The Jam Factory- Oxford

 

 

 

 

 

 

After most of last year was spent either ill or healing I decided that the end of 2014 was going to be spectacular. I had a big exhibition of my work and then threw myself a birthday party in December- something I have not done since the age of 7. As I've probably said before, I'm a classic introvert so the thought of having a party in my honour and inviting lots of people initially caused me to break out in hives. And then I remembered promising that I would try and inch my way out of my comfort zone and that I do actually like my friends and family. Of course I then had to spend a week alone not talking to anyone, listening to Radiohead and reading quietly, by myself. 

 

One of the amazing things that came out of the show at The Mill was that I got offered a chance to exhibit at The Jam Factory in Oxford, a venue I like enormously for it's wonderful food, homemade cakes, Blood Orange San Pellegrino and diverse exhibition programme. It's up until the 6th of April so if you're in the area pop in! I'm exhibiting with another wonderful local artist, Tina Burnett. I wish I had some images of her work but it seems I was too self obsessed to take any on the day. It's lovely though, I promise.

 

 

There's so much I want to tell you all about the last two months, so much about the last year in fact, which has been hard in ways I could never have imagined but also revealing and celebratory and cleansing. I don't feel like a new person but I do feel like a pared down and distilled version of the old me. More potent, more heady. Less watered down communion wine, more garden shed, throat stripping homebrew.

 

 

Confessions of a straight lace

This is my 2013 vision board.
Owing to various circumstances I didn't finish it until last week.
I've had the images stashed away for ages, the words rolling around my head. I know how I want this year to feel.
The thing is this: I'm worried about that word Wild. I don't think I am capable of being Wild. Not really.
That woman up there, on that board, she is so intimidating to me right now.
I was teaching my watercolour class yesterday. We were painting images of rambling gardens. Lovely English cottage gardens. Lupins, poppies, alliums. Little stone benches. Willow trees bowing in a light June breeze and little gateways hidden behind over grown foliage. I had one of those rare moments where you actually recognise your own contentment at the time you are feeling it. I had found a little patch of sunlight to sit in. There was the sound of paintbrushes in water and I think I might have heard a cookoo in the distance.
On Monday I will pop over to Hornton, the village my mum comes from. A lot of my family still live there and there will be proper Mayday celebrations. There will be a Maypole. Homemade cake and cider in the pub garden.
I don't know how to be that woman; wild, unapologetic, natural and brave, in these quaint settings. That little word. It just popped into my head without me giving it a huge amount of thought as to what it meant to me. And, of course, in my woefully naive way, I have become worried that it might mean going out when I don't want to, drinking when I don't want to, talking to people when I don't want to, talking to men when I don't want to. I'm worried it might mean accidentally becoming something I'm not. Which I have accidentally done before.

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Ok. It's three hours later. I very often write blog posts that I don't publish, mainly because they are a bit open ended.
I have decided to define what this word means to me.
Wild.
It means being slightly more audacious.
It means apologising less.
It means tending to my own needs before everyone else's.
It means listening to my body more.
It means calling people out on their bullshit. Quietly and politely. And then probably running away and hiding.
It means, actually, just doing what I bloody well want to do. Without reference to any of the dozens of people I nod at and say hello to as I walk from one end of this small town to the other.

Is the sun shining yet?

Today I am blogging from my sick bed. I seem to have spent a large part of this year feeling distinctly under the weather until last week when I well and truly hit the wall and under the weather became 'flu. Like proper grown up 'flu. If I wasn't feeling so ill I would be quite impressed at my body's ability to completely floor me in this unexpected way. I started January in such high spirits but the last few months have seen me forced to slow down a bit. Like everyone else, I am blaming the weather. Has there been a winter quite like this in recent memory?

 

I am feeling a bit better today and just wanted to post some images of the work students did on my Handmade Art Journals workshop a few weekends ago. The weather was freezing but everyone made it in and we had such a fun weekend playing with paints, inks, fabric scraps and found imagery.

One of the very best things about teaching these workshops is how inspiring I find them. For me teaching isn't about me imparting information and students copying what I do; it's more like an exchange of ideas. They take the techniques I show them in whole new directions, they filter them through their own unique skill set and come up with things I would never have thought of. I always leave these workshops completely amazed at the beauty of the work that's produced as well as buzzing with new ideas of my own. It highlights one of the things I have always believed: that creativity doesn't exist in a vacuum, it needs feeding and watering regularly and teaching does that for me.

 

Still life class with my students, part one.

These are the paintings of rusty objects that students in my watercolour classes have been undertaking. We have made little concertina sketchbooks out of them as well as collaging the paper before painting. Hence you can see little bits of newspaper and sheet music underneath the work. You start a class thinking that all anybody will want to do is paint pretty landscapes and flowers and it turns out that everybody loves rusty clamps, nuts, bolts and spanners.

I'm posting this as a distraction from the Oreo cookie brownies that are cooling in the kitchen. It's either dither on the internet for half an hour or tuck in to the still warm tray with a spoon and a tub of ice cream. I've spent two months exercising and eating in moderation (cereal and muller rice) and was beginning to wonder why I felt so joyless.

Bread and blueberries

My Monday evening post work post is becoming quite regular. It seems to be an ideal time to upload photos of the weekend's crafty activities and mull over what the coming week will bring. Above are the results of my little natural dying experiment. I cannot tell you how chuffed I am with the results. I particularly love the piece of blueberry dyed silk in the last photo. It's come out a moody, storm grey colour. All the fabric pieces have been washed in hot water with detergent until the water ran clear so hopefully this is how they will stay, at least for a while. Time will tell how colourfast they are I suppose. I already have plans for a series of small, stitched winter landscapes. My instinct with mixed media work is to start mixing paint with fabric and paper, building up collages and imagery but I want to keep any work I do with this fabric as pure and clean as possible. I am also keen to try something where I use no machine stitching at all but stick to hand stitching.

Below is my other little weekend project which worked quite well. This is the first time I have ever made proper bread without the help of a bread maker. The recipe is one of Rachel Allen's from her Bake cookbook. It worked beautifully, the smaller rolls were delivered to my parents yesterday whilst I kept the small loaf for myself. Tonight I am making white chocolate and peanut butter blondies. Just to make writing my class plans for the week a little sweeter.

Some more book covers...

The exhibition goes up in just over a week and I feel that panic should be setting in about now but it isn't yet. I have done the foolish thing of having all my work ready and ready framed for about a week now. Foolish because it has given me plenty of time to find fault with it.

In an attempt to fill the time I am making more books...