May & June Blog-Past/present lives

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It's June I can hardly believe it! The coming of summer with all it's beauty, colour and  growth has crept up on us with stealth. 

Wine making has prompted me to notice the growth on the oak tree in our garden and I was interested to read about the plight of some of our native bird species due to the earlier than usual appearance of the oak leaves. Apparently the little green caterpillars that populate the oak tree leaves are here too soon and the blue tits aren't breeding fast enough and won't be ready to eat and feed them to their young on time. They will suffer as a consequence, poor things. 

That said there is a noticeably higher population of birds fluttering about the hedgerows and garden due to our mild winter...so as always in nature pros and cons.

In May I took part in Art @ Ancrum exhibiting alongside Peter Hallam, another artist local to the Borders. Our work couldn't be more different but somehow we managed to make it work.

Peter  paints beautiful landscapes and portraits. His paintings often have witty titles, and the stories behind the paintings are insightful and very funny. Peter's company over the w/k certainly brought levity and laughter to the event and the Cross Keys made us feel welcome in their new side bar/ gallery for the w/k.

Since then I've been working slowly, still working on board and using the burnt earth with oil over the top. Working in a series is a useful way to go. I feel I can get caught up in the moment and get some energy into the imagery. What initially seemed like a large pile of supports soon became a stack of paintings, but still more to do. Each one offers up a slightly new approach and in the most recent three shown below I have been allowing the turps to saturate the surface ...I like how the oil,turps and soil react and I can't wait to tackle a 100x100cm canvas.

As artists, or any one that makes things you have a constant challenge in your creative life. How to be true to yourself and true to what informs what you do. Right through out my art school days, to when I left Ireland, moved to the Borders and then Newcastle,and back to the Borders and then eventually started hill walking and rock climbing I have used my experiences of the environment I have lived in as a source of ideas for my work. 

I painted urban scapes of Belfast,I made installations that fetishised chairs,slow motion videos of hands and sawdustI painted on glass with bitumen,I made drawings and  later I focused on identity finally making an installation that featured images of myself in different guises projected onto handmade clothing, a tricolour lined mans jacket with my bruised and battered madeup face projected onto the centre of the tricolour, a wedding dress etc.The bruised face was a reference to the beatings the Birmingham six took whilst in police custody.

During these years my work was very experimental I was constantly searching for the thing...I laugh sometimes equating it with Howard and Vince's search for the new sound!!
 I don't think I ever found it. When I finished my MA at Newcastle I was suddenly catapolted back to  the Borders....I had to begin that search all over again. I spent quite a while working with casting and sculpture, making panels and even a life size bronze that is still on public view at Dryburgh. 

But gradually I was spending more time out of doors in the mountains and crags and this is when landscape became my new focus.

Sketch book work on the chairs which featured in my degree show at UUB

Made the catalogue for the Royal Scottish Academy show in 1997

Installation shots of my MA show, 4 projections onto four garments, a wedding dress, communion dress, mans jacket (tricolour lined),mans overcoat. (not shown)

Group European show at The Laing in 1991

When I look back on this work I am immensely proud of it..I even had a show at City Racing in London in 1992..my first and last brush with BRITART !!

Small review in Time Out magazine 1992

When I started to paint in earnest I wanted to erase the past and begin again and to an extent I have, I've  reinvented myself..as a painter. But what I have learnt is that my past creative life can't be erased and nor should it be. It is part of me and how I think,create, make. Yes it's so very different, different media, subject matter etc But there are so many similarities too. It's still about my world, I still draw and always have, my spaces are to an extent imagined they were then,I still feel that fragility I felt then and of late I have been thinking about the possibility of extending my use of media.

May blossoms at Hepburn

John on Photographic Arete at Hepburn

Little oak tree, Hepburn

Beautiful broom, Hepburn 

Rain not far away at Hepburn

So back in the present I remain very much wedded to the landscape. New challenges await though. I have along with 11 other artists  been selected for a mini residency as part of Peebles Creative Place 2014. I can't reveal my host yet but put it this way it's going to be a challenge and one that has my brain searing with possibilities regarding mixed media.

New hair colour /windy day photos, just for fun!

The Eildon Hills in the distance

Shepherds crook

Night sky from the garden

Hairy ubitt

We had a trip to a couple of crags we hadn't been to before. Kettle Crag and Black Crag. Black Crag is an easy walk from the top of Wryenose pass in the Lakes. Great climbing and such a beautiful spot. 

Prince Charming? belaying Cinderella? on Glass Slipper, Black Crag!!!

Tree bark

New holly leaves, so soft to the touch!

Red dragonfly,only live for 2 years and only 2 months as an adult.

All the new growth, so beautiful.

So I'll keep the home fires burning, a few paintings out in exhibitions with one or two more things coming up before the Art Trail at the beginning of September. And if we are fortunate enough to get any decent weather we'll be off climbing if we can.

Thank you for reading.

March and April rolled into one

Looking for inspiration at Hepburn

 Two months blogs rolled into one, an indication of how I've been filling my time ?!
 March flew by. I was all consumed with preparations for the Art Fair. It went well for me. Having never been in quite such a public setting before and acting as both artist and seller...well lets just say I'd rather have an agent! It was nice though to talk to people who were genuinely interested in my work.

Oil and earth on card

Installation shot of small paintings from the Art Fair

Hepburn

Looking down from the last pitch of Troutdale Pinnacle direct, great days climbing :)

 Since the beginnings of April I have been working on a series of small pieces using the burnt earth as a base for the underlying structure or image if you like for the paintings. This time I am using MDF as a support. I wasn't wholly convinced that this would work. It's so rigid and hard, absolutely no bounce! Anyway despite my misgivings it is working out surprisingly well. The soil is much more stable on this surface , and the oil paint reacts differently when put on in washes etc. So all in all not bad. I really enjoy working on a series, it seems to drive the momentum both creatively and otherwise. Keeping control of the soil as I'm gluing it onto the MDF is my main concern. It is a fairly expressive act and what looks like a smudge of nothing seems to transform into an abstracted kind of landscape once the  paint is applied. This heightens the texture and of course adds colour. 
There is now a more definite link to the landscape not just through the actual soil but the in the physical act of making and producing these pieces....it feels ephemeral, both deeply tangible and intangible at times, a little like being in the landscape and very much like my experience of climbing.

Oil and burnt earth on MDF

Oil/burnt earth on MDF

New larch growth

John racking up in the background, Langdale.

Looking out from Shepherds Crag, Borrowdale.

You can see the sea from here, Back Bowden, Northumberland.

The brightest day of the year, so far.

So coming up at the beginning of May is art@ancrum. I'm exhibiting some of my new paintings alongside fellow artist Peter Hallam at the Cross Keys Ancrum . There are a host of other venues and artists exhibiting over the w/k.

I'm ending this blog with some trivia... observations that I have made in the last couple weeks.
 More owls hoot at night in the Lake District than in the Scottish Borders.

Grey wagtails and their spouses should wise up to windows and shiny surfaces, no other bird is trying to attack you!!

Rock climbing as a sport is a great leveller and it takes all kinds, the fast and the furious, the cocksure, the doubters,the slow and sloth like, the young, the old, friendly and not so friendly folks etc etc Out and about you meet them all.

Dandelion beer is not very alcoholic(it's a root beer doh)

Never under estimate the possibility that you might forget very important items of camping equipment when you go on holiday (like the inside of the tent!!!)

Never take your eye off the ball when it comes to the weather.

Lastly don't even dream about getting on your bike again for at least a week after your first cycle of the year. 

Thank you for reading. May is just around the corner  :)

t

Happy

Burnt out trees, Bowden

There seems to be quite a few of these around this spring, a good sign?

Gillean going for it on Hazel Rig wall

Close to home

Close to home

That white rabbit syndrome again..February into March

March is here! Feeling good now that spring is here, it's not exactly in full swing but tangible signs are everywhere, from the snowdrops and daffodils to the sun ever so slightly higher and warmer in  the sky.

Moving on from my experiments with the soil last month I spent some time going back to mono printing....always a good diversion when things start to go slow. Below shows the basic steps painting with oils on glass,and then pulling a print. The freshness and ease of mono printing is a joy. 

I have always worked into prints once they are pulled. This may be going against the grain for some but for me I find it solidifies the finished print and allows for a greater margin of error in the painting up process before printing.

Painting on glass

Oil on glass, good to go

Pulling the print

Final print

I have really enjoyed working on a smaller scale but I knew that I'd have to get back to some larger scale work especially with the Scottish Borders Art Fair coming up this month. I'm planning to exhibit a range of different sized paintings....having limited space to exhibit will determine and dictate the selection process. Hoping it is a success and looking forward to viewing all the other artists and meeting visitors over the week end.

Whilst doing some research  for college classes I came across May Babcock, an artist who amongst other things prints, performs and makes paper.I am drawn to her work on many levels especially to the subject matter of her graduate show The Latent Landscape. Having that back story in ones subject matter for any artist can be  a powerful agent to how the work is perceived. I 'm looking forward to seeing what she does next on her Rhode Island sited project.

Northumberland

 A connection with place is important for me. It doesn't really matter what level the connection is made,an observation,an ongoing physical connection,or a memory of place can be a strong link between the artist  and their work. Place acts as a reservoir for ideas which often leads you to pathways unanticipated.

There is so much interesting art being made which relates to our sense of place it's sometimes overwhelming.Borders based artist Oliver Reed  makes not only exquisite objects but also big drawings/paintings of many mountainous areas in Scotland. I feel connected in someway to these images...having walked and scrambled in many of those mountains leaves strong memories

In total contrast is another artist, Alec Findlay. His  work on a company of mountains shows exactly how amongst other things, a place and it's landscape are central to ideas about the various ways in which a place can be experienced and viewed.I'm really taken with this project... again before and now with family I have spent many days on the island climbing in the  the Cuillin and walking lower paths and slopes or driving around restlessly waiting for the weather to improve.

Skye is an amazingly beautiful Island. Her mountains are the draw for me. I have looked and looked in wonder and awe at this landscape again and again. To see another persons creative response and interaction with this place is inspiring.

Well then, keep on keeping on, make your observations, enjoy them and wonder. Keep curious and keep creating....below  are the images recorded in February and early March.

The crags on Green Sheen Hill

Looking seaward

Rain approaching over the Cheviots

Beautiful rock at Dancing Green Hill (Back Bowden)

Evening light, Pineal Heugh

Didn't go climbing last w/k (John was feeling abit sheepish)

A little side project, painting on the bottom of an old rusted pail

Meanwhile in the garden a thrush,he sat for a long while