Visit to Australia for Le Cheile and Off Straits. Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney

Recent visit to Australia was very productive visiting major art galleries in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney whilst taking part in exhibitions Off Straits and Le Cheile. Breakfast meeting with artists including left to right Trevor Wren, Dani McLean, myself, Gavin Malone, Lucy Thurley, Veronica Calarco, Suzanne Laslett and Craig Marsden. Full report of the Le Cheile can be found on the a-n site Artists Talking Project Unedited. Click on the title above for visit photo set. Celtica festival was very successful with visual art exhibitons taking place throughout Port Adelaide at the same time as Le Cheile at New Land Gallery, featuring large drawing/print work and screeprints. Off Straits featured several of the acrylics on paper made for the exhibition.

Off Straits: Wales andSouth Australia

The twelve paintings for Off Straits are finally to a point of resolution today 10 days before departure for Australia. I have been working on these new acrylics for two months and may paint on them more in Adelaide. Really enjoyed acrylics and this is the first time I have seriously used them. Collaborative work with Veronica Callarco is also planned. See below for full project details..

Nant Gwrtheyrn Wales Ireland Residency

The spectacular location of Nant Gwrtheyrn and excellent weather made for a good afternoons painting on the works for Off Straits. Joining Pamela de Bri, Eileen Keane, Margaret Becker, Alison Craig, Linda Davies, Ian Williams, Eirian Llwyd, Ross, and Don Braisby there was time for collaborative drawing and plenty of discussion. It is just what the painting needed, an injection of tertiary colour in response to the unfolding horizon...
Click on the title above to see photos of the residency.

Parrys Mountain Ynys Môn Bangor Team Exploration

Spectacular day exploring Parrys Mountain Ynys Môn overground during the day and then underground at night. Some of the tutors at Bangor University met for a really enjoyable lunch and tour of Mike Knowles studio before we were taken to the location of Parrys mountain copper mines. Noelle Griffiths, Wanda Zyborska, Noel McCready, Marged Pendrell, Joanna Evans and myself descended in to the dark depths of the labyrinth of mining tunnels emerging finally at 10pm..spectacular underground mineral formations, ochres and oxides making a subterranean landscape of elemental dimension.

Click on the title above to see several more pictures

Off Straits: Wales – South Australia

During Novemeber and December I will be visiting Adelaide, South Australia to research and develop a future collaborative project for presentation in Wales and South Australia. During the visit I will be participating in three art events:

Off Straits – An exhibition by Veronica Calarco (printmaker/painter, Australia), Suzanne Laslett (photographer), Andrew Smith (painter, Wales) and Gareth Wyn Jones (photography, Wales). (Off Straits – Off implying away, somewhere else, distant and Strait being a connecting waterway between two areas or pools of water). This exhibition will open at 6pm Thursday 10 December 2009 at the Parks AXIS Gallery, Port Adelaide. http://www.portenf.sa.gov.au/site/page.cfm?u=1307. I am now making works on paper for this exhibition, see the next post!

Celtica Festival: Celtic Roots II - The Celtica Festival 2009 will be during 4,5 and 6 December 2009 http://www.celticafestival.com.au/. As part of the Festival Celtic Roots II
http://www.celticafestival.com.au/location.html will be presented at the Newland Gallery and Gaff Gallery in Port Adelaide with selected work from open submission, 28 November -10 December 2009 and opens on Sunday 29 November 2009. As well as exhibiting artwork, I will be leading a workshop during the festival with 5 other artists (Danica Headland: Printing without a press workshop; Andrew Smith: concept/drawing/construction workshop; Sandy Elvard: Basket Weaving; Veronica Calarco: Stretching a canvas; Veronica Calarco: Polychromatic Printing; Lucy Thorley: Introduction to Painting; Sunshine March: Clay work)

Le Chéille, a Welsh-Irish Collaborative Project - The touring Welsh/Irish collaborative printmaking exhibition, exploring themes of land, language and place with seventeen artists from Wales, Ireland and Australia in this version of the original Co. Kildare exhibition. The project is ongoing and currently organising a residency in Nant Gwtheyrn on 19th-21st October 2009 with new members from Ireland and Wales and is now entering the phase of touring South Australia. The opening of Le Chéille in Adelaide will be at The New Land Gallery, Port Adelaide on the 27 November 2009 during its substantial tour of South Australia. As well as having several pieces of work it his exhibition including one substantial work, the exhibition in Adelaide will be a very good opportunity to discuss the idea of exchange as a process and further projects with artists, curators and exhibition organisers. http://www.countryarts.org.au/catalogs/whats-on/sa/le-chéile-223665.php

BSC Innovation Barry Public Art Commission Work in Progress 7

Click on the title for work in progress 7, final stages; description on the right. See here for the final artworks. 

BSC Innovation Barry Public Art Commission Work in Progress 6

Both paintings develop in this session. Palette well established and working fluidly as colour space areas are applied. See the description on the right of the photos by clicking the title link above. The left painting 'hook' section top left corner is established but the internal section of dark brown needs to be consolidated and reworked. This is changed to incorporate a wall section and further box element. The square boxes refer directly to the port containers, diagonally placed and viewed from the other side, the island.

LE CHÉILE: Welsh-Irish print collaboration, Graphic Print Studio, Dublin

Current leg of the print collaboration moves to the Graphic Print Studio, Dublin featuring digital print Edge of land (Borderlakes) and a screen print from the Surface of Colour.

BSC Innovation Barry Public Art Commission Work in Progress 5

Paintings in progress at the end of March. Several key areas are applied including the tha large light orange sweep of the harbour wall on the right painting. Edges and how the areas dry are crucial in the effective construction of the image within a tight deadline. Click title for photos of work in progress and studio progress.

BSC Innovation Barry Public Art Commission Work in Progress 4

The primed canvases are now ready to begin painting and the first areas of colour are applied. The process of locating forms and shapes from the digital sketchbook, drawings and other material is now of paramount importance as the ideas for the content of the paintings develop. Two paintings looking at and across to each other, being on the island and looking toward the town, the town looking toward the island. Left painting, the town or perhaps how the town is seen from the island. Right painting the island, climbing looking back. (Click on title to view the photographs).

BSC Innovation Barry Public Art Commission Work in Progress 3

The stretchers are constructed and allow to settle for a few days, then the canvas stretched, sized and primed, 2 to 11 March 2009.

BSC Innovation Barry Public Art Commission Work in Progress 2

The stretchers are now being constructed after the inital drawing and plan verified, 21 and 22 February. (Click on the title above to view photographs).

BSC Innovation Barry Public Art Commission Work in Progress

These are the first studio picturs showing the initial drawing, floor plan (an excellent feature of the studio being able to look down on the actual shapes) for the two new artworks.

Commision for Business Service Centre Innovation Quarter, Waterfornt, Barry

Public Art Commission by the Vale of Glamorgan Council has provided the opportunity to create two new paintings for the foyer and reception of the Business Service Centre, Innovation Quarter, Waterfront, Barry. I will be creating two paintings that will interact with each other and the designated foyer space. Ideas have begun and a site visit will follow in the next few days.