Tuesday 24 January 2012

Postcard Swap

Yesterday I received a collection of postcards by Carol Chien as part of the Postcards From Europe project. I was pleasently surprised when I opened the package as I was only expecting one card and Carol had produced 5 plus there was one sent by the exhibition as well. The cards are lovely and it was a great way for me to be introduced to Carol's work. I particularly like the garden postcard and that will be making it's way onto my wall. It's exciting to think that somewhere someone will be opening up an envelope and finding my postcard, I hope they enjoy it!

Here are some photos of the contents of the package and a link to Carol's website:


Monday 23 January 2012

Life Drawing

During September and October last year I attended a life drawing class in Warrington. I'd never actually done any life drawing before, somehow the chance never came up despite the fact that I studied art at GCSE, A Level and Foundation. I thought it would be a good way to practice and improve my drawing skills; drawing the human form is something that I feel quite intimidated by and this fear is something that I need to conquer and move past in order to further my work.

The class was quite hard but it was really good to be back in an environment of shared learning. After being away from education for a year it felt quite strange to be part of a lesson and to work alongside other people but it was very relaxed and I think I benefitted from being able to look at the work of the other members of the class and see how they approached the task. I went to about 5 classes, all of them started with quick poses and then progressed to 20 minute and half an hour poses. I think I improved slightly with proportion but I still found it quite hard to let go and work in a looser more expressive style. I've become accustomed to working in small spaces and with tiny detail and I think it's important to be able to work quickly and loosely as well. Below are some (very quick) snaps of the drawings.



Saturday 14 January 2012

Mull It Over

I'm currently showing some work at an exhibition in Brighton called 'Mull It Over'. The exhibition was organised by Collate Presents a curatorial team made up of two creatives from Brighton; Gem a furniture designer/maker and features editor and Carly a sculptor and artist. The exhibition brief was to send in some work that hadn't really had much exposure so I chose 2 pages from my Grow Your Own sketchbook from 2009. I'm really excited that the work is on show and hopefully it will be well received. The exhibition contains the work of 83 2d artists and had approxiamately 200 pieces in it, all of which are for sale. Unfortunately I couldn't make it to the private view (and won't be able to see the exhibition at all in fact!) due to travel/time issues but I was able to enjoy a video of the private view (see link below) and even spotted a piece of my work! If you're in Brighton any time in the next few days it's on until the 17th January at Artist Residence in Regency Square.

To see the here and read a bit more about Collate Presents click below!
http://www.collatepresents.com/mull-it-over-jan-12.html