An Unexpected Bonus

visitors enjoying the Harpenden Arts Club Open Exhibition

Coming as it does at one of the busiest times of the year, the Harpenden Arts Club Annual Exhibition always seems to take me by surprise.   As usual, the entry form was done in a hurry while I was in the middle of sorting out something else; when I came to prepare my entries for handing-in, I was surprised to find that I was going to show two watercolours and a monoprint, with half a dozen works going into the unframed section.

Painting the Boat alongide some other seaside-themed exhibits

 I haven't managed to get along to a club meeting for some time, so as a contribution to this most local of local exhibitions, I usually put my name down for a couple of hours' stewarding on the Saturday.  The exhibition, which ran from the Friday through to the Sunday, was enjoying some success:  the sales had clearly been good already, and we had a steady stream of visitors voting for their favourite piece and dropping by the stewards' table for a chat!

Two Hand Reel amidst a selection of works featuring figures

What's more, the exhibition had been hung really well.  For example, Painting the Boat had been placed with a number of seascapes and beach-related pieces;  they looked far better grouped together than they would have done dotted about here and there.  Two Hand Reel was hanging with some other paintings of figures;  it all made sense, somehow - our visitors certainly thought so.

view of the exhibition looking towards the stewards' table

The club kindly allows stewards to sell greetings cards during their stint, so I had a basket of mine with me;  yet again I spent the entire two hours convinced that nobody would buy one and for the third year running I sold a couple just as I was about to leave.  The bonus, however, came on Sunday afternoon when I went to pick everything up;  one of my Winter Birds two-colour unframed monoprints had sold.  Winter Birds is now one of my most successful series of prints!  The ash tree on which the birds were originally photographed has had to come down - a victim of ash die-back disease.  So the prints will have to be its memorial . . .

A big thank you to the organisers of the HAC exhibition!



Arting at Artscape

Artscape from the upstairs gallery

For the fourth year running a group of us have been taking part in Herts Open Studios, exhibiting as Artscape Arts, upstairs in our local art shop, Artscape.  It's an Aladdin's cave of art materials, stationery, greetings cards and frames; Gurmeet and his team will frame items for you, too.  He gave the room upstairs a revamp this year; there's more natural light and more space, both for hanging and to move around in.  When we set up a couple of weeks ago, we were thrilled!

Pauline's ceramic restoration display with some of Helen's prints and Hillary's cards

This year's Artscape Arts exhibitors includes Pauline Ashley, who works with ceramics - creating her own pieces and also restoring broken pottery and glass for other people.  She has chosen to focus on the restoration side of her work for this exhibition.  It's Pauline's first time at Artscape but she has been a member of HVA and an enthusiastic supporter of Herts Open Studios for many years; Pauline gave me my first taste of Open Studios by allowing me to share the gallery she set up in her garden workshop for Open Studios 2008, and a lot of fun we had, too.



Helen's prints & browser in the alcove . . .

. . .  and in the main room

I was also delighted that Helen Brooks was able to join us again this year, having last exhibited at Artscape in 2010; I was bowled over by her skillful linocuts then, and I still am.  She designs and cuts her printing plates at home and prints them up using the University of Hertfordshire presses.  This year she's hung several colour pieces as well as her classic black-and-white prints.

Sue's paintings with our card displays

Once again, Sue Wookey has put on a wonderful display of watercolours and photographs, ranging from the spiritual to the quirky; and during our Open Studios sessions (Friday & Saturday afternoons throughout September) she's been demonstrating some lovely small animal paintings.  Pretty impressive, considering that she's also in the throes of preparing for her first London exhibition at St Martins in the Fields!

Sue & Hillary's photo exhibits 

Hillary's acrylic photo prints and her other wall display

The fourth member of this year's group is Hillary Taylor, who is showing photographs, mixed media and computer graphics, many influenced by her time in Japan and Australia.  I don't know how she does it:  over the Summer Hillary has managed to do all our Artscape publicity again, set up a local artists' group, organise the refreshments at the recent HVA exhibition at Harpenden Public Halls and set up her own part of the Artscape exhibition.  And that's just her art life: she runs a home, a family and a job too!

my own corner of the exhibition

As usual, I'm the mongrel of the group;  or in art-speak, I'm showing an eclectic mix of watercolours, photographs and linocut prints.  The three paintings on show represent my entire output of watercolours for 2012, while many of the photos were taken in my garden; that is, apart from Buxton Quartet, based on my experiments with Photoshop Elements earlier this year as discussed here on this blog.  It hasn't come out too bad:

Buxton Quartet

But my biggest success was a last-minute addition to the display;  a double linocut Birds In Winter, taken from a couple of photos of birds in the trees at the end of my garden.  As regular readers of this blog will know, I completed one of the elements a few weeks ago;  it was only when we set up at Artscape that I got my act together enough to cut and print the second design.  It spent a few days drying, and I framed both pieces up on the Friday of our Open Evening.  By 8pm it had been sold!

'Birds in Winter' - sold at the Open Evening!

In fact,  we've all been very lucky as far as sales have been concerned; but of course that's not the main point of Open Studios, welcome as sales are.  It's interacting with the public and explaining the processes involved in creating our artworks which gives us the most satisfaction.  I'm finding it easier to chat to people than I used to; but just in case I get tongue-tied I've created a workbook out of the bits and pieces I use when working out a painting or a print:

my workbook showing preparations for 'Two Hand Reel'

my workbook pages about 'Signs'

It's really good to see some of this stuff out on display and people have been very interested.  I've also been doing a little project of my own during our Open Studios afternoons (Saturdays only in my case, as I've been at work on Fridays).   It's highly portable, great fun and has taught me a lot already; and we're only half way through!  you'll have to wait for my next blog to find out what it is.

If you're in Harpenden do pop into Artscape to see our exhibition - it's open when the shop is, unless there's a class going on.  And we're there in person on Friday and saturday from 1pm to 5pm.  Hope to see you!

keep calm and carry on . . .

Preparations for Herts Open Studios 2012 are in full swing: the August Bank Holiday Farmers' Market crept up on me almost without warning, despite having been in the diary for months.  Saturday's thunder and lightning had luckily given way to dry, cool weather; the Harpenden Artists' usual stall promoting Open Studios in the town generated a lot of interest, including the Acer Leaf print I'd hastily shoved in the car as my own contribution.

Harpenden Artists' stall at the Farmers' Market

Next weekend the HVAF is putting on an exhibition at Harpenden Public Halls just before Open Studios gets going;  artists from all over the county are taking part, some of whom are unable to participate in Open Studios this year - a great opportunity to include them, and promote Open Studios at the same time.  So there have been exhibits to sort out for that, and for the taster exhibition which runs alongside Open Studios at the Methodist Church in the High Street; and for the Open Studios promotion in the window of the Harpenden Building Society!

Open Studios brochures and envelopes awaiting distribution

There's also been a mailing to do for our own Artscape Arts exhibition, which runs alongside Herts Open Studios;  paintings, prints and photos to be mounted, labelled and wrapped;   wall labels & signage to print and laminate; browser items chosen; and a whole variety of greetings cards to sort out, some of which I've only just got round to printing!

last-minute card-making . . .

One of the items I'd hoped to show at Open Studios isn't close to being finished - at this rate it will become a demonstration piece during the event - and with a busy and potentially stressfull week at work coming up ahead of next Saturday's hanging at Artscape I'm just having to go with the flow, do what I can when I can, and give it up to God.  It's only art, after all . . . !!

 . . . other cards bagged up and ready to go!

More information about Herts Open Studios is available here on the HVA website; and you can see the brochure online here.

Stewarding with Shortbread

Harpenden Arts Club Open Exhibition 2010
© Teresa Kirkpatrick 2010

I spent last Saturday afternoon helping out with the stewarding at the Harpenden Arts Club annual Open Exhibition.  Life is so chaotic at the moment that I haven't managed to get to any club meetings yet this year;  and I suppose I could have stayed at home to work on some artistic projects of my own.  But I like to hear what the visitors have to say, and I wanted to see the exhibition anyway,  having not managed to get to the private view.  At the last minute I rememberd that stewards are allowed to have their own greetings cards available for sale during their stint, and hastily shoved some into a small basket, luckily realising as I did so that photographic cards would not be suitable!  Fortunately I've had cards made of some of my paintings, and these, along with my remaining mono leaf print cards, made a decent selection.

With two minutes to spare before the start of my shift I bagged the last parking space outside the Public Halls and ran indoors (then straight out again to fetch the cards which I'd left in the car by mistake).  The other stewards on duty were a charming retired couple; we spent a few minutes reading our instructions and then leafed through the sales book to see what had already sold.  Despite the recession the club had made some respectable sales already;  around a dozen framed items and almost as many mounted unframed had gone.  One of my companions had sold a couple of each!  We took turns to walk around the exhibition keeping  an eye on visitors and choosing our own favourites (all visitors were asked to vote for their top three).  As usual the standard was extremely high; exhibits ranged from large traditional landscapes in pastel to small acrylic abstracts, with etchings, collograph and monoprints also represented.  I showed Paula's Pansy and Elderly Couple on Rossbeigh Beach.

Elderly Couple on show alongside various other exhibits
© Teresa Kirkpatrick 2010

We had a steady stream of visitors during our two hours; halfway through, my fellow stewards produced a flask of tea and a box of shortbread fingers which they kindly shared with me.  And to complete my afternoon, I sold a few cards!  By the time I took my leave at 4pm a beautiful sunset was lighting up the whole sky.  It had been a thoroughly civilized afternoon.