Extended deadline for collaborative project

I am extending the deadline for  the 'Painting in the attic' collaborative project until the end of February as a few people are having difficulty locating their childhood artwork.
Lucy Fisher, one of the participants, has realised that she barely uses colour in her present practice in spite of loving colour when she was younger - the connection with this early work has led to the realisation that she is afraid of using colour now.

Lucy Fisher - Painted butterfly roughly age 8, Flower painting, GCSE exam, age 16

3 abstracts on white – Art Foundation, age 19 

Meantime the scraping away of the painting's surface continues slowly. I will post some more photos soon.

At the moment I'm busy making blank books for the Leeds Artists Book Fair in March and feeling rather downhearted that I have not developed this part of my practice in the way I wanted to, after taking part last year! What happened and where has the time gone I ask myself! Then I remember that I have moved house, set up a new studio and that the fine art degree course takes up a lot of my time, even though it is part time. Nevertheless there is life after the degree to consider and making artist's books is one of the ways I would like my practice to develop. So I'm looking forward to taking part again, meeting other book makers, being inspired, coming away with lots of ideas that I want to develop once my degree show is over in June!

An invitation to participate in my new project

‘The painting in the attic’ – a visual art collaborative project

Last year I initiated a collaborative project on the theme of ‘Failure’ which resulted in an artist’s book and also formed the dissertation for my Fine Art degree which I complete this year. I enjoyed the process so much and learnt a lot from it so I have decided to send out an invitation to submit work for a new collaborative project I am calling ‘The painting in the attic’ – I hasten to add that this is not just about painting but includes all visual artworks.

Background

Recently, a painting I had made around the age of 16 years came back into my possession after hanging in my parent’s home for many years and standing wrapped up in storage for a few more! I have no memory of painting it and have been curious to delve deeper into how it relates to my life now. I am recording my responses using different processes but not painting, at least not at the moment. I am not a painter and only used oils when I was at school. But the medium is only one way of looking at it and during reflection I have realised that it has a deeper connection than I initially thought! But more about that later! There is more information on older posts about both projects

The brief 

Many artists talk about the influence of childhood passions and the impact of this creativity in later years.

“It takes a very long time to become young.”  Picasso

Take a photograph of an artwork you created as a child or young adult and submit a jpeg image (maximum 800 pixel width) and write not more than 100 words on the significance of this artwork in your life now, does it connect to you, the way you work or how you see the world? Or you may feel it has no significance at all. It can be a story or as conceptual as you like, in the form of a poem, a piece of prose, or just random words.  

Deadline for entries – 4 February 2012.  You will be informed if you have been selected by the end of February.

Please send the image and words as an email attachment with your name and contact details and Collaboration in the subject box - you can email me by clicking on 'about me' at the top of the right hand sidebar and then on the left is a link to my email address. 

The works submitted will be selected for an artist’s book/s. This will be documented as a PDF and participants will receive a copy by email. One artist, picked at random from names in a hat, will receive a hard copy of the book. 

I will also be posting responses here on my blog with a link to your blog if you have one.

  

I really appreciate you taking the time to read this and I do hope you will join me in this collaboration. I feel really excited about receiving all the responses. Meantime if you'd like any more information please email me or make a comment here.  

I’m finished with Failure!

The book/catalogue is finally finished and was handed in to the University at 12 today – hooray!!  The size is A3 so it is quite a large book. I even made a slip cover to protect it – fiddly but not as difficult as I’d imagined.

I loved making the book and it has sparked lots of ideas for future work but I am glad to have the pressure of the deadline removed and to be able to move on to the studio practice which is going to be assessed in 2 weeks. 

As I’ve been concentrating on the book I have done little else so need to give it some serious attention – but tonight I’m having the night off and going to have a glass of wine and see a film at the Plymouth Arts Centre.

Leeds International Artist's Book Fair

It's been a busy time getting ready for this event last Friday and Saturday - first a long car trip from Plymouth up to Leeds via Leicester where I enjoyed dinner with an old friend. We talked about gardening and art and people we both knew. I'm now staying with one of my daughters and seeing friends up here too. My friend Jane from the days I was at Leeds College of Art shared a table with me at the event - you can see what she thought HERE. It was a great idea to share as it meant we could slope off and look at all the other tables and enjoy a break and cup of coffee. The feedback from visitors was so useful - it was a great learning experience and fun to do - the atmosphere was friendly and buzzy with lots of interest - I even sold work which has inspired me to continue making books. I only made blank books this year but now I am keen to include images, photographs, prints and drawings. I have lots of new ideas. Thank you Jane and to all the people who visited me. I almost forgot a really important part which was meeting Catherine Scriven whose blog I have been following and Susan Krause who has been following my blog. They are also both taking part in my Failure project - more about that later as it is now all coming together. I am also exhibiting in the 'Home from Home' exhibition running alongside the Book Fair with an archive of slide transparencies - I wrote about this in my last post - they are being shown on a slide projector in a walk in wardrobe - you have to peep around the door and operate the remote control to see them - an interactive installation that has a private feel to it - i am pleased with how it has worked and the comments I have received.