Life is SO busy ain't it?

Working at the end of the garden, cutting down all the weeds and hacking back the very overgrown Blackthorn hedging was pure pleasure with the heady perfume of this Philadelphus wafting in the air; it was almost intoxicating! 

Well, life is a busy as ever!  Which is why I have not blogged for a while, but I am still here and still getting on with things in the studio, house and garden.  Oh, how I long for the day when the house and garden is finished, so that I can spend more time exploring this beautiful area of North Yorkshire and having lots more fun with family and friends.  Did I say before, that we are expecting our first grandchild in July?  I have re-discovered the joys of crocheting blankets of late!  We are very excited and looking forward to meeting the small one.

Only a bit of painting to do in the new entrance at the back of the house; my new favourite place to sit with my tea in the morning.

Open Studios is over; I must remember to send in my feedback form and commission money. The second weekend was not as busy as the first, in fact, Saturday was pretty boring because I only had four visitors by eleven thirty in the morning and that was it for the day!  Never mind; Sunday was much better and I was very pleased to meet France-Leigh Hadrysiak from Chrysalis Arts, who made the effort to come and meet me and see my work.  It was very nice to be able to put a face to the name and France-Leigh's support is very much appreciated.  All my visitors were genuinely interested in my work, which is encouraging.  In all I made three sales of small works on paper but most importantly, more people now know about me than did before.

Another big bonus of the Open Studios is that I have become friends with three other artists in Ryedale; Catriona Stewart, Bridget Askew and Bridget Gillespie.  We met at each other's studios in between or just after the event.  It has been lovely to talk about our work over coffee and share ideas and experiences,  it quite brought a lump to my throat because it reminded me of doing this with my good friends I went to college with who are no longer here.

Since then, I have been finishing off some small paintings on board for the upcoming show at The White Room Gallery, Priestley's No. 36, Bootham, York.  The show is for the month of July.  I was unsure of the paintings at one stage, but now that I have worked on them further I am happy.  These are quite small works and tie in with my current theme and the Chinese sketchbook that was part of Sketch 13. Having them back from the framer, I am pleased with the work; framing always makes the work look so much better than I imagined it would.   I will deliver the works over to the gallery this afternoon; I plan to take all ten of the small paintings as well as some of the small drawings that were the origins of the whole series I am working on. Then I will select the best combination of pieces for the balance of the whole show.  I think it is important with a group show that the pieces work as well together as they possibly can.  I am showing with Sally Taylor and Lyn Wait who are both artists that I respect enormously.

A small selection from the work I will be taking to Priestley's this afternoon:

Connect, acrylic and mixed media on board

Fabricate, acrylic and mixed media on board

Song, acrylic and mixed media on board

Small drawing: The Departed series

Heart drawing

Meanwhile on the home front, things are gradually being finished off; I now have cupboard doors with the knobs on in my new porch as well as architrave and skirting boards.  Upstairs, as I type this, the architrave and skirtings are going on in our new shower room.  There are still some things to do but everything is coming together nicely.  After such a long slog, living with chaos all over the house and having to halt at one stage because we ran out of money, it is such a relief to see this stage almost completed.  I will have to do quite a bit of the decorating myself to save money.

The most exciting thing - our garden is finally about to get the hard landscaping  and turf laid! This is a real landmark in the whole process; we have lived for years with rough stones covering up the mud while the building work has taken place.  Again, we don't have much money for this but going along with our ethos of re-using materials, we have been lucky to find quite a lot of different types of slabs from kind people who were happy to donate them to our cause and glad to be rid of them in exchange for a fruit cake.  Mixed in with our bricks reclaimed from the build and some gravel, I think we are going to have a really lovely out-door space.  We have spent every weekend available clearing the garden in readiness.  There is still quite a bit of work to do but this weekend should break the back of it and I'll do the rest when I can next week, in between delivering the paintings to York and sorting out the hanging.  Exciting times indeed!

The courtyard area at the back of the house, finally cleared of all the building rubbish, ready for the hard landscaping and herb beds to be constructed.

We have a deadline for all this work in the garden; Pete's party in August.  There really is nothing like a deadline for getting things done.  We are looking forward to being able to enjoy the fruits of our labours after a very long and at times, bleak process.

I have no further exhibitions lined up for this year, which to be honest, I am quite glad about because it will give me time to do more work in the house, the garden and in the studio, to prepare and make the prints and artists' books for a submission in October.  That's do-able aint it?  !



Links to the artists I have mentioned in this blog:

Bridget Askew: www.bsaskew.wix.com/artist

Catriona Stewart: www.catrionastewart.co.uk

Sally Taylor: www.sallytaylor.net

Lyn Wait: www.lynwait.net

(Bridget Gillespie does not currently have a web site)

All rights reserved, images copyright the artist and PH Gough

NYOS 14: the first weekend

After all my stressing, I actually enjoyed the first weekend of open studios enormously.  Despite the awful weather on Saturday, 25 people came to see me and were very complimentary about my work. It is lovely to chat to people who are interested to know how I make the paintings and drawings, how I arrive at my subject matter and who are incredibly insightful themselves when talking about the work.

On Sunday, 22 people arrived, making the most of a lovely day, all of them interested in the my drawings and paintings. On both days, people were pleased to take one of my home made promotional packs that contain a brief CV, a couple of postcards and a business card with an original drawing on one side.  I figured that it being my first experience of open studios, the least I could do to people who came to see me was to give them something in return.

Along with the work on show, visitors really seemed to enjoy being in my studio and were interested to hear how I had transformed it from a bare garage, part of a barn, into the space it is today.

Paintings are slightly distorted in this shot because of the wide angle lens!

Although I only made two small sales this weekend, it has been a really positive experience and many more people now know about me and my work than before.  I am looking forward to next weekend.

Two of my favourite visitors were Beatrice Holmes and her sister, who if my memory serves me correctly, is called Eleanor, daughters of Joss.   They asked me some incredibly searching questions and were genuinely fascinated about the work.  I have since learned that Joss had been interested to see how the girls coped with "abstract" art and was amazed at their response to it.  Apparently, when they arrived home they got out their crayons and proceeded to make some abstract art of their own.  I am impressed with them both and pleased to have been part of their learning experience for a short while.  Thank you for coming girls!

Open Studios almost here, all welcome!

My home-made business cards, each one has a hand drawn image on, relating to current work

Preparing the studio.  I am so grateful to Pete, for helping me hang the work.

Well, it is almost upon me.  North Yorkshire Open Studios begins this Saturday.  All my plans for making new small new pieces and books were dashed when I got ill, so I have put up a mix of old and new work with quite a few pieces on paper, mounted on board for displaying in my hand made browser.  

Still some jobs to finish off but I think we are almost ready!

I have hand-made a mix of publicity materials.  Although a bit of a time consuming thing to do, the advantage of this is that mine do shine out from all the printed stuff produced by other artists.  Part of the reason for producing things by hand, (by utilising the IT skills of certain people to help me centre images and fit them into the space properly and who offered their time very kindly for free), is that I just didn't have energy to organise printed materials in time and also no money to pay for it anyway.

I have used a variety of methods for publicising the event, I sent out an illustrated email using Mail Chimp some weeks ago, I have hand made and hand delivered some packs containing a selection of my publicity material to people important to me and hand delivered some locally.  I have put posters up locally too.  

A selection of some my hand made and printed publicity materials with NYOS flyers

The meeting with the press photographer was a complete waste of time and I will not be bothering with it in future.  I was mentioned in a few words but none of the photos were used. Understandably, they want pictures in their paper that will appeal to most readers and my work just doesn't fit.  Never again.  Story of my life really; I just don't fit!  But, as they say; "you live and learn".

There was a meeting of artists within Ryedale participating in open studios last night, to swap publicity materials.  I realised that I didn't have enough of my remaining material left, so I made the flyer below, again with a bit of IT help and kindly printed by a local business.  I paid the princely sum of £7.60 for 500 A5 sized flyers, plus my time taken to design it and guillotine them when they were delivered, which isn't bad, I think you'll agree!

I really like the simplicity of this, and black and white is not only dynamic; it is cheap to produce!

Below are some shots of the studio in preparation for the event, it is actually a bit like a mini retrospective of my work:

Paintings I am currently working on for an upcoming show in York, propped up on my bench

I would like to wish all the participating artists lots of luck, good sales and enjoyment for this year's NYOS.

Better sign off, lots of jobs still to complete on my list. . . .


Thanks to Pete Gough for his support and practical help.

Thoughts on Rothko's restored painting and creative channelling

Study for painting, The Departed series

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGqAggmwyMU&hd=1

The above link takes you to the Tate short film about the restoration of the Rothko painting, one of the paintings from the Seagram Murals series, which was damaged with graphiti ink over a year ago.

I have books on Abstract Expressionism in my personal library and a couple on Rothko.  It is a long time since I have been able to look at them because they have been in strorage for most of the time since I moved up to N Yorks nearly nine years ago.  They have only just recently been unpacked and placed reverently on a shelf.  I have not looked at any Rothko paintings, whether in reproduction in my books, or at Tate for a very long time.

It was, therefor quite an experience to watch this video and to be reminded of the beauty, presence and majesty of the works.  I was also quite taken aback; I realised during the film, that quite innocently and unintentionally, my recent drawings and paintings have reflected and connected with the obelisk shapes that Rothko used. Now, I am not so stupid as to suppose that all art can possibly be completely original, and these connections between artists works happens a lot.  What took me by surprise is the fact that I had been unaware of my connection/reflection of the Rothko motif.  In my whirring mind as I continued to watch the film, I realised that this was probably subliminal, that because of such a long lay off caused by ill health when I moved here, I was not engaging much in art or art history but that my subconcsious was probably playing a part in the making of my recent works.  

I should add here that the recent works of which I speak are not pastiches of Rothko; they are quite different; it is the connection to them that I have been reminded of that has taken me aback. The connection in some way pleases me even as it worries me in the sense that now that I am aware of it, I need to beware of allowing my work to veer too near towards Rothko's motif or characteristics.  I am not flattering myself here; just writing my thoughts down honestly as I discuss and try to make sense of what I have just experienced during the watching of the above video mere minutes ago.  (My good friend Matt Lyon, who is a very successful graphic artist just told me on facebook that we cannot escape creative channelling!)

Rothko's great works communicate so profoundly because of the humanity they reflect back at us, I think. His works deal with the great and timeless subject of our own mortality, the human condition. When I first began my recent series of work, which I am still developing, at the very end of 2012, I was thinking about my own mortality having had to confront it during my illness, as well as the then recent deaths of four of my best friends. So the passage of time, the human condition and ideas of memory and loss began to emerge as the theme of my work; the obelisks within my initial drawings represented the people I had so recently lost.  It is not so surprising that I should find that I have a connection with other artists given that this is probably the greatest theme in all the arts there is!

What has surprised me so much is that I had been unaware of the connection and this is a timely reminder that I need to be making use of my library of books again and reflecting and noting down my thoughts in visual form as I do so. Also that a visit to Tate to see the Seagram Murals, to sit and contemplate things in front of these great paintings is way overdue.

Drawing, The Departed 1V, Graphite on paper

Some discoveries of delight and pondering while I recover

You can tell I have been poorly because I started a new blog and didn't publish it - see below!  I am happy to say that after four horrible weeks, I am now well again although pacing myself because I don't want to relapse.  I am now fit enough to start preparing for the open studios next month; my plans are reduced, but I will still be able to put on a good show.  I'll blog about it in more detail shortly.

Thank you to everyone who sent me good wishes for recovery, especially when I was struck with a chest infection on top of the ears; I really appreciated it.

I did manage to stagger down the garden and take some photos of Spring amongst the wildness too!

So here I am, still stuck indoors and feeling a bit sorry for myself as I struggle to recover from a double ear infection, the result of a nasty virus I became ill with a week before Easter.  You can imagine my horror at not being able to prepare the house, new sitting room and all, in time for Easter and my two lovely daughters' visit.  Mind you; for the past two years they have become very used to arriving and staying here among dust, partly finished plastering, stud walls not finished and a lack of proper dining facilities.  They both told me they didn't mind not going anywhere over the Easter break because it is just nice to come here and chill out after some busy weeks working.  I worry too much. . . 

Antibiotics finished, but still feeling as if I have my head stuck in a goldfish bowl full of water, with maybe even a couple of fish swimming about, the doctor has told me I will feel like this for another ten days. TEN DAYS!  And then it will be another four to six weeks before my ears are properly healed.  I remember when I was a little girl having six weeks off school many times after ear infections and to have to be patient when there is so much to do, is really intolerable. But; there's nothing for it but to devise a gentle strategy of working that does not involve any bending down (makes my head and ears hurt very much), and too much walking about, (makes me feel a bit dizzy). Sigh.

But looking on the bright side: I have just re - jigged the written insert I provided for the simple give away I designed for my solo show last year.  This will be used for publicity and as a give away for NYOS 14.  I have to contact Liz Bailey in the hope she has a spare box of the brochures as when I opened what I thought was my box it turns out I picked up the wrong set. So frustrating!  I will take a gentle run out to Rosedale once I've sorted that problem out, to deliver some to the lovely Kate Jones and Stephen Gillies of Gillies Jones Glass, they are always a pleasure to spend time with and talk to.  http://www.gilliesjonesglass.co.uk/

Meanwhile, over the last couple of days,  I have been trawling the tinterweb, checking out various artists web sites that I have found via Twitter or Facebook.  It is such a joy to find artists that I'd never been aware of, whose work makes my heart leap!

Freya Purdue - http://www.freyapurdueblog.com/
Tom Climent - http://tomcliment.com/
Kim Tillyer - http://witchmountain.wordpress.com/    https://www.facebook.com/pages/Witchmountain/113930678656104

Ryedale ArtWorks directory launch

Andy Dalton, Vice Chair and Treasurer and me, once again Secretary and Membership officer, posing for a pic with the new directory, that's going to be featured by the local press, I'm told.

Eighteen members turned up for our AGM and launch of the new RAW directory.  It was a good meeting and it was great to see some of our new members there, being made welcome by others.  Lovely to have a catch up with people and hand out the directories at the end too!

Members enjoying a chat after the AGM report had been delivered.

Many thanks to Ryedale Folk Museum for their hospitality.

Ryedale ArtWorks and North Yorkshire Open Studios 14

It's the new directory launch at our AGM this evening, at Ryedale Folk Musuem, 7pm.  I have, along with our Vice Chair Andy Dalton, spent the best part of two days preparing for this.  Last week we were writing the Report to Members and today I have been printing paperwork and generally gathering things together for tonight.

I have always kept copies of old directories and other printed material relating to RAW for our archive and today I gathered some together because it occurred to me that new members would be particularly interested in seeing how we are developing.  I found a plastic box to put them in but I think a properly labelled box file is called for in future.

Four years, four directories!  I think perhaps we should have cake next year. . .

Because we have over 11 boxes of the old directories left from last year; they were not collected for distribution, we made the decision to reduce the numbers available to individual members and have the rest delivered by Northern Print Distribution.  A huge weight off our minds, particularly as we will receive detailed data on uptake.  The use of NPD has been possible because, for the second year running RAW have been successful with our bid to Ryedale District Council's Creative Commissioning Board.  

The Commissioning Board has finished its work at the council and the work and activity is now being managed by the Policy and Resources Committee, chaired by Cllr Mrs Linda Cowling, also leader of the Council.  We are looking forward to hosting a visit by Janet Waggott, Chief Executive of Ryedale District Council at my studio on 28th May.

A visit to my studio on that date is probably a good thing; North Yorkshire Open Studios 14 begins in June. This means I will have to be tidy and ready!  I have sort of been in denial about the whole event up to now; nothing done at all.  I am riding the wave of panic at the moment; family things and needing to be at home for builders and all tasks related has prevented me from getting out to the studio.  I STILL have not made any prints!  But I will. . .   

Fortunately, I do have quite a lot of work that nobody has seen, so I can display that and have some printmaking on the go during the opening times if I don't achieve any new work by then.  It's my first attempt and, given the lack of time I've had to prepare, I am beginning to wonder if I should have left applying until next year but as the old saying goes: "nothing ventured, nothing gained"!  

Here's a map of the area my studio is in; there are lots of artists participating and it really does make for a lovely weekend of visiting:

My studio is just outside the village of Stonegrave, to the left of the map, between Helmsley and Hovingham.  It will be well signposted so you won't miss me!

As I prepare, I will post photos and info for any of you reading this who are interested.

NYOS 14 is part of Yorkshire Festival 2014 and you'll find info and links within their rather lovely brochure too.

Link to my page in NYOS catalogue with info on how to find me :  http://www.nyos.org.uk/Artist.aspx?id=374


NYOS 14 Home Page: http://www.nyos.org.uk/Default.aspx