Day 2

The shells are out and can go back to the beach (I want to go with them...)

The flowers are out and I find their incompleteness somehow compelling.

Another 'undoing' begins

Today I am releasing roses, scabious, busy lizzies and cornflowers from a shell!

A prize for Enid

I was delighted to find out this week that my poem 'A Wonder World for Enid' was the winner of the first ever poetry competition in The Psychologist magazine. It will appear with one of the paintings in the June issue.

.... loving this coming together of science and arts!

guaranteed to bring a ray of sunshine into your home

It's strange how an art project can just arrive. I'm in New Zealand with family, and spotted this book in a closing down sale in Nelson when we stopped for coffee.  The gorgeous flowers on its front cover caught my eye, but when I looked closer it made my hackles rise with its assumptions and misleading descriptions: Simple, quick, easy, practical. My mother arranged flowers, and it never seemed to be any of those. I resisted learning back then, and it seems I'm still resisting.

Inspired by my niece's photography experiments., I brainstormed ways that I could 'explode' the quick and easy arrangements:

from my little sketchbook

and below you can see what happened to "Flowers and Fruit". In my big sketchbook, the flowers were liberated from the kumquats, limes, lemons, and crockery. The cut-out inspired painting. The exploded flowers asked to be printed. The trial was re-done on a square canvas.

The title of the final piece comes from the book - "guaranteed to bring a ray of sunshine into your home".

The gap

During my exhibition ‘A Wonder World for Enid’ in the University of Leeds Clothworkers’ Hall, I am blogging about the paintings, where they came from and how they were made.

In all the Wonder World for Enid paintings there is a gap, often lighter or darker than the rest of the space.  As the theme of memory and forgetting came together with the painting process, the gap emerged as the most poignant aspect of the works. The gap is the distance between the person with dementia and those who care for them. The gap is silence. The gap is a new kind of 'alterity'.

I believe that, all through life, other people remain ultimately unknowable. This otherness, or alterity is unavoidable, inevitable, and thus to be managed, not mourned. We do our best with the tools of language and thinking to reach across the gaps of alterity, to properly see the other, and to share ideas. Most of the time we manage reasonably well.

With dementia, alterity changes. Before dementia, the two of us had different memories of the same event, but they were close enough to leap the gap. Now what I remember is often no longer close to what you remember. And the more recent an event, the more we differ in our perceptions and memories. We can sit in the same room as the light shifts and voices are heard. To me, it’s just the afternoon passing, the sun going down, and people bringing the tea trolley. To you, it's a cause for fear and worry, convincing you that you are locked in a prison and in immediate physical danger.

Thank goodness that deeper memories of long ago events are less affected, and happier emotions attached to them can still be re-experienced. On a good day, I could activate them by reaching across the gap and pulling out bright moments of your past to remind you.

                                             Thrown off course. Acrylic on paper. 34 x 37 cm framed.

Leeds exhibition opens

The exhibition in the Clothworkers' Hall Foyer at the University of Leeds opened last Thursday with a Private View and Artist Talk. Here are some photos from the hanging day. To make best use of the large open space, I hung the smaller works in blocks of six.

It was lovely to catch up with friends and former colleagues at the Opening, and I feel so grateful for their continuing support, even on a windy, rain-lashed January evening. Several paintings were sold, including one of my favourites A Late Page.

The exhibition is up until 23 March.

Layering the greys

Before and during my exhibition ‘A Wonder World for Enid’ in the University of Leeds Clothworkers’ Hall, I am blogging about the paintings, where they came from and how they were made.

A body of work demonstrates both continuity and change. Continuities across the Enid paintings include the flower-like forms, intense colour under greys, layers and blending, a gap.

                          What’s true?   acrylic on watercolour paper   34 x 36 cm   

When I'm painting, the painting process is what drives me: creating texture and colour, deciding on the space between forms, suggesting light and shade or movement. I especially get involved in making the greys. My favourite grey comes from mixing indigo and burnt umber with titanium white. I love the process of mixing the paints until colour is almost lost in a black. Different colour combinations make different blacks, and some of the paintings use alizarin crimson with viridian green.

I take at least three passes over the image with grey. The first one encloses interesting sections of colour. These sections are then more carefully enclosed, developing their own shape and integrity. A second pass considers the whole and removes several sections one by one, each time considering the effect on the whole. The third pass requires most courage. It's the "kill your darlings" phase when any sections that are too 'lovely' or decoratively harmonious are removed. This stage goes very slowly.  I can change my mind if I do it immediately and wipe off the paint with a damp cloth. The wiping off sometimes itself creates a blurring that I like, and leave.

Visiting dementia

Before and during my exhibition ‘A Wonder World for Enid’ in the University of Leeds Clothworkers’ Hall, I am blogging about the paintings, where they came from and how they were made.

As an abstract expressionist painter, my art comes out of and responds to my emotions. The most intense emotions of the last few years were generated by my father's dementia, and by my experiences as I watched it eat away at his mind, discussed decisions about his care, sat next to him on weekly visits to the care home.

The series of paintings that I call 'A Wonder World for Enid' emerged out of multiple, complicated emotions brought into the studio. Enid was frail old lady who lived across the corridor from my dad. It is still too hard, too raw, to make art directly relating to my father's last illness. The paintings are for a re-imagined Enid, made safe through metonymy, appropriation and projection.

Go back to your room now      acrylic on paper    25 x 35 cm    2013

These paintings speak to the experience of watching my father fade away. Colour and form respond to the multiple emotions of that experience. The bright shapes underneath and among the grey suggest the rich lives of people with dementia that are gradually obliterated, but remain accessible longer than we think. They reflect moments of joy and connection that brightened my visits.

A body of work

Creating a body of work is considered an important step in an artist's development. It puzzled me for some years how this might happen. Yes, I could paint several works on the same theme, but more often, I'd want to move on to something else, try some other exciting idea. It seemed rather boring to stay in the same groove (rut?).

And then, a year or so back, it happened. I worked my way into the series of paintings that became "A Wonder World for Enid" and that became the body of work I am drawing on for my next exhibition.

This painting was the very first in the series and is called "What is this place?" (acrylic and pen on paper, 25 x 35 cm), and it's now sold.

I discovered that I was happy to stay with these paintings because they offered such rich exploration of possibilities. I'm still painting new ones.

Christmas cards

These two colourful paintings are being printed as cards! One version has the words "Peace at Christmas" inside; the other is blank.

All profits will go to the charity Building Bridges for Peace and the work of the amazing Jo Berry in promoting peace and conflict transformation around the world. If you watch Jo Berry's TED talk, you will understand why it feels so right to support this charity. I will also be donating to them 10% of the price of any prints and paintings sold in December.

The cards are A5 in size and lovely quality. They cost £12 for 6 (3 of each design) plus £1 p&p. You can buy them at my online store.

Popping up

I'm busy preparing my nearly empty house for next week's pop-up show. As part of re-owning the space, I am giving my paintings a space to hang and be seen.

The exhibition is by invitation only.  If you are within striking distance of rural Buckinghamshire and would like an invitation, do send me a message via the Contact page.

More exhibition news - I will be exhibiting at the University of Leeds, opening on 15 January 2015.

Finding new rhythms

The rhythm of my days has changed as I move to paint full-time and professionally.  It's not just the institutional timetable that has gone away with my academic job, but also the prioritising that had become part of my way of thinking. Released from that, there's a sense of bliss but also a bit of wobbling around in this new big space.  Routines that I imposed at the beginning – out of fear that I might waste precious time – are being relaxed and adjusted day by day.

As the weeks go by, I notice yet another set of restrictions that I had placed on myself over the years, absorbed into my mind, and that can now be let go of.  It doesn't matter if I paint at 8.30 in the morning or 8.30 in the evening, or both. What matters is that the gesso has dried properly and that the paint is at the right consistency still. There's a rhythm to this work that emerges from doing the work.  I am trying to allow its emergence by setting a couple of fixed points in the day (writing in my journal and lunch!), then trusting in the process.

Three questions for an artist

'Daybook', the journal of American artist Anne Truitt, was one of the first books that caught my eye when I unpacked my boxes from store. It spoke to me the first time I read it, and re-reading it now was very moving.

She writes as a woman artist in an art world even more dominated by men than it is now. She writes about her sculpture and painting, and how her art making fits into the span of her life. She writes about her children growing up, leaving home, becoming adults.

I especially love how she describes a key transition in her life as an artist:

I saw my first Barnett Newman, a universe of blue paint by which I was immediately ravished. My whole self lifted into it. "Enough" was my radiant feeling -- for once in my life enough space, enough color  ...

...I stayed up almost the whole night ... I decided, hugging myself with determined delight, to make exactly what I wanted to make... What did I know, I asked myself. What did I love?  What was it that meant the very most to me inside my very own self?

I wrote out those 3 questions in my sketchbook. The answers will be found in the work.

A studio of my own!

I have moved to Bath from central London - occasionally missing the buzz but more often appreciating the calm. When looking for a place to rent, top of my mind was finding a studio space. Synchronicity helped too - in Greece, I met an amazing American woman who introduced me to scores of lovely people including a couple staying at the hotel. As we talked, the woman and I  found more and more life coincidences: Cambridge schooling, mountains in Pakistan, and then Bath. She, it turned out, was buying a house there to live in one day; I was looking for a house to rent.

So here I am.

And the middle floor of the house is making a fine studio. I have covered the floor with heavy duty plastic, unpacked all my paints, brushes and canvases. I have committed to starting each day there, with my journal and second cup of coffee. From writing emerges the work for the day.

Today I am removing an old painting from its stretchers to re-use. I remember painting it at York College, using a Velasquez painting (old woman cooking eggs) as a starting point to explore and transform. I remember noticing the round shapes all through the painting. And the tenderness of the young boy's face. Connecting it to my boys leaving home. From this exercise, I learnt about leaving space.

Next step - stretching canvas for a new painting..

The portable studio

I am in Greece, swimming and looking. And painting, even if a little slowly because of the heat. A Swedish watercolourist told me how he comes here twice a year, in spring and autumn. He hires a bike, rents a place, packs his studio in his backpack, and spends each day in a new place painting. After five weeks or so, he returns to his family. The results made a fine exhibition in the old school here.

My studio is not quite that portable, but the basics fit in my suitcase: some canvas panels and pads of paper, a small sketchbook, a selection of brushes, and a palette of colours warm and cold in tubes of acrylic and watercolours. Once I arrive, I cut up water bottles to make pots for water and brushes. The local supermarket provides plates for mixing, and a trip to the rubbish bins often offers cardboard boxes in a selection of sizes which I cut up for big paintings.

This year I have also bought locally foil trays with lids, sponge cloths and baking paper. From these I make a wet palette that keeps acrylics working for days (especially if kept in the fridge when not in use).

The looking provides a portable store of colours and images to take home, and that may emerge later in the year. And as always, the olive trees beg to be painted.

The creative process

This post is part of a 'blog hop' with four other artists. At the end of the post, you can find links to their sites.

My creative process as a painter, and as a researcher, works on many timescales. I started writing this blog post sitting in a white gallery space in an exhibition of my own paintings. It's been a wonderful few days – hanging the paintings, celebrating the opening with friends and family, selling originals and print – really precious moments on the long winding journey of being an artist. Now I'm already anticipating taking down the paintings, wrapping them up and seeing them back in my flat where they will fill the space and remind me that I really do need to find a new studio with good storage space.

 Organising an exhibition is more about logistics than creativity. It feels like the creative process more or less ground to a halt several months ago when I started planning events, organising framing, making bookings. There was some creativity in selecting the paintings, arranging them and hanging, but in between these creative moments were long stretches of list writing, phone calls, emails, preparing posters, ordering drinks - just getting things done.

When there's no exhibition to organise, the creative process happens inside and outside the studio. Each day begins with coffee and writing my ‘morning pages’, a habit adopted several years ago when a friend and I worked through the wonderful “The Artist’s Way” by Julia Cameron. Morning pages clear out the rubbish in my mind and provide a seedbed for little ideas may or may not sprout into projects.

This last year I've shared a huge studio in an old factory and I've worked on my tiny kitchen table in my tiny, city centre apartment. The studio, I’ve decided, is actually a state of mind. Physically it requires a flat surface to paint but little else. Images are stuck on the walls and cupboards as photocopies and postcards. Sketchbooks are nearby, and a little one is always in the bag I take with me when I go out. Paintings I'm working on are on the floor and leaning against the wall.

There's getting started on a painting, and there’s revisiting. I get started by making a drawing, mixing colours, or making marks with a brush. If I'm in the middle of a series of works, there's usually paper or canvas prepared to go. If I am painting something new, it is a much slower process because there are so many choices to be made: size, surface, composition, colour. Quite often I don't have a clear idea in advance of the finished painting – it's more a matter of exploring and finding a way. Some painters find it hard to stop at the right moment but I think I’ve got quite good at that. I make myself walk away from the painting when it's looking as if it might be finished. I turn around, look out of the window, let my eyes adjust. Then I look back at the painting with refreshed eyes. I add or take away something, repeat the walking away, and eventually leave it for another day.

Now we are on another time scale. Days or weeks later I revisit the painting and sit looking at it, allowing it to speak to me and tell me what it's about, what it needs, and whether there is a variation to be explored in a next painting.

Painting happens best when I’m alone, but other people are crucial in my creative process. I have artist friends I meet with on a monthly basis, and artist friends I spend a weekend away with every year. We share successes and struggles, and set ourselves targets.

There is planning on a yearly basis, putting exhibitions in the diary for 18 months ahead, sometimes setting goals. And then there are long term memories that can surprise me by turning up in my paintings.

My earliest art-related memory goes back more than 50 years to a double-ended colouring pencil, a yellowy-green at one end and a deep crimson pink at the other – I loved those colours. I recognised them decades later in the spring blossom of cherry trees. Today I noticed them again in the plastic cups I bought for my private view.

To read about other people's creative processes, follow these links - and share yours in the comments!

With a background in physics and English, Melissa Fu is an educator and writer who enjoys working across many disciplines. Currently, she is writing a collection of pieces based on growing up in the Rocky Mountains. Melissa’s approach to teaching writing is informed by her experiences in the classroom as well as her studies at Teachers College, where she earned a Masters in English Education. She is especially interested in creating ways for writers to claim and hone their voices. Read more from Melissa at her blog,  and find out about upcoming workshops at www.melissafu.com.

Emily Gubler suspects John Wesley Powell would say she is over encumbered by unnecessary scruples. She spent a decade traveling the country as a wildland firefighter and another half working in the back of an ambulance–and was thrilled by the number of poets and artists she met in each field. Currently Emily lives on a Colorado hillside, writing short stories and personal essays and delighting in Western Tanagers, Great Blue Herons, and Golden Eagles. Her writing can be found at www.ordinarycontradictions.com.

Sue Ann Gleason, creator of Chocolate for Breakfast, the Well-Nourished Woman, and the Luscious Legacy Project, is a lover of words, a strong believer in the power of imagination, and a champion for women who want to lead a more delicious, fully expressed life. Sue Ann has been featured in Oprah and Runner's World magazines and numerous online publications. When not working with private clients or delivering online programs, she can be found sampling exotic chocolates, building broccoli forests in her mashed potatoes, or crawling into bed with freshly sharpened pencils and pages that turn.

You can connect with Sue Ann in a number of places. Delicious freebies await you!
joyful eating | nourished living | wise business
Facebook
 

Narelle Carter-Quinlan embodies the Body-Land. She is a global leading exponent on yoga with scoliosis and the lived experience of spinal anatomy, illuminating the complex with reverence, humour and story. As a Photographer, her work is a benediction of communion; our inner and outer terrain. As a dancer, choreographer and artistic director, she is currently researching House of the Broken Wing; a performative, image and written exploration of moving within a scoliotic landscape. She is also a Transformer; true story. Visit Narelle at embodiedterrain.com to view her Embodied Ecology Photography© and blog, and to hear more about EASS-y, her upcoming e-course exploring the embodied anatomy of scoliosis and yoga.

Not just paintings at the exhibition

but also

fizz and nibbles on Thursday evening

creative writing in response to the paintings on Friday

tea, cake and talk on Sunday

creativity and conflict transformation, in conversation, on Tuesday

and a very special event on Wednesday...

   ...  when Jo Berry and Patrick Magee will talk about their journey to empathy after the death of Jo's father in the IRA bombing of the Brighton hotel in 1984, with film maker and psychotherapist Michael Appleton.

Exhibition preparation

There is so much to do!

The exhibition in London opens on 5 June and I still have to sort the catering for the Opening Reception, and prepare the catalogue. I have updated the paintings on the website today so that job can be ticked off. Must rush - have to sort the insurance next...

Up in the mountains, looking down

I've been in the French Alps for a week. One day when my friend and I were snowshoeing, we stopped and looked down. In the snow-covered fields below we could see skeletal trees standing in a line, and, further across, trees clumped together forming a small wood. The two of us had quite different stories about how the trees had come to be there.

My story was of human intervention. I was intrigued to imagine a person deliberately and carefully planting those trees in a line, here, high up in the mountains. What an imagination to see how the landscape might look in the future; what tough work to make it happen!

My friend's story was of chance and accidents. For her, the trees had grown there after the wind had blown seeds across the landscape. Some of the seeds landed, or were caught, managed to survive and flourish. Once some of the seedlings established themselves, others found shelter and grew close by. Many of the young trees will have perished in the harsh winters, and the little wood that we saw was the result of both growth and failure to thrive, absence as well as presence.

Both stories explain something. Both offer metaphors for the process of making art - the deliberate envisioning and action, and the push-pull dynamic of flourishing and removing.

On the trail of Sowerby's English Botany

I spent an amazing couple of hours in the library at the Natural History Museum yesterday. I was on the trail of James Sowerby whose 'English Botany' provided the illustrations for the Observer's Book of Wild Flowers. It is a time trail -- I used the Observer's Book when I was about 11 years old to find the names of the flowers that I picked, pressed and stuck into an album. Finding the book again decades later, I read the Preface and found there the link to Sowerby. A google search showed that Sowerby had made drawings and engravings from 1790 onwards. The first edition of English Botany came out in 1801 and the 3rd in 1848. The search also showed that the originals are in the Natural History Museum Library - just a tube ride away!

A few more searches and emails led me to the Reading Room and 4 enormous red leather-bound boxes that had been brought out on a trolley for me to see.

Inside were large sheets of thick paper, deckled brown around the edges. Each flower had a sheet on which were stuck three smaller sheets: an original drawing, the engraving for the first edition and a litho print for the third edition.

What treasure! The original drawings were made in pencil, the colours added in watercolour, just enough for the colouring of the engravings. Exquisite delicate drawings, with notes, of places where the flower was found or who found it. Some had grumpy comments on some had little hand made packets with seeds inside - stories suggesting themselves from over two hundred years ago.

I'll be going back. And I'll be forging a trail of inspiration for my artwork with a sense of awe and gratitude -- that Sowerby and his family began this work 224 years ago, that the Observer's Book gave me my first unknowing access to it in the 1960s, and that today it was so easy for me to go and see it physically.