Summer 2016 b
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
DORSET<br />
SUMMER<br />
<strong>2016</strong><br />
ARTISTS<br />
1
Editor’s<br />
Letter<br />
Well, here we are, <strong>Summer</strong><br />
is finally upon us after what<br />
has felt like a very long time<br />
of waiting. Our Artists have<br />
been busy beavering away to<br />
get everything ready for the<br />
spectacular Dorset Art Weeks,<br />
which by the time this issue is<br />
rolled out will probably have<br />
just ended. I’m sure it will<br />
have been a major success!<br />
So, what do we have in store for you<br />
with this issue I hear you ask. What<br />
could possibly top that? Well we have<br />
an interview very talented non-Dorset<br />
Artist, Caro SaintVire, a major coup!<br />
I think so anyway, I’m sure you will<br />
too. Our lovely Andrea Jenkins writes<br />
about the muse/mistress of Rodin. Annie<br />
Taylor gives us the low down on<br />
her thoughts on her mountain top, and<br />
we have two short stories penned by a<br />
new contributor, Michael Bailey, with<br />
one to follow in the next issue after<br />
this! Also Michael Hemmings shares<br />
his art and provided the front and back<br />
cover images. What an Artist! Plus<br />
much much more.<br />
We hope you love the new funky look<br />
to the magazine, we have been working<br />
hard to give it a new lease of life,<br />
freshen things up a little, make us and<br />
you feel summery and get in the mood<br />
for those long hot summer days...oh<br />
wait this is England not the Med!! We<br />
can but dream!<br />
Which leaves me to say thank you to<br />
everyone who has contributed to our<br />
magazine, to those who have supported<br />
us since the beginning a little over<br />
a year ago. It has been an incredible<br />
journey steeped in tears, joy, frustration<br />
(at times), and sheer pride. Sadly it<br />
is a journey I can no longer give 100%<br />
to, so I had to make a hard decision. It<br />
is now time to hand over the reigns to<br />
a new editor. At the time of me writing<br />
this, no one has been chosen so I have<br />
no idea who will be taking over the<br />
production of our magazine. Or even if<br />
anyone will (I do hope it continues), so<br />
without further delay I shall say goodbye<br />
to you all.<br />
Thank you...<br />
Bye<br />
Bye!<br />
Front and back cover images<br />
Michael Hemmings ©
in this issue<br />
Features<br />
Regulars<br />
Hall of Mirrors - Michael Bailey 15-16<br />
Annie Taylor 3 - 4<br />
Chopstinking - Maureen Nathan 19 - 20<br />
ScottScott 18, 34 -35<br />
Michael Hemmings 28 - 30<br />
Andrea Jenkins 25 -27<br />
Caro SaintVire 41 - 50<br />
Stephen Yates 37 -40<br />
Plus Much, Much<br />
More<br />
Front & Back Cover Images © Michael Hemmings, Artist<br />
summer <strong>2016</strong>
Thoughts<br />
From<br />
My<br />
Mountain<br />
Top<br />
Remember the friend I told<br />
you about when I talked<br />
about creative block in the<br />
last issue? The one who was<br />
about to give up painting forever?<br />
Well I have to be honest, she is a bit<br />
like a dog with a bone sometimes and<br />
she’ll worry at a problem until there’s<br />
no bone left and she has to dig up another<br />
one! This week she has been bemoaning<br />
the fact that she flits around<br />
all over the place and can’t stick with<br />
one idea or style. ‘Why don’t you try<br />
them all?’ I said as I reached a near<br />
terminal state of exasperation. Result!<br />
She hadn’t thought of that! Why<br />
shouldn’t she indeed? After all what’s<br />
stopping her? Some unwritten law that<br />
says you MUST focus and develop a<br />
style or forget about being a painter?<br />
Actually I think it all boils down to remembering<br />
the importance of having<br />
‘fun’ with your work. Fun can be a<br />
tad illusive sometimes if you are trying<br />
to make art your business. In fact<br />
many people prefer to remain gifted<br />
amateurs rather than to risk losing the<br />
joy of creativity because they ‘have’ to<br />
create in order to live. But I maintain<br />
that even for the ‘pro’ the fun or joy<br />
of it all has to be an important ingredient<br />
in the process even if there’s a<br />
certain amount of creative angst along<br />
the way. In fact the day I completely<br />
stop feeling that I am getting a modicum<br />
of fun out of it all I will close the<br />
studio door.<br />
One time when I was very stuck another<br />
painter friend of mine was talking about<br />
her work and said: “I do it because it<br />
makes me feel good”. That was a good<br />
reminder at that moment and helped to get<br />
me moving again. I had been agonising<br />
so much about the ‘validity’ of my work<br />
that I had completely lost touch with why<br />
it was I wanted to be an artist in the first<br />
place - painting was something I loved to<br />
do and it gave me pleasure.<br />
Of course for many of us creativity is also<br />
a ‘fix’, a daily necessity which I think has<br />
much in common with daily meditation -<br />
it is all absorbing and focussing and you<br />
can not do without it for very long because<br />
actually when all is said and done, it does<br />
make you feel better and after all one day,<br />
just possibly, you might produce something<br />
really good! What’s so great about<br />
making art is that it is a never ending journey.<br />
There are always new places to discover.<br />
There are no limits of time or destination<br />
on this journey, other than those in<br />
your head.<br />
I love discovering new places both physically<br />
and in my head and in mountain<br />
countryside that possibility is endless.<br />
So when I’m not working I’m walking. I<br />
have access to literally hundreds of paths<br />
through the mountains from our back door<br />
and particularly at this time of year the<br />
pleasure of that daily walk is a marvel and<br />
a wonderful source of replenishment.<br />
With the arrival of Spring we look<br />
down onto a valley planted with miles<br />
of cherry and nectarine trees – a cloud<br />
of pink that stretches for miles. On the<br />
mountain slopes the mimosa has now<br />
given way to vast swathes of brilliant<br />
yellow broom and bushes of wild lavender<br />
providing a veritable orgy of<br />
pollen for hundreds of thousands of<br />
bees. The temperature on the mostly<br />
sunny days is up around the 20’s, the<br />
eagles are soaring, the mountain tops<br />
are glowing – all in all not a bad way<br />
to start off a day in the studio!<br />
By<br />
Annie<br />
Taylor<br />
4
5<br />
ICELAND - A<br />
PHOTOGRAPHER’S<br />
DREAM<br />
Last year my husband and<br />
I celebrated our tenth wedding<br />
anniversary. As part<br />
of that special event we<br />
decided we would book a<br />
holiday to Iceland.<br />
We originally intended to travel there<br />
for Christmas and New Year, however<br />
we were thwarted by leaving it<br />
too late to book, thus we could only<br />
achieve 7 days. In hindsight this was<br />
in our favour, even if a little disappointed<br />
at the time. Travelling to Iceland<br />
in March would be much better...longer<br />
days for starters.<br />
With much preparation, research<br />
and general internet surfing, we were<br />
ready to head off on our Icelandic adventure.<br />
Full of anticipation, excitement<br />
and just not knowing what to<br />
expect once we arrived. We weren’t<br />
disappointed with what awaited us...<br />
I don’t want this article to become a<br />
review or a blog entry/diary of our<br />
time there, rather to share with you<br />
what the country has to offer from a general<br />
tourist and photographer’s experiences.<br />
It’s difficult to know where to start, so<br />
I’m just going to go for it. We hired a 4x4<br />
as part of our package mainly because we<br />
knew we didn’t want to be a part of a group<br />
tour. We wanted the freedom to make our<br />
own choices of the places we wanted to<br />
visit. That was our choice but if you want<br />
to be part of a group then there are plenty<br />
to choose from. We had also booked a<br />
whale watching excursion and snowmobile<br />
ride on a glacier as part of our package<br />
deal. Neither of which we did. Bad weather<br />
and bad planning put paid to those two.<br />
My advice is to wait until you arrive, you<br />
just don’t know what the weather is going<br />
to throw at you.<br />
Right then, that’s the boring bit out of the<br />
way, now to tell you about the holiday and<br />
our experiences! What to say and where to<br />
start? The country is amazing and the Icelanders<br />
we met were friendly. Don’t worry<br />
about any language barriers, English is<br />
their second language. Yes that adds to the<br />
English being lazy language learners theory<br />
but...<br />
We stayed in Rejkyavik for 6 nights, 2<br />
nights in Vik and our last in Grindavik.<br />
We wished we had stayed longer in Vik,<br />
another mistake on our part when booking.<br />
Hey, you live and learn! It wasn’t<br />
such a bad decision we just didn’t know<br />
that we were going to fall in love with the<br />
area of Vik!<br />
We drove and drove but the roads were<br />
easy to traverse, no road rage, no endless<br />
traffic jams, just long open roads. Sometimes<br />
the scenery was a minimalist’s<br />
dream, follow a bend and you’re in mountainous<br />
terrain, then in amongst the moss<br />
fields. Such diversity. Wide open spaces,<br />
with scattered farming communities<br />
with their traditional stone and grass huts<br />
built into the base of mountains. The odd<br />
church here and there with maybe just one<br />
or two houses nearby to serve them. Huge<br />
glacier faces that seem to go on for miles<br />
and miles and miles. Are you starting to<br />
get the visual picture yet?<br />
Our eyes were treated to a veritable feast<br />
of magnificent, epic landscapes and seascapes.<br />
There were times when I just forgot<br />
to use the camera, times when I just<br />
wanted to take it all in and process what<br />
I was seeing, the first time that has ever<br />
happened to me. Mr B commented
Sometimes the scenery was a minimalist’s dream...<br />
7<br />
that I wasn’t taking as many photographs<br />
as when I’m on a walk in Puddletown<br />
Woods! There was just too much to absorb.<br />
There are not enough superlatives<br />
to describe how I felt about the whole<br />
experience.<br />
I could tell you about the places we visited<br />
but then I run the risk of this article<br />
turning into a holiday brochure. Maybe<br />
you should visit them for yourself, create<br />
your own memories, collect your<br />
own thoughts and experiences. Yes, we<br />
visited some of the tourist attractions<br />
like Gulfoss Waterfall, the Geyser, and<br />
Jokulsarlon Glacier Lagoon and Ice<br />
Beach. You just have to do it, don’t you?<br />
We visited Pingvellar National Park and<br />
saw the place where their first parliament<br />
was formed in 900AD, we walked<br />
through the two tectonic plates (I think)<br />
of two continents, we did those touristy<br />
things. The one thing that I noticed was<br />
that it never felt too busy, I never felt like<br />
I had to wait my turn to see and experience<br />
something or some view. Occasionally<br />
people would inconsiderately walk into<br />
my shot without realising it and yes I had<br />
to stop myself from shouting out. The polite<br />
Englishness in me won and so I would<br />
just wait patiently, they were on holiday<br />
too just like me! They were also creating<br />
their own memories.<br />
From an artist’s point of view, there is an<br />
art scene in Iceland. Plenty of galleries in<br />
Reykjavik, many dotted around the country<br />
and of course there are the Museums in<br />
the capital as well. I didn’t get the chance<br />
to look at any of them.<br />
I was too busy taking in and absorbing<br />
everything else!<br />
It just leaves me to say that we fell in love<br />
with Iceland and plan to return in 2018…<br />
By<br />
Sarah<br />
Broome
9 10
By Janis Martin ©<br />
The Saturday Girl<br />
Saturday morning<br />
My dad touched me.<br />
He laid his head in<br />
my lap<br />
He moved his hand<br />
under my skirt.<br />
Sneakily. Quietly. To<br />
the tops of my legs.<br />
My dad touched me.<br />
Over forty years ago<br />
– for the first time.<br />
A different Saturday.<br />
My dad touched me.<br />
Bumping along the<br />
white, chalky lane.<br />
He stopped the<br />
minibus.<br />
He said I could drive<br />
–<br />
I had to sit between<br />
his legs, though.<br />
The Death of Punch & Judy<br />
© Sarah E Broome<br />
Mum’s working<br />
again.<br />
My dad touched me<br />
Over forty years ago.<br />
I got myself a<br />
Saturday job.<br />
Opposite Page<br />
Model: Sophie Johnson<br />
Image: © Andy White<br />
11
Image and poem © ScottScott<br />
We Miss Our Sister...<br />
13 14
“Have you got anything on under<br />
that overcoat?” she asked.<br />
He shook his head. “Good, take it off<br />
and squat over there. Get down on your<br />
right knee with your left hand on your<br />
left knee and hang your other hand<br />
down by your side. Twist your neck to<br />
look over your left shoulder.” He tilted<br />
his head to the side and looked up at<br />
her standing behind him. “Now don’t<br />
move. Stay like that until I say” He<br />
nodded. Suddenly bright lights seared<br />
the darkness pinning him in their glare.<br />
Twenty pairs of eyes stared at him from<br />
all around. He tensed his muscles then<br />
relaxed, breathing slowly, moving his<br />
eyes to look from one face to another<br />
as far as he could. He was used to this.<br />
The lights on him were hot but he didn’t<br />
sweat, his mouth was dry but he stayed<br />
still, not tempted by the glass of water on<br />
the ground near his dangling hand. He was<br />
not young or old, neither fat nor very thin.<br />
Mr Ordinary, he was balding slightly, with<br />
two day’s growth of grey stubble and dark<br />
hair on his chest, belly, groin and forearms.<br />
His penis and testicles hung exposed between<br />
his thighs.<br />
Maybe that was because he rememberedcoming<br />
here years ago when he was young<br />
and wild, running with a pack, a gang. That<br />
had been a bad night, out of control but<br />
it was so long ago and he had long since<br />
put it from his mind. The stare unsettled<br />
him somehow, drilling into his skull like a<br />
dentist, it was giving him a headache. He<br />
blinked and dry swallowed, suppressed a<br />
cough and breathed in more deeply, shifted<br />
his weight slightly. “Can’t you keep still?”<br />
A loud brash voice, probably some banker<br />
wanker. His neck reddened in anger, he<br />
swallowed again, his jaw twitching as he<br />
clamped his back teeth together.<br />
Relax, let your thoughts empty, concentrate<br />
on not moving, mentally massage your<br />
thigh muscle as it aches, meditate away the<br />
pain in your foot, relax. It usually works<br />
but not tonight. Tonight, in here of all<br />
places, his mind is on the tear, racing from<br />
shadow to shadow back into the past, back<br />
to that night when he was here before. Now<br />
his skin feels chilled and clammy, his cock<br />
and balls feel shrivelled, only the hand dangling<br />
at his side feels alive, heavy, tingling<br />
with energy and menace. He feels the pulse<br />
in his wrist and his fingers twitch as if curling<br />
around something long and thin. Face<br />
blank, his eyes stare unfocussed back over<br />
his shoulder, back into the past.<br />
his gaze away but it is dragged back<br />
against his will. The light seems to have<br />
drained from the room so that all he can<br />
see is the outline of heads and shoulders<br />
crowding in towards him. The contours<br />
weave and shift, dancing around him to<br />
the chaotic beat of dry insect rasps and<br />
wet amphibian flops. His vision swims<br />
and swirls of light like sparks from a firework<br />
swarm across his eyes. He wonders<br />
if he is going to faint and then everything<br />
clears as if someone has lifted a blanket<br />
that was suffocating him.<br />
He relaxes, the tension ebbs from his<br />
muscles and he feels back at home in<br />
his skin. “Ten minutes left.” The woman<br />
says, the sounds around him quicken,<br />
more urgent, frantic. On the home<br />
straight now, he tells himself, confident<br />
he can pass the test again, last them out,<br />
stare them down. That cocky feeling that<br />
comes with knowing he is still on top,<br />
better than any of them, just like the old<br />
days. After all they never caught him did<br />
they, never even guessed. How many was<br />
it? Seven? Eight? He’s lost count. After<br />
the first one who cares anyway and the<br />
first one was right here and none of these<br />
tossers has any idea even after staring at<br />
him for more than an hour. It makes him<br />
feel so good his cock is getting pumped.<br />
Hall of Mirrors<br />
by<br />
Michael Bailey<br />
Their noises were surprisingly loud,<br />
scratching, rubbing, rasping, tapping, the<br />
sound of water and glass, metal and wood,<br />
heavy breathing, low moans and mutters.<br />
Their eyes flicked away then back again<br />
to stare as intensely as the lights, hard unblinking<br />
stares, probing his body, peeling<br />
his skin, raking at his hair. No problem. He<br />
was used to it.<br />
An hour and a half, he’d done longer that<br />
than countless times, staying silent and<br />
motionless as they searched for him. He’d<br />
been cramped and cold, wet with sweat and<br />
rain and worse. This was a cakewalk compared<br />
to some stinking ditch or car park.<br />
Funny really, so many hours spent hiding<br />
from the searching eyes and now here he<br />
was exposing himself, like he was thumbing<br />
his nose at the world.<br />
He found that he kept coming back again<br />
and again to one pair of eyes that locked<br />
onto his own, opened unnaturally wide in<br />
an expressionless face. Not someone to<br />
play poker against, he thought. It was hard<br />
to look away from them, impossible not to<br />
look back as soon as he did. He shivered<br />
slightly despite the lights as a thin trickle<br />
cold sweat ran down his ribs.<br />
A roar of motors, racing, over-revving,<br />
tyres squealing then boots smashing on wet<br />
concrete. Running, running, heavy leather<br />
and iron crunching small stones, splashing<br />
oily water, slipping. The smell of exhaust<br />
and fear, adrenaline sweat and excitement,<br />
beer breath, whiskey and cheap aftershave,<br />
tobacco and wet hair, wet clothes. He cannot<br />
close his eyes, he doesn’t need to, he<br />
only sees flashes of shapes in the shadows,<br />
broken street lights and bricks in the road,<br />
the wet slick of rain on the tarmac, pools<br />
of piss and vomit, sodden trash, tangles of<br />
wire.<br />
Outside, in the room, his body is still except<br />
for the slow breathing, the film in his<br />
head is in black and white, flickering images<br />
like an old news reel of a long forgotten<br />
Bank Holiday down on the coast. He wants<br />
to shake his head but the muscles of his<br />
neck keep still, twisted so he gazes back<br />
into the path of those penetrating eyes.<br />
They pull at him, devouring him, travelling<br />
from his head to his shoulders, chest, waist,<br />
cock and along his legs to his feet. They<br />
consume his hunched shape, his tension,<br />
the arm hanging loose, the hand closing.<br />
He searches for the eyes, those eyes but<br />
they are too strong to keep looking at now,<br />
he shifts<br />
“Thank you, time’s up” She says just in<br />
time. He casually picks up his overcoat<br />
and holds it in front of him as he stands<br />
and stretches. He eases his shoulders and<br />
looks around the room. It’s like being in a<br />
hall of mirrors, he can see his body from<br />
all angles, crouching as if ready to spring,<br />
looking back as if ready to run or to spin<br />
around. Some of the pictures distort him<br />
making him unbalanced, awkward, grotesque.<br />
They always do. Some make him<br />
look fine like a dancer or an athlete. A<br />
couple tell the middle-aged truth accurately.<br />
One is still turned away, the one in front<br />
of those intrusive eyes. As he takes a step<br />
towards it the noise in the room quietens.<br />
Now everyone is looking with him as the<br />
board turns and the picture comes into<br />
view. His shape is there, his crouched<br />
body thin, naked, raw. The face looking<br />
back is young, savage under long lank<br />
hair. The figure is drawn in stark crisp<br />
outlines as if lit by a searchlight or a forensic<br />
photographer’s flash. It is colourless,<br />
black and grey defining skin, muscle<br />
and hair. Colourless except where, in<br />
the hand, the silver glint of a cutthroat<br />
blade is distorted by a wide smear of<br />
fresh bright blood.<br />
15<br />
Image © Michael Bailey
Zara McQueen ©<br />
Zara McQueen ©<br />
Grandmother sister daughter and wife<br />
All of these aspects you share in my life<br />
Constantly with me you faithfully stand<br />
If ever I need you’re holding my hand<br />
Distant yet touching caressing your face<br />
Forgetting all cares so safe your embrace<br />
Although as light grows my feelings are torn<br />
Prepared for the world I approach each new dawn<br />
Grandmother sister daugther and wife...<br />
Image and poem © ScottScott<br />
17 18
Maureen Nathan: “Chopstinking”<br />
Mark Making with Chopsticks & Ink<br />
Tulips, ink, chopstick and watercolour<br />
Colmers Hill, ink, chopstick and chalk in sketchbook<br />
I’m a painter/printmaker who works<br />
figuratively. Drawing is key to all my<br />
work and I love lines and marks.<br />
About five years ago I felt that my drawings were<br />
tight and stale and it worried me. How was I going to<br />
loosen up and free up my mark making? I tried various<br />
exercises that suggested new ways to engage with<br />
drawing. Nothing really seemed to work for me until<br />
one day I was looking at some chopsticks I’d brought<br />
home from my daughter’s birthday at a Japanese restaurant.<br />
I took one of them and stuck it in a bowl of<br />
Indian ink and started drawing.<br />
The chopstick isn’t made to hold ink so it was a<br />
case of constantly dipping it in the ink and drawing<br />
and holding it sideways or straight on to stop<br />
it from dripping down the paper or into my hand.<br />
No time to think, just get those marks on the paper.<br />
Hold the chopstick sideways to fill in large areas<br />
and using various pressures get thin or thick lines.<br />
Use the ‘wrong’ paper and the lines swell up thickly<br />
– if it looks good, then do it on purpose!<br />
I want to make drawings that capture something of<br />
the sitter or motif and at the same time acknowledge<br />
that it is 2D and show the workings of it, even<br />
the ‘mistakes’. They show my part in it and I think<br />
give an energy and emotion to the image.<br />
I have a diploma in portrait painting from the<br />
Heatherley School of Fine Art but seldom paint<br />
portraits traditionally now, instead I draw them<br />
with ink and chopstick and use pastel, paint or<br />
watercolour in addition to that.<br />
I teach drawing using ink and chopstick with<br />
the aim being to freely make marks, looking<br />
and drawing, and looking again. Participants<br />
loosen up, ‘feel’ their drawings and realise at<br />
the end of the sessions that whether a likeness<br />
of a sitter or replica of the motif is achieved<br />
they have created a pleasing set of marks.<br />
They have also learned a new way of approaching<br />
drawing which they can incorporate into<br />
their own way of working.<br />
As a note to anyone who wants to try this, use a<br />
wooden chopstick. The plastic ones don’t hold<br />
any ink and result in huge frustration!<br />
Maureen Nathan<br />
www.maureennathan.com<br />
19 20
ART<br />
EXHIBITION<br />
CHURCH HOUSE<br />
High Street, Wimborne, BH21 1HT<br />
Monday 8 th - Tuesday 16 th August<br />
10.30am - 4.30pm<br />
Stairlift access available<br />
Entry by donation<br />
Leukaemia Educating and Fundraising<br />
www.leafcharity.com<br />
Registered Charity no.1113696<br />
Outsider © Ian Rowden<br />
21 22
Wild Sketching with Sarah Humby<br />
I love sketching<br />
outside, and I do it<br />
often, come rain or<br />
shine.<br />
I used to paint mainly from photographs<br />
and it wasn’t until I visited<br />
a wonderful exhibition at The Fine<br />
Foundation Gallery at Durlston Castle<br />
by Tony Kerins; a great advocate of<br />
sketching, that I became inspired to<br />
start drawing while out and about and<br />
learned that a sketch is vastly more<br />
useful as a reference tool for studio<br />
work.<br />
How I work has changed a great deal<br />
since I got into the wild sketching habit.<br />
It has become a major part of my<br />
art practice. Work made and developed<br />
from sketching in the field is invested<br />
with my own personality from<br />
the very get go.<br />
You can focus on the things that attract<br />
you and which you want to explore<br />
later and develop into new work. You<br />
learn how to problem solve and record<br />
things quickly which is a great way of<br />
23<br />
loosening up and allowing your creativity<br />
to ‘flow’. Soon you begin to develop your<br />
own personal ‘language’ when recording<br />
and documenting the world around you. I<br />
regularly sketch with a friend and it’s always<br />
interesting to compare the different<br />
ways we depict the same views.<br />
Emotional response David Hockney calls<br />
it.<br />
The very act of sketching requires you to<br />
tune in and properly look at the subject<br />
and make personal decisions about what<br />
you want to say about it. And that process<br />
is the starting point from which you can<br />
later translate and develop finished work.<br />
However beautiful a photograph may be<br />
it will never do that work for you.<br />
Sketching grounds you firmly in the environment<br />
and requires you to engage with<br />
it. You need to be prepared sometimes to<br />
battle with the elements. Wind and rain<br />
should be no match for the well prepared<br />
sketcher. Tony Kerrins even sketches in<br />
darkness. Some of the worst weather creates<br />
some of the most fantastic opportunities<br />
for drawing and recording in whatever<br />
medium you like. You will need<br />
sunglasses and sunblock sometimes but<br />
you will also need a woolly hat, gloves<br />
and a good set of waterproofs.<br />
On a recent trip to the ridge above<br />
Durlston Lighthouse I needed all of<br />
the above in the space of three hours!<br />
Only the threat of lightning strike<br />
made me consider moving to lower<br />
ground. I call it wild sketching for<br />
good reason.<br />
It’s useful to have a bag dedicated to<br />
your sketching trips with everything<br />
in that you need. Remember it’s going<br />
to be windy so take lots of clips!<br />
Watercolour is the perfect sketching<br />
medium in a lot of ways. It is so transportable<br />
and convenient and obviously<br />
perfect for recording even the most<br />
subtle of colours (and boy don’t the<br />
colours change quickly when you are<br />
out in the real world!) But you can use<br />
whatever you find easiest to document<br />
the scene. I use pastels because they<br />
are direct and dynamic (and, truth be<br />
told, because I am not very confident<br />
with watercolour).<br />
So go to it. Get out into the<br />
big wide Dorset world; it’s<br />
one of the most inspirational<br />
counties in the UK<br />
for the intrepid artist and<br />
it’s all just waiting to be<br />
sketched!<br />
joyce<br />
ringrose<br />
sarah<br />
humby<br />
coastal<br />
colours
Andrea Jenkins takes a look at...<br />
The Muse and The Artist:<br />
Camille Claudel<br />
The idea of the muse originates<br />
in Greek mythology,<br />
nine goddesses, daughters of Zeus and<br />
the Titan Mnemosyne (Goddess of memory),<br />
who inspired literature, science and<br />
the arts. Each had an attribute but none is<br />
applied to the visual arts.<br />
The current concept of an artist’s muse<br />
has evolved from this and covers a huge<br />
range of sorts and conditions of people<br />
and other anthropomorphic sources<br />
of inspiration. We tend to think of an<br />
artist’s muse as being model, lover, an<br />
emotional involvement and a fascination<br />
to the artist; often an obsession. This<br />
is particularly the association from the<br />
mid-nineteenth century onwards with the<br />
rise of non-commissioned art and groups<br />
of artists such as the Impressionists and<br />
pre-Raphaelites with shared ideals and<br />
styles … oh and shared muses too!<br />
The muses of the 19th century came from<br />
a variety of backgrounds and several<br />
were well educated, surprisingly liberated<br />
women who were also artists.<br />
One such was Camille Claudel who was<br />
Rodin’s muse for several years in the late<br />
19th century. I was surprised to find that<br />
coming from an ordinary middle class<br />
family she was encouraged in her artistic<br />
talent as a sculptor by her father and was<br />
allowed to study at a women’s art academy<br />
where she was tutored by the sculptor<br />
Alfred Boucher. When he left to work in<br />
Italy, she was introduced to Rodin who<br />
took her as an assistant along with her<br />
fellow student and friend Jessie<br />
Lipscomb.<br />
Her own work, of a neo-classical style, was initially<br />
intimate portraits of family and friends.<br />
She acquired the skills of modelling the human<br />
form which became very useful to Rodin in his<br />
studio. Although Claudel exhibited her sculptures<br />
in the Salon de Paris over the 20 years she<br />
was associated with Rodin, they were always<br />
overshadowed by his monumental creations.<br />
Rodin was was captivated by this beautiful,<br />
precocious nineteen year old who had a passion<br />
for art that equaled his own. She modelled for<br />
him, became his lover and muse but more importantly<br />
became his most prominent assistant<br />
as she helped to compose the huge sculpture<br />
‘The Gates of Hell’ and it is also thought that<br />
she sculpted the hands and feet of the ‘Burghers<br />
of Calais’.<br />
There was mutual inspiration between Claudel<br />
and Rodin during this period and whilst it might<br />
be assumed that the young Claudel would learn<br />
from Rodin as she worked in his studio, there is<br />
evidence that he took ideas from her work also.<br />
Her sculpture of the Girl with the Sheaf is one<br />
example, closely emulated by Rodin’s stone<br />
carving of the same figure.<br />
This relationship combining the professional<br />
and emotional was not smooth and while<br />
Claudel appeared to accept Rodin’s womanising<br />
under the guise of frequently requiring<br />
fresh models for his work, she was more<br />
disturbed by his long term relationship with<br />
Rose Beuret with whom he had a son. Rodin<br />
refused to give up this relationship as Claudel<br />
asked him to constantly and he eventually<br />
married Beuret in 1917, the year they both<br />
died.<br />
Claudel found this love triangle increasingly<br />
difficult to live with and it gradually ate<br />
away at her creativity and sanity. She began<br />
to work obsessively often creating sculptures<br />
that reflected her personal circumstances and<br />
then destroy what she had done. The studio<br />
she eventually rented close to Rodin’s was<br />
her haven and she became more and more of<br />
a recluse living in poverty. She became increasingly<br />
dishevelled, filthy and unpredictable.<br />
her neighbours gave her a wide berth<br />
and warned their children about her. Eventually,<br />
her family realised that she could no<br />
longer care for herself and her brother had<br />
her interned in a mental asylum in 1913 at<br />
the age of 39. That was the end of her career<br />
as a sculptor.<br />
Diagnosed with a persecution complex and<br />
with a paranoia about Rodin, she remained<br />
there until her death in1943. It is a sad story<br />
and I have found a variety of contradictions<br />
while researching her life but most constant<br />
is the description of destruction wrought by<br />
emotional entanglement and perceived betrayal.<br />
It is easy to reflect and wonder why<br />
Claudel let herself be seduced by Rodin,<br />
knowing that he already had a long term partner<br />
and a string of models and mistresses. It<br />
was almost certainly very difficult to live independently<br />
as a female artist at that time,<br />
financially of course, as it still is for any artist,<br />
but also because of social restraints for<br />
women at that time. It is surprising that her<br />
middle class parents allowed her to become<br />
a sculptor at all rather than insisting on the<br />
conventional course of marriage and family<br />
life. Perhaps they thought Rodin would marry<br />
her but that is conjecture.<br />
25 26
27<br />
Her story makes for great cinematography<br />
and there are two films about<br />
her, a french biography ‘Camille<br />
Claudel’ released in 1988 which was<br />
nominated for two Oscars and a more<br />
recent one released in 2013, ‘Camille<br />
Claudel 1915’ starring Juliette Binoche.<br />
If you have a chance to visit the<br />
Rodin Museum in Paris, you will find<br />
examples of her work and acknowledgement<br />
of her influence on Rodin<br />
there. Meanwhile, beware becoming<br />
a muse in the 19th century way, especially<br />
if you have aspirations to being<br />
creative yourself, unless you are able<br />
to rise above the emotional subservience<br />
such a role often requires.<br />
On-line acknowledgements<br />
“Camille Claudel” www.musee-rodin.fr<br />
Artist Profile: Camille Claudel,” www.nmwa.org<br />
“How Rodin’s Tragic Lover Shaped the history of<br />
sculpture” www.independent.co.uk<br />
Michael Hemmings<br />
“My main goal with a piece of work is to provoke<br />
an emotional reaction from the viewer. “
When you look back on your<br />
life there are always regrets.<br />
One of mine is that I left it until<br />
I was in my forties to try<br />
and earn a living as an artist.<br />
I’ve always loved art, it was my joint<br />
favourite subject at school along with<br />
woodwork but when I left school life took<br />
me in a different direction. About seven<br />
years ago circumstances meant that I had<br />
to find another job. I’ve always worked<br />
with my hands so naturally I wanted to<br />
do something creative, I started collecting<br />
driftwood and making mirror frames.<br />
This led to making other items from driftwood.<br />
I started painting on driftwood,<br />
then wood panels, then canvas.<br />
I currently favour working on panels as I<br />
like a solid surface to withstand vigorous<br />
brush and knife work.<br />
I’m classed as self taught but who can really<br />
claim to have taught themself? With the<br />
abundance of source material around nowadays<br />
you can study any artist’s methods<br />
and processes learning as you research and<br />
experiment along the way. I much prefer<br />
trying to work things out myself by studying<br />
other artist’s work than being shown<br />
how to do things from a series of instructions.<br />
I feel that finding your own way helps<br />
you to develop a greater understanding of<br />
methods and principles. It doesn’t work for<br />
everyone but it suits me fine. In a way I’m<br />
being taught by the best teachers there have<br />
ever been.<br />
A common question is “which artist is<br />
your favourite?” This is a difficult one as<br />
I like and appreciate many artists, but if<br />
I had to name three, at the moment they<br />
would be Van Gogh, Picasso & Turner.<br />
Turner’s skies are just something else.<br />
The atmosphere he captured in his work<br />
virtually jumps off the wall at you and<br />
grabs your attention. Van Gogh’s energy<br />
and determination to succeed were<br />
remarkable and this comes through in<br />
his wonderful work. It’s such a shame<br />
he was never appreciated to the full extent<br />
when he was alive. His paintings<br />
certainly thrive today with the life that<br />
was so prematurely snuffed out in such<br />
a sad way. Picasso was a natural artist<br />
who developed art in an unusual and<br />
unique way pushing the boundaries of<br />
his art at the time. I suppose these are the<br />
marks I aim for and it’s this inspiration<br />
that drives me on .<br />
My main goal with a piece of work is to<br />
provoke an emotional reaction from the<br />
viewer. I think skies can do this well because<br />
a sky can so easily reflect human<br />
feelings like peace, excitement, foreboding<br />
and darkness and people can relate<br />
to these. With a foreboding sky I will<br />
often provide the viewer with a glimpse<br />
of blue or bright sky giving a feeling of<br />
hope beyond the despair.<br />
Over the last six months or so I’ve worked<br />
from a limited palette. I find that this really<br />
unifies my work and makes<br />
me think more about how to achieve a certain<br />
hue without reaching for a tube of ready made<br />
pigment. It’s really interesting what colours<br />
you produce along the way when you mix<br />
your own. The only trouble is remembering<br />
to note down how you did it, otherwise forget<br />
trying to repeat it exactly!<br />
When it comes to subject matter, landscapes<br />
are my chosen area of concentration along<br />
with seascapes and occasionally some urbanscapes.<br />
Getting outside into the elements is<br />
important to me and I like to record the feel<br />
of a place with sketches and reference photos<br />
to work from when I’m back in the studio. I<br />
recently saw an artists sketches which were<br />
shown alongside his finished paintings and on<br />
these sketches he noted down all of his sensory<br />
observations such as sounds, smells, feel<br />
of the air, brightness etc, in fact anything that<br />
would aid him in his accurate portrayal of<br />
the scene. It brought home to me that all<br />
these things are necessary because they<br />
are the vital ingredients that make up the<br />
finished work and breathe life into a painting,<br />
there’s more to it than just projecting<br />
an image, it’s about projecting a whole experience.<br />
With recent work finished for a summer<br />
exhibition I’m now thinking ahead to my<br />
next series of paintings. I have some ideas<br />
which I’m working on. That’s what I love<br />
about producing art, you’re always aiming<br />
for your next goal and looking for some<br />
new angle or perspective. There’s always<br />
something new to strive for on the horizon,<br />
and that’s the good thing about the<br />
horizon, you can never reach it but it’s always<br />
in sight.<br />
29 30
Stephen<br />
P o u l t o n<br />
speaks to us<br />
about his<br />
Exposing<br />
for the Light<br />
series.<br />
Earth’s Atmoshere © Stephen Poulton<br />
Exposing for the light series<br />
has been a slow progression, It is,<br />
in what I cannot see into, that fascinates<br />
me, so much beauty goes<br />
by in one long eternal moment, it is<br />
us that have split the moment into<br />
segments of seconds, so I study and<br />
wait until the magic in the universe<br />
taps me inside.<br />
And of course because the last thing I am<br />
is selfish, I have to share with the world, to<br />
help make a better world, to give others the<br />
opportunity I was given in that moment, it<br />
was lovely inspiration.<br />
Exposing for the light is very rewarding,<br />
so much beauty remains hidden when we<br />
look away from the light. These Images<br />
are for me to show others just how beautiful<br />
life is, and yet normally we would have<br />
to look away.<br />
Photography can give so much in so many<br />
ways if we have the inspiration to discover<br />
its possibilities, this is what I hope<br />
exposing for the light series does for people.<br />
I have included Two Images from my<br />
Skylife series, I hope you will like them.<br />
you can maybe use this one for another<br />
article in the future if you like, as I know<br />
the Gravity Image is the one that’s most<br />
intriguing to you.<br />
When I took the Image Galaxy in the<br />
clouds, I had no Idea it was there for a<br />
while, in a folder on my desktop, waiting<br />
for me to find time to open it.<br />
When I processed the Image I pushed the<br />
colour to bring out what I was seeing,<br />
and as I looked at it I saw a Galaxy in the<br />
clouds, I love gazing into our universe, It is<br />
one magical melting pot of Inspiration, it’s<br />
purpose so scintillatingly beautiful, and<br />
unfathomable at the same time, If we are<br />
all prepared to listen to our Nature within<br />
us, she will guide us gently through the<br />
maze of questions, well this is how it feels<br />
to me, my connection with Nature, I love<br />
her dearly.<br />
When I look upon this Galaxy in the clouds,<br />
I see our Galaxy the Milky Way there instead,<br />
Then for me the Image takes on a<br />
whole new life of its own. I put forward<br />
that our Galaxy and all others, exist not on<br />
a space time imagined surface, not like sitting<br />
on the surface tension of water. We are<br />
floating as a cloud does according to something<br />
I have still yet to discover, Gravity I<br />
believe to be a kind of magnetism.<br />
Each Atom has density, and like smoking<br />
takes its toll on our longs over time, so the<br />
Atoms cumulative effect by pulling together<br />
over time builds a planet with a lot<br />
of cumulative Magnetism, Gravity isn’t a<br />
constant, it varies according to how many<br />
atoms it consists of, after all, what tells an<br />
atom that it needs to be a part of a tree, an<br />
eye.<br />
We seek to control our world, yet our<br />
answers only become visible when control<br />
is what we let go of.<br />
Nature reflects through all her elements,<br />
whispers to us all, I see her also in the<br />
Flames<br />
Creation Image also gave me lovely<br />
Inspiration on our universe when I processed<br />
it. It is 100% a candle flame, I<br />
just agitated the flame and then just<br />
changed the colour temperature.<br />
For me Creation is just that, Light and<br />
heat bring life, and for me has shown itself<br />
in the Flames also, It’s been a great<br />
ride and I hope it continues to be, as life<br />
is precious.<br />
What we see as heavy has a lot of gravity,<br />
It;s the cumulative effect of magnetism<br />
that causes gravity, And our<br />
Galaxy floats in its more understandable<br />
place, just like this Galaxy in the<br />
clouds<br />
Well maybe.<br />
Creation © Stephen Poulton<br />
Exposing for the Light © Stephen Poulton<br />
31 Galaxy in the Clouds © Stephen Poulton<br />
32
Small Signs<br />
Small signs light my way<br />
Enveloped in your mist<br />
All life ends today<br />
The object of our tryst<br />
Heartbeats pull me forward<br />
Your desire tells me so<br />
Steel love holds me tightly<br />
Inner screaming rises, no.<br />
You smile, you grasp me tightly<br />
You press it to my hand<br />
I hear you say ‘I love you’<br />
My heart, it turns to sand<br />
Cold heat against my temple<br />
I hold my promise against yours<br />
I know you’ll hold our bargain<br />
We’re on a different course<br />
Arena Theatre return in July and August with this intriguing and completely unique<br />
musical which explores the five year relationship between rising novelist, Jamie, and<br />
struggling actress, Cathy. What makes this musical so special is that Cathy’s story is<br />
told in reverse chronological order and Jamie’s is told in chronological order. With a<br />
heady mix of musical styles, from pop and jazz through to Latin, Folk and The Blues,<br />
this riveting modern musical masterpiece will appeal to all.<br />
Presently we will be playing at Forest Arts Centre, New Milton / The Shelley Theatre,<br />
Bournemouth / The Mowlem Theatre, Swanage.<br />
If you know of any venue in Weymouth / Dorchester who would take us then we would<br />
love to know.<br />
I feel your muscles stiffen<br />
Time slows, death takes my hand<br />
But I leave you, unforgiven<br />
I fall, alone, you stand.<br />
© ScottScott<br />
Many thanks<br />
Paul Nelson<br />
34
i used to be afraid of shadows<br />
I used to be afraid of shadows. Now<br />
I watch you from them. Enveloped<br />
in guilt I see each sigh, each gasp<br />
for breath, your shoulders shake<br />
with grief. I see. I have no choice.<br />
We knew it couldn’t continue, such<br />
passion, fire and need, hollowing<br />
us, leaving us bereft of future. You<br />
knew, you decided, you told me. At<br />
first I laughed, we would find a way,<br />
a plateau, where we would be saved.<br />
We grasped each other. Kissed.<br />
Felt our world ending and beginning.<br />
I think I might have pitied<br />
you then.<br />
In our embrace of life and death,<br />
we brought the cold metal to each<br />
other’s temples and kissed again.<br />
We would rescue each other from<br />
this life.<br />
Now.<br />
You insisted, you persuaded, you<br />
wanted us to be together forever,<br />
to end forever. I gave in, but doubt<br />
gnawed at me as you prepared.<br />
Guns you said. Together. One shot<br />
each. Together forever.<br />
I don’t know where you got them<br />
from. A friend you said. Tonight<br />
you said. Tonight we say goodbye<br />
and live forever. I knew I couldn’t. I<br />
knew you were wrong, but you were<br />
so strong I agreed.<br />
Yes. Together. Forever.<br />
Small signs marked our path, memories<br />
of times before. We arrived,<br />
the clearing dark in the moonlight.<br />
You gave me my gun. You didn’t<br />
notice the change in me.<br />
One shot, one lifeless falling eternity.<br />
It was the only way I could tell<br />
you, to stop you. I thought it<br />
would end it. I was wrong.<br />
I looked at my lifeless body from<br />
the shadows. I saw your scream<br />
of grief and guilt and despair. My<br />
gun never fired, yours did.<br />
You killed me. I let you live. And<br />
now I watch you, dying with your<br />
guilt from the shadows.<br />
Together<br />
For ever<br />
by ScottScott<br />
Flamingo © Gekko Art<br />
35 36
Dorset Artist in Italy - Stephen Yates<br />
I recently asked a friend, what they<br />
would expect from a painting holiday<br />
in Italy? This was her response…”I’m<br />
not really sure. I’ve always been such<br />
a sort of rogue artist, doing my own<br />
thing, alone, that I think it would be a<br />
very new and interesting experience to<br />
do art with other people.<br />
“I’ve always been proud of being self taught too. I<br />
paid attention to other artists and used common sense<br />
and instinct to figure out techniques. I learned how<br />
to work with power tools and could joint wood and<br />
make furniture in woods, smelt, heat, twist and turn<br />
metals by the age of fourteen. I learned to sculpt by<br />
sculpting wood. I learned to paint a mural by painting<br />
a mural. I learned to throw pots and hand build in<br />
ceramics, by doing just that: doing. Call me a handson<br />
learner. I’ve bought a few books. Booklets really.<br />
The rest was trial and error. It was at times, a lonely<br />
education.<br />
But really, what I wouldn’t have given back then to be<br />
taken under the wing of an aged master artist (traditional<br />
and digital, if you’ve got one) willing to teach<br />
me all he has gleaned before he departs this mortal<br />
coil, my very own Guru. I could place an ad in the<br />
newspaper: ‘Humble fast-learning disciple seeks austere<br />
but patient old master willing to share his or her<br />
genius. Fee negotiable. Have supplies. Available immediately.<br />
Maggie Hampton via the website link for<br />
Must tolerate cats and classic artistic neurosis. Please<br />
Traditionally in Renaissance Italy, Leonardo da Vinci’s<br />
father, after seeing his son’s talent, apprenticed<br />
him to Andrea del Verrocchio. Verrocchio had studied<br />
under the great artist Donatello. Michelangelo was<br />
apprenticed to the most fashionable painter in Florence<br />
at the time, Domenico Ghirlandaio. They lived<br />
with their masters, under constant instruction, honing<br />
their skills. And just as it is in any area of study, be it<br />
science or psychology, the torch was passed and the<br />
flame more refined. My intension is to offer a structure<br />
for artists to be able to develop their painting with<br />
a balance of instruction and demonstration and given<br />
real time to develop.<br />
Arriving on a late flight to Pescara, Italy, in May<br />
this year, there was a sudden glimpse of this beautiful<br />
ancient hilltop Town of Capestrano. The hilltop<br />
fort is illuminated and a striking image against the<br />
warm night sky. The Villa Casa Dei Papaveri is situated<br />
right opposite the beautiful hilltop Town. For<br />
me, there was immediately an overwhelming sense of<br />
peacefulness and tranquility in this ancient location<br />
and the very next morning wondering onto the terrace,<br />
my vision was complete, some absolutely stunning<br />
views of Capestrano, with its Medieval Castle<br />
and Churches.<br />
The plan is to create a ‘hands on’ Painting Holiday<br />
in September <strong>2016</strong> and May 2017 from this beautiful<br />
location. If you and your friends are interested in actual<br />
dates and would like to book then please contact<br />
Maggie Hampton via the website link for an enquiry.<br />
Or contact the tutor Stephen Yates 07720892944 to<br />
ask specific questions about the painting course in<br />
both Watercolours, and Acrylics.<br />
Capestrano Painting holidays – Where you stay and what<br />
it costs.<br />
You stay in bright, well-decorated bedrooms in a beautiful<br />
hillside Villa. Casa Dei Papaceri. We’ve put in new, comfy<br />
mattresses and original artwork on the walls.<br />
There is a large communal sitting room and a kitchen/<br />
dining room for leisurely breakfasts and mouth-watering<br />
evening meals. There are facilities at the Villa for personal<br />
tea-/coffee-making.<br />
EVERYTHING is included in the cost of your holiday:<br />
• all tuition fees and accommodation<br />
• local transportation (including transfers to and<br />
from Pescara or Rome airport; including our mid week excursion<br />
to local restaurants and riverside painting venues.<br />
• all meals including breakfast, gourmet picnics<br />
on location, pre-dinner aperitifs, dinner at the mill or at<br />
small and friendly local restaurants with regional Italian<br />
dishes and wines. A BBQ in a remote location in the<br />
mountains...<br />
All you have to do is to get to Pescara or Rome airports,<br />
and we do the rest! What it costs<br />
Our policy is not to discriminate against people coming<br />
on their own by charging a vast supplement for single<br />
rooms. So, if you are coming on your own you can have<br />
your own individual bedroom. We would, however, like<br />
friends (and married couples) to share if it is at all possible<br />
and there will be a saving if you do so. And if you share<br />
with a non-participating partner he or she will enjoy a generous<br />
discount of £200 for the painting holiday. The Villa<br />
is arranged as four self-contained bedrooms three en suite,<br />
and one shared, but, during a painting course, we all come<br />
together and we use the big reception room in<br />
our principal apartment as our communal meeting place, or<br />
the wonderful terrace outside.<br />
Because The Villa is a building of historic importance and<br />
listed by the Italian government, we cannot make major<br />
alterations, so some guests will have to share a bathroom<br />
with either one or two other people. BUT we do have three<br />
bedrooms, each with en suite shower rooms for those who<br />
want their own bathrooms. The cost is £895 All prices include<br />
the painting courses.<br />
* Single: £955 single occupancy<br />
Deposit and balance<br />
A deposit of £250 per person is required to confirm your<br />
booking. The balance for your holiday is due eight weeks<br />
before arrival. Please note our cancellation conditions set<br />
out below. (We recommend that you take out normal holiday<br />
insurance, including cancellation insurance.)<br />
How to make your payment<br />
We ask you to make your payment by direct bank transfer<br />
and we will give you our bank details for you to make this<br />
transaction.<br />
Cancellations: A handling charge of £75 per person per<br />
course will be levied on all cancellations. In addition, if<br />
you have to cancel four to eight weeks before departure, a<br />
charge of 40%of the total price is payable; at two to four<br />
weeks, 60%; at one to two weeks, 80%; at less than one<br />
week, 90%. Once the course has started, 100% is payable.<br />
We reserve the right to cancel any course at two months’<br />
notice and, where possible, provide you with an alternative<br />
course.<br />
37 call today.’…”<br />
38<br />
Getting there<br />
For our UK guests:<br />
You can book your own flights (there are good connections<br />
from Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, East Midlands,
Birmingham, Leeds/Bradford, Manchester and Bristol<br />
and an increasing number of other UK airports).<br />
We pick you up at Pescara or Rome airport on the first<br />
day given your flight details. Our departure times from<br />
Capestrano on the last Monday are after breakfast, usually<br />
between 7.30 am and 9.30 am. (It takes between<br />
an hour-and-a-quarter and an hour-and-a-half to get to<br />
Pescara airport.) Rome is two hours.<br />
If you arrive or leave outside these times we can arrange<br />
transportation for you but you will have to pay for it.<br />
You may decide to come by car. You can park at the<br />
Villa and we’ll give you full instructions on how to get<br />
there.<br />
Typical painting holiday’s itinerary September <strong>2016</strong>.<br />
The following is a typical painting course itinerary but<br />
it will all depend on the weather and other unpredictable<br />
factors. According to the weather, we’ll pick the<br />
best locations for each day’s painting excursion.<br />
Itinerary<br />
Monday<br />
* Pick-up at Pescara or Rome airport<br />
* Light lunch/afternoon snack.<br />
* Settling in at Villa; exploring the nearby town.<br />
* Facilities for making tea and coffee at the Villa.<br />
* Aperitifs at the Villa.<br />
* Dinner at local restaurant including wine.<br />
Tuesday<br />
* Breakfast at the Villa<br />
* Painting around the Villa, with individual tuition.<br />
* Light buffet lunch at the Villa<br />
* Painting around the Villa, with individual tuition.<br />
* Facilities for making tea and coffee at the Villa<br />
* Aperitifs and dinner at the Villa, including wine.<br />
Wednesday<br />
* Breakfast at the Villa<br />
* Short walk uphill to Capestrano: impressive castle with village<br />
nestling around it.<br />
* Painting at Capestrano, with individual tuition.<br />
* Packed Lunch in Capestrano<br />
* Painting at Capestrano, with individual tuition.<br />
* Walk back downhill to the Villa<br />
* Facilities for making tea and coffee at the mill.<br />
* Aperitifs and dinner at local restaurant.<br />
Thursday<br />
* Breakfast at the Mill.<br />
* Transport to riverside<br />
* Painting in and around Riverside with individual tuition.<br />
* Panino, ice cream and coffee at the Ricci gelateria in Popoli.<br />
* Painting in and around riverside with individual tuition.<br />
* Pick up late afternoon.<br />
* Facilities for making tea and coffee at the mill.<br />
* Aperitifs and dinner at the mill.<br />
Friday - (No formal tuition this day)<br />
* Breakfast at the Mill.<br />
* Excursion: to Roccacasale (at breakfast time we’ll provide<br />
materials for your own picnic lunch or, if you prefer, you can<br />
buy a snack or a more formal lunch when you are out -<br />
* Sightseeing and Individual sketching around Roccacasale<br />
* Packed lunch or buy yourself lunch or a snack<br />
* Early afternoon travel back<br />
* Facilities for making tea and coffee at the Villa.<br />
* Aperitifs at Villa. Then a Pizza at a local restaurant.<br />
39 40<br />
Saturday<br />
* Breakfast at the Mill.<br />
* Transport to local sustainable farm with animals...sheep,<br />
goats, pigs, free-range chickens and children!<br />
* Picnic lunch at the farm<br />
* Painting at the farm with stunning landscape views across<br />
the mountains and Capestrano in the distance, with individual<br />
tuition.<br />
* BBQ and wine at the farm provided by hosts Ralph and Ninka.<br />
Sunday<br />
* Breakfast at the Villa<br />
* Transport to local beauty spot.<br />
* Painting in the locality, with individual tuition: ancient houses<br />
and church, spectacular mountain views, valleys, hill-top<br />
villages, olive groves, etc.<br />
* Special lunch at the local gourmet restaurant (local specialities),<br />
including wines.<br />
* Painting with individual tuition.<br />
* Pick up late afternoon.<br />
* Facilities for making tea and coffee at the Villa.<br />
* Aperitifs and farewell dinner at the Villa.<br />
Monday<br />
* Breakfast at the Villa.<br />
* Transport to Pisa airport between 8.30am and 9.30am.<br />
* Those with late flights may leave their bags at the airport<br />
and take a (very short) taxi ride to Pescara or Rome for sightseeing.<br />
What you need to bring<br />
Your tutor will be in touch well before the course with a suggested<br />
list of materials, but we are generally very relaxed and<br />
there’s no obligation to bring anything specific. To save you<br />
being overloaded on your flight we can provide:<br />
* portable chairs<br />
* drawing boards<br />
* water bottle<br />
* rags<br />
* easels<br />
As for clothing the days are usually warm to hot, but it can<br />
rain, sometimes for a day or two at a time. So we recommend<br />
a lightweight waterproof coat and perhaps an umbrella to protect<br />
your work. The evenings might be a little cooler, so warm<br />
pullovers or tops are a good idea. Sensible shoes for walking<br />
are also recommended.<br />
You may wish to contact the tutor Stephen Yates 07720892944<br />
to ask specific questions about the painting course in both Watercolours,<br />
Acrylics and Oils.
Coffee & Cake with<br />
Caro SaintVire<br />
Dorset Goes to Sussex<br />
41 42
Caro SaintVire grew up<br />
in a family of artists. Her<br />
mother is a portrait painter<br />
with clients all around<br />
the globe, her grandfather<br />
was a painter and<br />
sculptor. Caro is an artist<br />
in her own right.<br />
I caught up with Caro to<br />
find out a little more about<br />
the lady behind the paintings...and<br />
of course a slice<br />
of cake!<br />
Sarah: You come from a family<br />
of artists, what was it like growing<br />
up surrounded by art?<br />
Caro: Well, of course, I thought it was<br />
perfectly normal to grow up in a studio<br />
with a mother painting at her easel,<br />
stretching canvases and having<br />
portrait clients in for sittings. I was<br />
dressed up often, holding flowers,<br />
cuddling kittens, looking a bit wistful,<br />
to model for the prints and cards<br />
that she did as well as her portrait<br />
career … the other day I came across<br />
some of those old photographs - all<br />
shot in black and white… so 1970’s!<br />
One of our favourite outings was to<br />
go to the National Gallery where my<br />
44
would take me around the grand rooms<br />
full of enormous paintings by Gainsborough,<br />
Van Dyke, Constable and Turner…<br />
She knew all the stories behind the work,<br />
some of them a bit scandalous - so that<br />
was my introduction to art history… My<br />
father’s favourite outing with my brother<br />
and I was up over Hampstead Heath and<br />
often we went into Kenwood House where<br />
I was awestruck by Stubbs’ life-size painting<br />
of the famous 18th century racehorse<br />
“Whistlejacket” - now in the National Gallery<br />
- I thought it was the most beautiful<br />
and exciting painting I’d ever seen!<br />
We used to visit my mother’s old tutor and<br />
mentor, Rowland Hilder, who was a really<br />
well-known and successful landscape<br />
painter at that time and I loved his paintings,<br />
mostly incredible watercolours of the<br />
English countryside and estuaries… my<br />
mother wouldn’t paint landscapes because<br />
she said they just looked green to her - but<br />
I saw all the colours of the world in the sky<br />
and the sea.<br />
My grandfather was an artist too but<br />
passed away the year I was born. As well<br />
as his paintings, he left us lovely plaster<br />
casts of his hand and foot that he did in art<br />
school. Rather disrespectfully, we used<br />
Grandpa’s foot as a door stop for a time, but<br />
now it’s up in proper pride of place on the<br />
bookshelves, a very elegant foot it is too.<br />
Sarah: This must have influenced you to<br />
become an artist in your own right?<br />
Caro: I studied art and design at college<br />
but also took business courses as I was<br />
really running my mother’s studio by the<br />
time I was 18. She spent a lot of time in<br />
America and had galleries representing<br />
her over there, particularly New Orleans<br />
where we later bought a house and split<br />
our time between here and there. I was<br />
her “gallery liaison” and took care of all<br />
the design and admin for the business<br />
side - all artists could do with someone to<br />
do that couldn’t they!?! But as her career<br />
slowed down a little bit (though she’s still<br />
painting everyday at her easel!), I found<br />
the time to finish my fine art degree and<br />
start painting everyday too…so that was<br />
about 6 years ago and I have really surprised<br />
myself with how I’ve taken to being<br />
in the studio creating art everyday and<br />
learning so much about that creative process<br />
and what I want to do with paint.<br />
Sarah: Did you know straight away that<br />
skies and seas were going to be your<br />
theme?<br />
Caro: No, not at all! I started off working<br />
very big and very abstract on the floor of<br />
an old converted barn in the countryside<br />
nearby - throwing paint around and dribbling<br />
it about like Jackson Pollock - a lot of<br />
pieces I worked on from conception right<br />
through to destruction - I think it was a<br />
kind of cathartic process where it was<br />
necessary to create and destroy, create<br />
and destroy, to find my direction, or maybe<br />
just to loosen up. But then one day after<br />
about a year of this, making some pieces I<br />
liked and a lot I didn’t, I found myself up<br />
off the floor and working on an easel and<br />
this particular piece which I was creating<br />
with masses of paint and medium<br />
46
follow, inspiration returns and the magic<br />
starts again. At the end of the process, a<br />
lot of the time the painting is nothing like<br />
what I thought it would be when I started…!<br />
Sarah: What inspires you?<br />
Caro: Oh, I’m inspired every day by the<br />
process of creating and by the natural<br />
world around us, which is awesome in the<br />
original sense of the word. I love to watch<br />
the sea, in all its moods, from tranquil,<br />
misty mornings as the tide breathes gently<br />
in and out on the shore, to dramatic<br />
stormy seas and crashing waves with all<br />
their incredible power… I watch the sky<br />
and the clouds and the sunrises and sunsets<br />
and drink it all in. My little dog and<br />
constant companion, Zuki, watches it all<br />
with me too on our daily walks.<br />
Sarah: Do you find the artist’s life an isolated<br />
one? You must spend hours alone in<br />
your studio and that can be an issue for<br />
some artists…<br />
Caro: Actually I love that aspect of my life<br />
- it’s like “me” time when I’m in the studio<br />
- I become very focused and get into a<br />
state of flow which can be energising and<br />
peaceful all at the same time. I’m not really<br />
alone as Zuki is patiently flopped out<br />
on his cushion waiting for more walkies,<br />
and we recently rescued a Birman cat who<br />
graces me with her presence in the studio<br />
when she’s not presiding over the garden…<br />
I have music on in the background,<br />
or radio 6 which does some great interviews<br />
with musicians and I am amazed<br />
at how what they say about their process<br />
is so exactly what I’m going through - it’s<br />
like having a support group in the room!<br />
When I’m not painting I also mentor other<br />
creative businesses and meet fascinating<br />
people through that - I find marketing and<br />
business strategy deeply creative too!<br />
Sarah: How do you overcome Artist’s<br />
Block in times of “drought”? If indeed you<br />
do ever suffer from this!<br />
Caro: Block? No - just the opposite! I could start<br />
a new painting every day! In fact I often do - it’s<br />
just the finishing of them that’s the problem! I<br />
love a bare canvas and that feeling when you’re<br />
just about to mix up paint - I find that really exciting<br />
- the opportunity to explore the new ideas that<br />
have been going on in my head whilst I developed<br />
a theme in the last paintings - it’s a new start with<br />
47<br />
and layer after layer of colour, just started<br />
to look like a sky - and I found I liked that - I<br />
was surprised, maybe even quite shocked<br />
- it affected me, and people I showed it to<br />
really liked it and responded to it too - so I<br />
started painting with that intention… and<br />
that year of pure experiment with texture<br />
and abstract techniques became a basis for<br />
more realist and considered oil paintings.<br />
Sarah: So how would you describe your<br />
style?<br />
Caro: Well I think my style is constantly<br />
evolving - maybe it always will be - and<br />
maybe it should because then it’s this fascinating<br />
learning, growing process…I mean,<br />
sometimes I feel that I’ve done some work<br />
that’s really classical in style with wet-inwet<br />
techniques, glazing and scumbling,<br />
and then I’ll add in areas that are really<br />
quite impressionist or more abstract - I<br />
use brushes, palette knives, my hands,<br />
bits of old cloth and I’m really most comfortable<br />
with oil paint and a variety of different<br />
mediums depending on the viscosity<br />
I want. I find that I have to work in<br />
quite a free and spontaneous way to create<br />
with authenticity - though often I look<br />
at what I’ve done and change it almost entirely<br />
in the next layer or right there and<br />
then. I do know when I begin to see the direction<br />
a painting should take but sometimes<br />
paintings are stubborn and won’t<br />
reveal themselves for a long time! And<br />
sometimes you can miss the moment of<br />
magic when the painting becomes what it<br />
should be and then it’s ruined. But when<br />
a painting shows me where I’m going and<br />
I see it and follow, inspiration returns and
with new possibilities every time. The<br />
danger is I have so many ideas and take so<br />
many inspiring photos when I’m out, just<br />
on my iphone, that I may never be able to<br />
tackle them all - and I have to keep track<br />
of what I wanted to start next and what<br />
fits in with my overall vision of my work.<br />
Maybe having so many paintings on the go<br />
all the time means that if I’m not inspired<br />
by one at that moment there’s always another<br />
I can pick up and put on the easel<br />
and start to get inspired again…<br />
Sarah: Is there anything that being an<br />
artist has helped you learn about yourself?<br />
Caro: Many things! Some of the most important<br />
I call the 4P’s - Patience, Persistence, Positivity<br />
and Performance - I had no idea how much patience<br />
I would have to learn to accept, and daily<br />
persistence with my work. You have to believe<br />
in yourself and learn not to beat yourself up and<br />
put yourself down - that’s the positivity, and as for<br />
performance - well, that’s the moment you suck in<br />
your breath and put brush to canvas isn’t it? You<br />
are performing, it’s just that the audience isn’t<br />
there at that moment.<br />
Sarah: If you weren’t an artist, what would you be?<br />
Caro: A musician - music has a direct highway to<br />
the soul…<br />
Sarah: How would your friends and family describe<br />
you in 3 adjectives?<br />
Caro: Outgoing, optimistic, responsible.<br />
Sarah: If you were stuck on an island and could<br />
only have one item what would it be?<br />
Caro: Can I take my paddle board?<br />
Sarah: Is there anything you’d like to add for our<br />
Dorset Artists’ Readers?<br />
Caro: Just how lovely Dorset is with it’s breathtaking<br />
countryside and coastline - I’ve visited many<br />
times and love the West Country. And thank you<br />
for letting a Sussex girl into the pages of your excellent<br />
magazine!<br />
All images © Caro SaintVire<br />
49 50
Short Story by Michael Bailey<br />
Three steps from the top he saw her<br />
and almost tripped. It would have been<br />
better if he had. Fallen then and broken<br />
his bloody neck. It would have saved a<br />
lot of pain. For him at least. She was<br />
already numb to pain, since she was a<br />
little girl. He didn’t know that then but<br />
the way she drew his eyes to her should<br />
have warned him. It was like when you<br />
pass a window and out of the corner<br />
of your eye you imagine you see something<br />
you shouldn’t. Someone getting<br />
dressed or undressed. You hesitate<br />
and then give in to the urge to look and<br />
by the time you do they have covered<br />
up. All you get is embarrassed.<br />
With her, it was in her eyes that instant<br />
before the glaze came over them and all<br />
you could see was yourself. In that split<br />
second you felt were looking into a pit<br />
of misery. Then you just thought you<br />
imagined it. Her face was so striking,<br />
so alive, full of tease and laughter. How<br />
could you think that when she looks<br />
so serious and challenging? What does<br />
she look like? You have one impression<br />
and the next moment something opposite.<br />
Only the glaze that reflects your<br />
own face is constant.<br />
All eyes were on him but he could only<br />
see her. He finished his climb to the<br />
deck floor stepping clear of the circular<br />
stair that had carried his feet up.<br />
She had half risen from her seat then<br />
sat back down, her glass of Pernod in<br />
front of her. Still her eyes held his and<br />
he found himself sitting at her table.<br />
She told him her name and that she<br />
was his new student. He said he never<br />
takes students and that he was leaving<br />
for Biarritz the next day. “So am I”, she<br />
had replied.<br />
Click. “Damn, I’m sorry, something<br />
ran over my foot and startled me”. The<br />
bright light in the darkroom went out<br />
again. A roll of negatives that had been<br />
exposed to the flash of light in mid development<br />
was plunged into the hypo<br />
fixative. When they looked at the images<br />
of a woman’s nude body, black from<br />
the light flash seeped right to the edge<br />
of the body creating a stark outline.<br />
“Look at that. Quick, expose another<br />
of the rolls of film waiting to be developed”,<br />
he said. In the next hours<br />
they experimented until they ran out<br />
of exposed film. He was so excited he<br />
couldn’t sleep that night and didn’t let<br />
her sleep either, pulling at her body<br />
in his urgency. In the morning he was<br />
up and out getting more film and she<br />
finally had the chance to escape with<br />
her tumbled body into sleep. Not for<br />
long because he immediately wanted<br />
her to pose, naked and sleepy, her skin<br />
marked by the wrinkles of the sheets.<br />
Unable to leave her alone, he touched<br />
her, he kissed her, he made love to her<br />
day and night. He photographed her as<br />
she walked around naked, standing at<br />
the window with the shadow of the net<br />
curtain making a mesh on the skin of<br />
her breasts, bending forward with her<br />
back and buttocks naked and anonymous<br />
like a lush fruit. It was nothing<br />
new. Her own father had photographed<br />
her naked for as long as she could remember.<br />
But this was different, she<br />
could match him shot for shot, fuck for<br />
fuck, idea for idea. It drove him mad,<br />
made him beg, made him angry.<br />
Her own photographs were getting noticed,<br />
her name repeated and recognised<br />
around Paris and beyond. Her<br />
photographs were admired and bought<br />
as she matched his surreal visions and<br />
outrageous experiments and made advances<br />
of her own. Her face, her image<br />
was recognised from magazine covers<br />
and gallery exhibitions. Her work<br />
matched and eclipsed her persona as a<br />
model. With him she shook off the role<br />
of the model and took the mantle of the<br />
artist.<br />
When she looked in the studio bin she<br />
saw a negative amongst the screwed<br />
up paper. She pulled it out and held it<br />
up to the light. It was a photograph of<br />
her, discarded because it did not meet<br />
his exacting standard. “I can make<br />
something of this, use it for a picture”<br />
she thought as she put the negative in<br />
her purse.<br />
He went ape shit, totally demented. He<br />
screamed and ranted, shouting “Who<br />
is the real artist? Me, not you. You are<br />
my assistant, you help me. You are<br />
nothing without me. Now you steal my<br />
picture to put it in your trivial reproduction<br />
of my ideas. You think you’re<br />
so clever but really you are just a fuck<br />
who is smarter than most, but just a<br />
fuck nonetheless”. She threw the picture<br />
she had been holding. It smashed<br />
on the wall behind his head. “Fuck you”,<br />
she spat, “I do your work, take your<br />
photographs so you can paint and let<br />
you pass them off as your own and you<br />
get on your fucking high horse about<br />
a negative you threw away”. “Out”, he<br />
bellowed. The studio door slammed<br />
and she was gone.<br />
He couldn’t bear the silence, the absence,<br />
the empty bed.<br />
Who knew who she was fucking now?<br />
Nothing would calm the raging headaches<br />
that overcame him. He raged like<br />
a bull in a tight arena, maddened by a<br />
hundred cuts. Her throat arched white<br />
and exposed. He slashed at it with a<br />
razor and splashed red ink across the<br />
cuts. The gore was pinned to the wall<br />
like a crime scene photograph when<br />
she came back days later.<br />
They rowed and made up, worked in<br />
tandem, fucked each other and other<br />
lovers as their fame and the demand<br />
for their work grew. She adored him<br />
but did not love him, followed where<br />
her sexual desires led her until inevitably<br />
she lost her heart as well as her<br />
head. The love affair that cost her lover’s<br />
first wife her life burned so bright<br />
she married the Egyptian and was<br />
gone from him.<br />
The man on the crest of the surrealist<br />
wave foundered and went under.<br />
Drowning, he bought a gun and threatened<br />
her, her lover, himself in turn.<br />
He made a picture of himself with the<br />
pistol and a hangman’s rope strung<br />
around his neck, made art of suicide.<br />
Nothing could bring her back. He cut<br />
her eye from a photograph and pasted<br />
it onto the swinging pendulum of<br />
a metronome. It swung left and right,<br />
observing a world that lurched drunkenly.<br />
Unable to distinguish between grief and<br />
art he called his creation the object of<br />
destruction. Instructions on a picture<br />
he made of his mechanical sculpture<br />
advised regulating the weight on the<br />
pendulum to the tempo desired so the<br />
pulse of grief could be captured until<br />
the limit of endurance was reached.<br />
52
Thereafter a hammer should be<br />
used to destroy the whole mechanism<br />
with a single blow.<br />
Nothing could replace her, not<br />
fame, not suicide, not art. Beyond<br />
their shared bed and shared studio<br />
their lives swam into the core<br />
of the history of their age. His repute<br />
rose strong and enduring as<br />
an erection. Hers recorded the<br />
depredation of the human spirit,<br />
fouled by the torrents of evil<br />
that spewed out of the middle of<br />
the century.<br />
They had joked in bed, fought in<br />
the studio, taunted each other in<br />
their spirit of sexual freedom. Reality<br />
was more outrageous than<br />
surrealism. World War more of<br />
an adventure than fashion. Her<br />
stark black and white images of<br />
SS suicides and concentration<br />
camp inmates both dead and<br />
alive are more shocking than<br />
the staged absurdities of Dada.<br />
She found escape from Dachau<br />
promised but never delivered<br />
however much she drank. In the<br />
long post war English years she<br />
never stopped seeking that unattainable<br />
peace.<br />
53 54
Stephen: When did you<br />
first realize you were<br />
Artistic Holly?<br />
Stephen Yates catches<br />
up with emerging artist<br />
Holly Norris in her<br />
studio.<br />
I possibly do that alongside<br />
being a Doctor!” As I thought<br />
about it the more peaceful I<br />
became, so I enrolled with the<br />
Open College of the Arts and<br />
I did begin to study and only<br />
after five years of study did I<br />
feel that I was in a position to<br />
begin to show my work at an<br />
exhibition, and get over the<br />
‘imposter syndrome!’ of not<br />
being a ‘proper’ Artist!<br />
Stephen: Which Artists had<br />
a profound influence on your<br />
development?<br />
Holly: Growing up surrounded<br />
by designers, the influence<br />
of the Bauhaus, pared back industrial<br />
design and Emin and<br />
other contemporary artists. I<br />
am a massive fan of Grayson<br />
Perry and his social, political<br />
commentary, expressed in a<br />
variety of media. I like construction<br />
when doing my textiles<br />
and have done a great<br />
deal of research into designers<br />
like Alexander McQueen, and<br />
Zandra Rhodes.<br />
Stephen: Where do you now<br />
find your inspiration for these<br />
amazing pieces of work?<br />
Holly: I use first hand experience<br />
and use the world<br />
around me, and things that I<br />
have seen. I tend to respond<br />
directly to things and work directly<br />
onto paper, then distil it.<br />
That may be something that is<br />
quite immediate. It might be<br />
capturing a moment, which is<br />
particularly poignant for me<br />
to create a sense of place. At<br />
the moment we are preparing<br />
for an exhibition called<br />
‘unknown Island’ which is<br />
Portland based and I am influenced<br />
by just being in the<br />
environment, in my studio by<br />
Portland Bill. My marks and<br />
colour are helped by the slowness<br />
of the process; in most<br />
of my work there is evidence<br />
of the time taken to develop<br />
my art. Even in my prints it’s<br />
about the burnishing and the<br />
marks made by the hand and<br />
really feeling and portraying<br />
in that way.<br />
Holly: I grew up in an artistic<br />
family, and it wasn’t<br />
something I was particularly<br />
interested in, as I<br />
wanted to be a Doctor as<br />
long as I can remember.<br />
It was only as an adult<br />
working in an increasingly<br />
stressful job, that I started<br />
making and initially used<br />
this to bring some balance<br />
into my life. Increasingly<br />
the balance tipped towards<br />
making and expressing<br />
myself. I realised that life<br />
is too short and I decided<br />
to take a leap and my<br />
Mum picked up a leaflet to<br />
go to University to study<br />
Art, and I discounted it<br />
and said, “It was a ridicu-<br />
55 lous idea and how could<br />
56
Stephen: Are there any exhibitions<br />
that you are currently preparing<br />
for?<br />
Holly: First off there is my DAW<br />
Open Studios, which is the first<br />
time that I will be publically showing<br />
at Portland Bill Venue 115,<br />
which is very exciting and also<br />
nerve racking. Perhaps more exciting<br />
is my first gallery exhibition<br />
in a hugely intimidating space at<br />
Upton Country Park in ‘the gallery<br />
upstairs’ from 6th-12th July <strong>2016</strong>.<br />
10:00-17:00 each day.<br />
57 58
Juggling<br />
by<br />
Sharon<br />
James<br />
Before I was a gallery owner I<br />
was a lecturer in Art and Design.<br />
That was fifteen years of<br />
my life dedicated to teaching<br />
often unruly but uniquely gifted<br />
teenagers to septuagenarians.<br />
From Level 1 to Degree.<br />
A job I loved with bureaucracy<br />
that I hated.<br />
When redundancy was offered I<br />
grabbed it with both hands and ran<br />
laughing into the sunset.<br />
Enter a horribly run down bike<br />
shop. This was an absolute horror<br />
of a building. Crumbling walls and<br />
every single surface had a thick<br />
layer of grease on it. A dark tunnel<br />
with zero personality. Four months<br />
of very hard work later the gallery<br />
opened for business.<br />
Obviously I had a good background<br />
in art as I have been in the art world<br />
since 16 when I entered art college.<br />
Graduated from Camberwell School<br />
of Art with an MA in Printmaking.<br />
(People seem to always want<br />
to know that) I literally have been<br />
hanging exhibitions ever since.<br />
I put on my first exhibition relying<br />
heavily on the work of all my fantastically<br />
talented friends. It was a<br />
success. The first year flew by with<br />
exhibitions of work of all my friends<br />
adorning the walls. It was this that<br />
got the gallery under the noses of<br />
local artists. Then the bookings<br />
started to come in and the gallery<br />
was getting booked up a year in advance.<br />
It hasn’t been all plain sailing<br />
though. I faced some interesting discrimination<br />
when I opened. People<br />
questioned my background and often<br />
asked where I trained in a condescending<br />
way. It was annoying and<br />
it often transpired that I was more<br />
qualified than they were. I think the<br />
crazy hair and maybe my quirky<br />
dress sense threw people as I am not<br />
a ‘typical’ gallery owner.<br />
The bonus of having the gallery was<br />
that I built my studio behind it. This<br />
allowed me to get back to making<br />
art. Something I had severely neglected<br />
during my time as a lecturer.<br />
I fell back in love with drawing and<br />
consequently had my first major exhibition<br />
in several years. Now I’m<br />
the artist in residence at the gallery.<br />
This was a big step as I hadn’t necessarily<br />
wanted to put myself under<br />
the spotlight. It has confirmed<br />
everything that I already knew. Art<br />
is a great mental leveller. I am considerably<br />
happier when I am making<br />
art than when I am not.<br />
Work life = happiness so then it was<br />
time to think about having a family.<br />
Fast forward a couple of years and<br />
my partner and I had a little boy after<br />
several false starts. Now I’m a<br />
gallery owner, an artist, and a mother.<br />
This has meant that I spend a bit<br />
more time with the family, which is<br />
why I endlessly ask people to contact<br />
me first before heading to see<br />
me at the gallery. This is the tricky<br />
bit though as I still need to nurture<br />
the gallery. The constant push for<br />
publicity and ensuring that the exhibitions<br />
are doing their thing. There’s<br />
no day that I don’t think about the<br />
gallery or do some aspect of work<br />
connected to it. Much to my partners<br />
consternation. The truth is I<br />
work hard as I know many of you<br />
do. I am as keen for exhibitions to<br />
be a success as the artists I show.<br />
It’s good for business.<br />
An art gallery in a recession has<br />
been an uphill battle. No matter<br />
how fantastic the work is people<br />
aren’t spending in the same way.<br />
I have always been someone who<br />
loves a challenge and we didn’t<br />
want our son to be an only child<br />
so we decided to expand our family.<br />
What we didn’t factor in was<br />
twins. We are now parents to 3<br />
children under 2 years old. Can I<br />
just mention here that I have three<br />
furry babies too. Puss Puss, Merlin<br />
and Barney.<br />
I’m writing this when any sensible<br />
parent of 3 under 2 would be<br />
asleep. I hate to let people down<br />
so here it is.<br />
Finally, it would be remiss of me<br />
not to mention Shirley my gallery<br />
assistant. Everyone should have<br />
a Shirley. She makes my constant<br />
juggling of life and work<br />
and vice versa possible.<br />
59 60
Bridget<br />
Townsend<br />
-<br />
Hurt but<br />
Healing<br />
I am not an Art Therapist,<br />
but I do believe that art (in my case<br />
painting and printing) is a kind of<br />
therapy. The idea of using visuals to<br />
think and have a conversation about<br />
something…that has to be a therapy<br />
doesn’t it? Even if the conversation<br />
is just in your head or throughout<br />
your sketchbook. I have always tried<br />
to create work that has a meaning or<br />
creates an interesting dialogue; otherwise<br />
what’s the point? The idea that<br />
we can all create an emotion in the<br />
viewer just by showing a mix of colours<br />
or by the way we mark make. To<br />
me that’s really interesting.<br />
I have looked at interesting subjects before;<br />
feminism in the Muslim faith, portraiture<br />
using objects, but my hardest<br />
subject and possibly my most therapeutic<br />
was reliving and painting a series of<br />
work about my own sexual abuse. What<br />
I wanted to do was express something<br />
which was accurate, true and real, but do<br />
it in such a way that it had a narrative as<br />
I perceived it. When I started I wanted to<br />
build a tension, but paint in as free and<br />
expressive way as naturally possible –<br />
This meant I could ‘go with the flow’ of<br />
my emotions as I felt them. The idea that<br />
you can see ‘something’, but it’s not obvious;<br />
just ‘unsettling’ made the work very<br />
interesting.<br />
I looked at a few artists as inspiration:<br />
Francis Bacon and Adrian Ghenie’s<br />
work has a tension that I wanted to emulate.<br />
Often their work is confrontational<br />
and thought provoking. Francis Bacon’s<br />
‘Study for a Portrait, 1952’ has a pain that<br />
I wanted to generate within my series of<br />
paintings, the pain I had felt for the past<br />
30 or so years has been so deep, it has<br />
never really been gouged out and examined.<br />
I honestly just feel that I have hovered<br />
over the surface of it and picked at<br />
the scab because it is such a big ‘thing’ to<br />
get out and examine. The idea of getting<br />
that whole big black rock out and chipping<br />
away at it was very intimidating.<br />
The point was I had time to indulge and<br />
heal the feelings I had linked to this; I<br />
also wanted to add ‘healing’ to my composition.<br />
I hoped that by examining the<br />
facts and painting down my feelings that<br />
I would be able to examine ways to help<br />
myself recover from the deep hurt. Adrian<br />
Ghenie’s ‘Pie Studies’ have a confrontational<br />
feel and without knowing the<br />
subject matter I was originally really saddened<br />
by the faceless ‘drones’.<br />
Both Bacon and Ghenie’s work have dark<br />
backgrounds and anonymous rooms in<br />
many of their paintings, which add to the<br />
air of mystery, where is the pain coming<br />
from? What I am lead to believe is that it<br />
has come from inside the artist; that each<br />
artist perceives a degree of pain in everyone,<br />
because they feel it in some part in<br />
themselves. Of all of Ghenie’s work I<br />
found the ‘Pie Fight Study 2’ most hopeful.<br />
In this work the figure has been battered,<br />
but has not been beaten.<br />
The hands are wiping the face. this act of<br />
wiping the face is one of resistance and<br />
rebellion.<br />
Throughout my series of sketches, paintings<br />
self-examinations I strived to find<br />
a way of painting a figure that was also<br />
battered, but not beaten. Adding white<br />
to my portraits added ‘healing’, a way of<br />
covering the sadness, but also enclosing<br />
the persona, trapping it and stopping commuication<br />
with speech.<br />
Covering parts of the body, creates distortion<br />
and a ‘sinister’ air was achieved<br />
by Gerhard Richter in his over painted<br />
family photographs. His choice of coverage<br />
is also unsettling and ominous, like a<br />
menacing force has overtaken his family.<br />
This ‘poltergeist’ expression of painting<br />
is something I struggled to create personally,<br />
but working over some of my own<br />
photographs was something I found quite<br />
upsetting. The act of thinking about that<br />
time and how I felt has once again meant<br />
a ‘facing the horror and self loathing. By<br />
adding paint to a photograph I am creating<br />
a narrative of my feelings. Covering<br />
my face in some pictures is my way of<br />
expressing my feelings of impotence. A<br />
photograph is a ‘truth’ a moment in time<br />
and by adding paint to that truth & that moment I<br />
am expressing my perceptions and feelings from that<br />
time; feelings of oppression and ensnarement.<br />
Bacon, Ghenie and Richter (in his over painted photographs)<br />
paint with self-belief, but also rely to a degree<br />
on ‘accidents’ with paint. These ‘accidents’ are<br />
created by mark-making with an artist’s expressive<br />
instinct, but none the less are ‘accidents’.<br />
In my paintings I tried the same over painting (in<br />
white) many times, trying to create the perfect feeling<br />
of ‘hurt-but-healing’. My hurt and gut-wrenching<br />
sadness from abuse in my past sits like a black<br />
rock inside me. I tried to paint this black ‘rock’ and<br />
then over painting (using photographs as a resource)<br />
on top of the thick black marks. I found myself<br />
compromising the brush strokes and this lead to an<br />
unsuccessful ‘mash’ of a painting. By over painting<br />
photographs and sketching some compositions in<br />
canvas I created something that discusses<br />
where I am now and where I was when I was a nine<br />
year old girl, a history of myself in one piece of expressive<br />
work. Bacon worked from images in photographs.<br />
A photograph records a moment. In the<br />
process of painting, Bacon seeks the accident that<br />
will ‘turn that moment into all moments’, likewise, I<br />
seek to turn that child into my today-self and narrate<br />
the history of what happened and who I am. What<br />
I really wanted to do is show my strength now and<br />
the fight I have. The anger I have had throughout<br />
my entire life dissipated substantially while I painted<br />
over the course of 2-3months. What I mostly felt<br />
was sadness and by the end I felt powerful. The scale<br />
of my work (some pieces were 150cm square) and<br />
the emotional investment created some of the most<br />
interesting work I had ever done. I felt wrung out,<br />
but I also felt very proud that I had faced a very old<br />
demon and I had finally shook it and brought it out<br />
in the open.<br />
61 62
Connections<br />
Project<br />
I take photographs all the<br />
time. It’s kind of an obsession;<br />
I’ll capture some moss<br />
on a concrete post, the sunlight<br />
through leaves or my<br />
children laughing. I will stop, get<br />
my phone out and take a couple of clicks,<br />
pop my phone away and we’ll all resume<br />
our lives. What am I doing?<br />
As an artist, I think I observe the world<br />
slightly differently than say, my ‘engineer’<br />
husband. I want to remember, preserve<br />
and review that moment, that light,<br />
that emotion. This passion for ‘looking<br />
back’ is my reason for sharing my story<br />
with you today.<br />
My mother’s parents died when she was<br />
just 17. They had very little as a family,<br />
what they did have was a few photographs.<br />
My mother held this collection in<br />
an old suitcase under the stairs and added<br />
to it as my brother and I grew up. She<br />
would rarely be in the pictures. She wanted<br />
to remember us as little people who<br />
wiggled when a song came on the radio<br />
or played in the mud in the garden...<br />
those un-momentous moments of everyday<br />
joy. Her collection would be revisited<br />
whenever a relative would come and<br />
visit for a cuppa. She’d get the suitcase<br />
out and I remember sitting on the floor<br />
running my fingers through the black and<br />
white pictures. I knew the stories behind<br />
most of the pictures by the time I was<br />
eight, but I still loved to sit and listen to<br />
my family reminisce using the photographs<br />
as prompts.<br />
Stories from the past have ever since<br />
been interesting to me. I love to hear how<br />
ordinary people have beaten every day<br />
challenges. How did they live, overcome<br />
those struggles and what did they do that<br />
was different or extraordinary?<br />
I work with a group of elderly people in a<br />
care home in Dorchester, Dorset. We’ve<br />
worked together for over two years now.<br />
When I first started I naively expected I<br />
would enable them to express their inner<br />
self straight away. It was at a time when<br />
there were a lot of stories about abuse in<br />
63<br />
residential care homes (Bristol) and I<br />
thought I could help to change that. What<br />
actually happened was that I had to take<br />
stock and re-plan. I needed to lower my expectations<br />
and go with their flow. So I did<br />
and it worked. I piloted an idea I had after<br />
meeting Jenna Edwards (15 days in clay)<br />
in Holton Lee. She works with adults with<br />
learning difficulties helping them to create<br />
a piece of (theme based) work for an exhibition<br />
at the end of their term (which was<br />
initially one day per week for 15 weeks).<br />
The artists she worked with found many<br />
health and social benefits from the weekly<br />
group sessions and the exhibition created<br />
a sense of purpose & self-confidence (particularly<br />
once they sold some work).<br />
My older group has done three themed art<br />
exhibitions so far. Each exhibition has a<br />
catalogue and all work is mounted and<br />
framed. The artists enjoy the exhibitions as<br />
much as making the work, their relatives<br />
and friends all attend which gives them a<br />
new intelligent stimulation and allows for<br />
more interesting engagement.... and it’s a<br />
fun party!<br />
The new theme for the exhibition they’re<br />
currently working towards is ‘Connections’.<br />
The artists are connecting with their<br />
PAST (using photographs, film, painting<br />
and creative writing), the PRESENT (by<br />
making new connections, with schools,<br />
community members, members of the public<br />
& local businesses and groups) and their<br />
FUTURE (talking about their hopes and<br />
dreams for their families and the world at<br />
large).<br />
Another part of the connecting with the<br />
PRESENT is encouraging people to write<br />
to them and share their stories or something<br />
about themselves, share a ‘selfie’ and send<br />
their hand shapes.<br />
Throughout the project and working with<br />
the artists I have learnt the value of photographs<br />
for other people; particularly as<br />
a trigger for memories and to start discussions.<br />
One member of the group doesn’t<br />
have any photographs. We have no idea<br />
where they are. She has early dementia and<br />
can’t remember. I can’t imagine that and<br />
I feel incredibly strongly that what we record<br />
and discover throughout her story is<br />
recorded and shared. The stories we have<br />
already learnt through our sessions have<br />
been interesting, funny and heart-warming.<br />
The group have lived through wars, poverty<br />
and many family ups and downs. Their<br />
everyday challenges are frustrating, but<br />
through this Art Exhibition I hope that you<br />
will learn to see past those challenges.<br />
Story telling helps us all to feel more connected,<br />
we hope that by sharing the artists<br />
stories using different creative media people<br />
will try and understand their challenges,<br />
take a moment to engage with an older<br />
person and see the value in engaging with<br />
the over 70s.<br />
There is something to be learnt from the elder’s<br />
past & the way they tell stories. Their<br />
pace gives time for energies to settle & for<br />
more thought; possibly a stronger connection.<br />
By connecting with other groups, both the<br />
artists and the visitors can share a new energy.<br />
We had a group of school children come<br />
to the care home during one session; both<br />
groups talked about their artwork, played<br />
and read stories. The spirit and atmosphere<br />
in the care home & within the artists themselves<br />
was lifted long after the children had<br />
gone. When I saw the children a week later<br />
they were still excited and stimulated by<br />
meeting the older artists and listening to<br />
their stories.<br />
It’s interesting that the children have been<br />
the most open to all aspects of connecting<br />
with the artists in the care home. They<br />
came into the home and didn’t stand back,<br />
but poured into the room ready to share<br />
themselves.<br />
The Connections project has a social media<br />
presence which I hope will continue<br />
after the exhibition in September. I really<br />
want to tour the exhibition and continue<br />
with the momentum we have worked hard<br />
to build. The messages in this whole project<br />
are about spending time with the older<br />
generation, raising awareness of the common<br />
problems they face every day (with<br />
the hope that if awareness is raised we can<br />
all work together for the betterment of the<br />
‘moment’ and to find an eventual cure).<br />
If you are interested in connecting, participating<br />
in a session, sending a picture or<br />
you’d simply like to come to the exhibition<br />
please connect through our Facebook page<br />
or email me (Bridget) bongley@gmail.com<br />
Bridget<br />
Townsend.
DORSET<br />
SUMMER<br />
<strong>2016</strong><br />
ARTISTS