Holly Bell, Matthew Bayman, Katie Almond, Sarah Grove, Adam Marsh, Justine Munson, Holly Bell, Kerry Boswell, Kerry Hastings Jewellery: Lucy Jade Sylvester, Michele Wyckoff Smith, Cristina Zani, Susanna Hanl, Cathy Newell Price, Esa Evans, Stuart Jenkins, Caroline Reynolds, Emily Thatcher and Lorraine Gibby "The paintings which emerge from Paul's time in India amplify that sense of colour leaping from the canvas - the rich textures of verdant foliage, the humid warmth of the air, the dripping fullness of the trees. Water is a recurrent element, reflecting and intensifying the life which throngs through the paintings. And just as these images are vibrant with adventure and personal narrative, so they are peopled with figures who emerge from the landscape to tell their own stories; working, walking, worshipping, dancing. At times the paintings burst the confines of their own canvasses, affixed to larger boards which allow them to continue expanding, shrines at the centre of a world which is fruitful and multiplying. There is nothing 'touristy' here; this is the work of someone who has immersed himself in these landscapes, succumbed to them, become intoxicated by them. They are overwhelmingly positive and life-affirming. A painting of trees over water shimmers and shifts, the colours constantly rearranging themselves, reflections moving as if still fluid. I think that's what I love most about Paul's work - the sense that each painting is still growing, still evolving, still finding its own story. I could look at them for hours, days, years. I am sure you will feel the same." Mark Kermode, April 2015 Mark Kermode was writing about Paul's exhibition at Campden Gallery "Stories from the Banyan Tree" which continues until 31 May in Chipping Campden, Gloucester.
But many of those statements could apply equally to his seascapes currently on show in our Between Land and Sea exhibition which runs until 27th June. Painting in Penzance you can feel the ferocity of the storms lashing the coastline, coming to life as the sun streams through the gallery windows, picking out the colours as the clouds sweep across: "There is nothing 'touristy' here; this is the work of someone who has immersed himself in these landscapes, succumbed to them, become intoxicated by them." We couldn't agree more. |
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July 2019
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