Welcome to Newsletter 29
Hope 2020 has been treating you well.
I have been frightfully busy so far this year – but only a little time for creating artwork. Such is life..... Double Elephant has been keeping me super busy. We have been blessed with some rather nice funding to schedule a whole series of mental health workshops focused on social isolation. We are calling these groups “Kick Start your Creativity”. The four parallel groups of 6-8 people being looked after by three tutors is proving to be quite challenging and I have been having to exercise my scheduling and admin hat as much as my workshop facilitator hat. We are just over half way through and although challenging it is proving to be very rewarding seeing how people have settled in and groups have gelled despite being such disparate characters and age ranges. All of these groups are working towards an exhibition in Double Elephant’s very own gallery space. But more of that later under “item 2”. First I would like to invite you to my next Art Fair!
Here’s a quick list of what’s in this newsletter:-
1. Invite to Bath Art Fair.
2.
New Double Elephant Gallery
3.
RAMM Local Show
1. Invite to Bath Art Fair.
Saturday 29th Feb 10am – 6pm.
Sunday 1st March 10am – 5pm
Private View Friday 28th February 6-9pm
Bath Pavilion,
North Parade Road,
Bath, BA2 4EU
I took part in the
Bath Art Fair for the first time last year and I was so happy with the experience that I’m taking part again, this year! Centrally located in the heart of Bath at the
Bath Pavilion this is really easy to get to – even a short walk from Bath Spar train station. The splendid Edwardian building also has good parking facilities and is a short walking distance into the town centre. All of which should make it very easy for you to come and have a visit to see 80+ artists’ work and find me at stand 36! Tickets are £5 on the door (children and students free), but I can ping you a half price ticket or even a PV invite if we act quickly.
Sorry about the short notice but I really do hope that you are able to visit me at stand number 36 (which is half way along the left hand aisle). I was very pleased with the quality of work shown by the other art fair participants last year and this year looks to be equally as good. To have a peep at the other artists exhibiting, take a look
here.
Although I only have a week to go before I pack all the artwork into the car, I am still, even now, preparing some NEW artwork that will have its first airing in Bath. A large statement piece will also be picked up from the framers tomorrow.
Some of this work forms part of a new set of prints I am developing with the RAMM Local Art Show in mind (See item 3) and will be continuing with after I’ve returned from Bath.
2. New Double Elephant Gallery.
Double Elephant’s new Gallery is an exciting collaboration between Exeter Phoenix and Double Elephant and is located in the busy Café Bar at the heart of the building we share. The plan is for our new gallery to present a programme of exhibitions that showcase critically engaged contemporary visual art grounded in printmaking practice and to provide an accessible platform for selling this work to the public.
The first exhibition has been on since January and shows Simon Ripley’s new work. It was Simon and myself who set up Double Elephant 22 years ago – you could say we are the original Elephants... However you only have until March 4
th to catch
Simon’s work. It’s all about the experience of colour, layered onto Japanese papers in these relief print monotypes. They are very much about the process of printmaking – each piece is un-premeditated and made intuitively as a response to the physical process of printing.
Next will be FLOOD AND PULL, an
exhibition of screen-prints by four artists that demonstrate the range and versatility of this most popular of printmaking mediums – from the mid-century, decorative vibe of Rachel Jaques’ work to the hard-edged abstraction of Jeremy Specks’ colourful prints.
Then at the end of April we will be preparing the gallery to show the work by our “Kick Start your Creativity” mental health groups.
3. RAMM Local Show.
The annual Royal Albert Memorial Museum’s
Local Art Show gives art groups and societies from Exeter and the surrounding area the chance to display members’ work in an exhibition at RAMM. Double Elephant entered for the first time AND won in 2017. It was fabulous to see so many of our members work displayed in a large, quality museum’s gallery – all reflecting the theme of “Dartmoor”.
This year groups are being invited to prepare artworks inspired by RAMM and its collections; so we thought we’ll give it another go. We will hear any day soon whether we have been short listed and if we are we will need lots and lots of votes from the public if we are able to win again. The exhibition will be from 23 May to 17 June, so I am preparing work with this in mind. I looked around the collections and what caught my eye was their rather splendidly presented Barn Owl. Now it was my intention to start some work with Barn Owls last year, but for various reasons that didn’t happen – so now’s my chance!
Shortlisted entrants and voting details will be featured in Exeter Living magazine on 6 March 2020.
Voting will take place between 6 March and 3 April.
Some of my initial pieces of work will be going with me to Bath and I shall continue creating and developing ideas when I get back.
If we don’t win the chance for the exhibition, all is not lost – I shall have created the artwork I wanted to do anyway. Plus, Double Elephant has a browser in the RAMM
shop where they like us to keep them stocked-up with artwork that reflects some of their exhibitions – so that would be a natural home for some of the unframed work.
Hope to see you again soon
Thanks Lynn
