The third OSA event is coming up in a couple of weeks time and my studio in Kirkmichael will be open for visitors on Saturday 25th and Sunday 26th April. If you live locally, you'll see lots of posters, leaflets and booklets about this interesting event. There's a website and a Facebook page.
It's essentially a trail - you can go from studio to studio, talk to the artists and maybe even buy a piece of work from the person who created it - but that isn't essential. We're delighted to see everyone and tell them something about the work. The variety of talent is immense and fascinating and there really is something for everyone. We'll have lots of original art, a wonderful selection of very reasonably priced prints and even greetings cards, The village itself is a lovely place to visit and walk around - there's a cafe with delicious home baking and light meals and a friendly village pub too for those who might fancy making a day of it. Hope to see you then!
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Back when I was working as a woodcarver, I did quite a bit of work for the Hansel Village here in Ayrshire, including designing and making carvings like this one for a miniature golf course for the residents. This was a pleasure from start to finish, although it was very demanding! Now that I'm painting, and no longer able to carve because of health problems, I was very happy to be invited to contribute a little picture to Hansel's fundraiser which will be launched at the beautiful Lochgreen Hotel in Troon on Monday 9th March. All the paintings will be on sale for charity and will go to help sustain this very worthwhile foundation. The exhibition is on for three days and my contribution has a nautical theme - this is Ardminish Bay, on Gigha - a detailed little image as you can see below! Was meant to be doing the Antique and Collectors' Market at the Citadel Centre in Ayr this weekend, but a combination of horrible weather and a flare-up of my arthritis, to the point where any kind of movement is problematic has meant that I have had to cancel. Never mind. It has at least given me some time to sit in the warmth of my studio and paint. I'm currently working on a large and cheerful picture of sunflowers, and at least that's a happy subject for a dreich time of year!
I'm back on my serious arthritis meds after a break over Christmas when I contracted a nasty chest infection and had to discontinue them - let's hope that they begin to kick in soon and make me feel well enough to do the occasional show, even if I do sit down for most of it! You can now find a very good selection of my prints and even my original art on eBay - in my wife's 'Scottish Home' eBay store. Once you get there, click on the Gallery link and you'll find them. I'm planning to add quite a lot more of my original art over the next few weeks. Although I know these pictures are rather expensive you're very welcome to make an appointment to view in my studio, but the online display will give you some idea of the work before you do. Or you could buy a small print to see if you might like to live with the original!
Meanwhile, we've just had a big meeting of all the artists who will be involved with the Open Studios Ayrshire event this year. The date for your diary is 25th and 26th April. More than 60 artists will be involved this year and there will be a mini bus to bring people from the various 'hubs' - our local hub is the Carrick Centre at Maybole. This should make it much easier for visitors to see more of what's on offer in individual studios. We'll be open from 10 am on both days and all visitors will be made most welcome. Our village cafe and pub will also be open on the day offering a wonderful selection of food and drink, from teas, coffees and home baking in our community shop and cafe, just along the road from my studio, to the excellent full meals on offer in the Kirkmichael Arms. Meanwhile, why not go along and 'like' our Facebook Page so that you can keep up with all the news as it happens. Coming to the end of the year on a cheerful note, with the very welcome sale of one of my bigger artworks, via the gallery where it was exhibited for some time - and I'm very grateful for their promotional help. Since it's a Christmas gift for somebody, I can say no more about it - and of course it isn't this image - this is one that I used as a Christmas card a few years ago. I've got plenty of plans for publicity and promotion in 2015, and - health permitting - I also plan to do occasional craft fairs and shows especially throughout the spring and summer, although I always have to pace myself and take my wife along to do the fetching and carrying from car to stand - it takes me all my time to get myself there. I've just updated my listing on the excellent new Scotland's Artists website and am looking forward to the Open Studios event in the spring and already starting to plan for that too. Meanwhile, I'm also planning to start a major new painting over the Christmas period and have a really interesting (and very place specific) idea in mind - something on a subject I know well. But much more about that in January 2015. We did another antique market at Ayr's Citadel on Saturday. Very tiring but sold a few prints and cards and spoke to a lot of interested and interesting people. This was a busy event, the last before Christmas. I've decided to carry on doing these monthly events as far as possible, because people keep asking me if I'll be 'there next month' and I tell them I hope so! The more often people see you as a regular exhibitor, the more interested (and confident) they become. Or that's what we're hoping, anyway. Back when I was working as a woodcarver, people knew who I was and what I did, but making a name for yourself in another field entirely, albeit a creative one, is a bit of a challenge. One visitor came up with another word to describe my work - primitive, in a good way. He said he loved the way it was so full of life. The next market is at the very end of January and we've booked a stall, hoping that the weather won't be too bad. At least the disabled parking is very close to the door, and my wife does all the carrying! I'll be taking a stall and exhibiting at the forthcoming Antiques and Collectables Market in Ayr's Citadel Centre, this coming Saturday 25th October from 10 am. I've spent the last six weeks or so getting prints and cards made and sorted out, sourcing mount board, cutting mounts (learning to use a mount cutter in the process) and generally making sure that everything is well packaged and presented for public consumption. Why not come along and say hello if you're in the vicinity?
It's something of an undertaking for me - doing a show of this kind. Way back when I was carving for a living, we did numerous shows, carting full size rocking horses and other heavy objects in and out of buildings. This is probably one of the reasons why I have serious mobility problems now. We have to pick and choose where we go - access is always a problem and I really can't do any carrying. Just getting from A to B is a bit of a struggle. However, my wife is coming along to carry the boxes and fortunately canvases and prints don't weigh nearly as much as rocking horses made of oak! And it's good to engage with the public - to chat about the work. We've booked Saturday's stall, and another one at the end of November. The Citadel is closing for renovations soon after that so we won't be back there till the spring, but will be looking for other venues. I'm hoping to be able to do a venue of this kind roughly once a month. We'd like the chance to exhibit in Dumfries and Galloway, which is only a short hop over the border from here - and seems to be a place that values artists! Hate to have to say it, but we're beginning to think about Christmas here in the studio. We've booked a couple of dates at our local antique and collectables market here in Ayrshire, at the end of October and November - where we'll be displaying (and hopefully selling) my prints and greetings cards as well as a little bit of original work. The eBay shop will be refreshed during October and we may well experiment with an Etsy shop. We're looking at the possibility of tea-towels and just possibly printed bags as well. We hope to produce a calendar of my seasonal images as well. And we're also beginning to think about next year's Open Studios event! But mostly, I've got to spend just a bit more time on my painting. At the moment, I'm thinking about 'men who go down to the sea in ships'!
Spent the weekend setting up and manning my part of a small exhibition of artwork by local artists at The University of the West of Scotland as part of our annual Ayrshire Doors Open Day event. The new campus on the banks of the River Ayr is wonderful and the exhibition itself was well organised, the studio-gallery a beautiful venue. The organiser herself had worked beyond the call of duty. Unfortunately, almost nobody came. On the Saturday, the nearby Air Show had certainly attracted most of the potential visitors but we had a few people and they seemed interested. The cafe was open, so was the excellent library, there were willing student guides and it was a pleasant day. Sunday, however, was a different matter. The cafe was closed (nobody had told them about the event) and so was the library. There were no student guides on hand - in fact a solitary lassie at the desk told us that she hadn't been asked to attend at all - but had been told by a friend that the venue might be open, and thought that she ought to help, bless her. I arrived to a closed barrier at the car-park and a security man asking me what I wanted. One of the big iron gates of the campus was propped open about two feet - just wide enough for an individual to squeeze through. The whole place looked closed and forbidding. Not so much Doors Open Day as Doors Ajar Day. All of which is a shame when a number of people had gone to a great deal of trouble in honour of the event. Still, it allowed me to see if it would be feasible for me to do the occasional exhibition. And seems that it will - with help to set up and carry items, as well as somewhere to sit down during the day. At least prints and paintings are much lighter than the woodcarvings I used to show! A few weeks ago, somebody remarked that my work reminded him very much of the work of Grandma Moses. I knew almost nothing about her, but when I went looking for her, here, I saw that he was right. Then, last night on one of those television antique shows, there was a painting by Fred Yates. And once again, somebody said 'ooh - that's your kind of work!' You can see some of Fred Yates's wonderful pictures here and make up your mind whether I'm the new Grandma Moses, the new Fred Yates, or something else entirely! What would you call my style of painting? Naive? Outsider? Folk? I'm never very sure. I paint what I see, or do I? Perhaps I paint what I feel. I know that the way I paint, see, feel seems to be nothing at all like the way other people see, feel and paint. I'll never paint a still life, seldom will I paint a landscape but when I do, it always seems to involve some vivid and rather disturbing elements. Sometimes I feel I'm illustrating something - but what? Often I'm not. I'm just creating colour, light, people in a certain setting - telling a story. I'm invariably telling a story. |
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