In Our Garden

Just before lockdown - was about to put some work into an exhibition with a group of Digswell artists at the New Maynard Gallery in Welwyn Garden City, as part of the 2020 centenary celebrations. I'm posting here images of the pictures that I made for this exhibition, The theme 'In Our Garden' linked with the idea of garden cities and conjured up ideas for me about houses that are growing and gardens that are built - played with collage using prints of bricks, tiles, patterns and flowers and gradually ripped off the paper and replaced its with paint and oil pastels. Here they are: From left to right: Ghost House, Tree House, House Tree

Here is the beautiful poster of the exhibition that didn't happen by the very talented Sue Jarman - if you click on the poster you'll find more details about the other artists that made work for this show - hope we can show it one day as I was so looking forward to seeing all the work together:

Imprinted, St Albans Museum and gallery, 24th Nov till 3rd feb

Everything is Kept

Delighted that one of my 'time pieces', Holding Still 2017, is currently inhabiting one of the Keepers Galleries at St Albans Museum and Gallery.  It's part of the Imprinted exhibition with Suman Gujral, curated by UHArts, University of Hertfordshire's arts and cultural programme.

We'll both be talking about our work in the gallery at a meet-the-artists event on 9th December, between 3.00 and 4.00 - all welcome - no need to book.

My piece includes twelve of my paintings, twelve pockets of the now dried flowers seen in the paintings, and the twelve vases that are featured in the paintings - all given to me or purchased from craft stalls or second hand shops throughout my life. The paintings were made one per month on the day that I picked the flowers.  I made the paintings over a few hours, never allowing myself to go back to them once the day was finished.  They are in second hand frames that I repurposed to fit the paintings. The vases in this show were all made by other people and I hope I remember to acknowledge them where I can.  This seems a good place to start:

Here are the credits for the vases:

(From top, left to right)

January: Tintagel Pottery, 1984
February: Lisbeth de la Cour, 2003
March: Lisbeth de la Cour, 2005

April: Denby, 1930

May: Ford and Sons, Derby pattern, Burslam, 1900
June: Trident Pottery, 2007

July: Unknown origin and date

August: Stuart Crystal Vase in Cascade Fuchsia Pattern, 1999
September: Unknown origin and date

October: Kinska, London, 2013

November: Jean Knowles, Norfolk, 2004

December: Wileman bone china c1840 - 1900

The frames also had previous lives and were reclaimed from family and friends' pictures and from second hand shops.  I now have a range of prints, paintings, drawings and embroideries, emptied from their frames - they are kept carefully and I'd like to find a way of showing them one day too. 

You can find out a bit more about this piece here.

11th October 2018

MK Gallery Family-in-Residence

Been very much enjoying working with the Collins Family during their residency at MK Gallery.  We've been exploring book making, animation and stories, themed around clothes.  This Sunday 14th October will the culmination of their residency and we're inviting people to come along to the Project Space from 2.30 - 4.30 to explore their own creativity.  Participants will be invited to create handmade books, contribute to a giant animation and colour illustrations for a big story.

Full details here:

https://www.mkgallery.org/whats-on/family-in-residence-the-collins-family/

Tuesday 2nd January 2018

We have entered 2018.  Here's the last of the monthly flower paintings: December 2017

Looking forward to this year - hope you are too!

4th October 2017

I am spending this year making work about my life before and with our eldest daughter Bronwen and how she continues to be a huge influence on my life, long after she died.

Here's a picture based on my memory of Bronwen's kindergarten.

And here's a picture of our wedding day complete with baby Bronwen, aged one.

2 October 2017

Been ages since I've written anything here.  Here's a picture of an oil painting I made a couple of days ago for September:

and here's one I made a month ago for August:

Here's a photograph of the flowers drying on the table so that I can sew them into a bag and keep them safe.  I want to keep each of the bunches of flowers in its own bubble for as long as possible.  I now have a white bag of dead flowers for each of the flower paintings.  Not sure what for - at the moment all the flower bags are in a carrier bag labelled "Please do not throw away these dead flowers."

I'm also saving all the jugs and keeping them apart from the rest of the household vases.  Not sure whether anybody in the family will notice that all the vases are slowly disappearing - I'm trying to leave a few obvious ones but they are looking very tempting. 

A small selection of limited edition prints of flowers are available here:

I am still writing and drawing about my childhood and early life, including our daughter Bronwen who died a few days before her sixth birthday many years ago.  I'm hoping to acknowledge and celebrate her and also to examine some of the ways that her life changed our lives. I am fascinated by the way memory is fluid and I am sure that my childhood memories have been affected by my experiences with my own children.   

19th July 2017

Here's another oil painting of flowers from our garden.  Making one painting a month as part of a 2017 diary - you can see all the pictures and buy limited edition prints here:

Flower Print Shop 2017

Friday 23rd June 2017

Family Garden

Been a long time since I posted anything here.  This is a picture I painted today of roses from our garden.

I'm making a painting for each month of this year of flowers picked from the garden.

I'm also writing/drawing daily about my childhood and my children's early lives - I like the way different memories pop up, partly because of family anniversaries and seasonal reminders, but also because of my ever changing personal preoccupations - I am allowing myself to write whatever comes to mind - I hope to find some patterns later and expect it to fall neatly into chapters when I analyse it at the end of the year!

Here is a picture of a pull string strawberry music box that our daughter Bronwen played with when she was a toddler.  She could hum the song before she could talk: the verse of "It's a Small World" by the Sherman Brothers.  I have no idea what happened to it - it was very popular in 1983.