SUSAN WOOD TALK AT SOUTH LONDON WOMEN ARTISTS GROUP EXHIBITION, BANKSIDE GALLERY, LONDON

Susan Wood, an artist member of SLWA, gave a fascinating talk on Saturday, 1 May 2010.  She explained how the Exhibition Group, lead by Moira Jarvis, had worked so hard to put on this, the first group exhibition of the SLWA.
Susan likened our group to the artists' colonies, such as the ones at Newlyn and Pont-Aven, but said we were more a 'virtual' colony, as we participate with each other on the internet, since we do not all live in a small area of London.
Susan went on to talk about the exhibits, and set out to point to various groupings, the first one being 'colourists' such as Anne Lynch and Janet Tod. Next was a group of 4 works based on 'people', this included the portraits by Julie Bennett and Joley Goodman, the scene of the Smithfield Nocturne cycle race by me, and the painting of a bar front in Alburquerque by Carol Cooper.
I was pleased that Susan remarked on my vibrant colours, and remarked that my painting was not just of athletes, but of athletes in relation to their city surrounding, a city context.
Marnie Pitt has used egg tempera and oil for for her surreal image, Susan Short has a print, the only woodcut in the show and Leonie Cronin (founder member) was mentioned for her acrylic, of a mythological theme, with a background of women playing in a brass band (which her daughter does).
Jane Higginbottom has a small sculpture, stone on wood;  Jane has work in Burgess Park also.
Selina Jane Steele has a collection in a display cabinet, and is influenced by the 19th century idea of cabinets of curiosities.
City scapes are represented by Tory Wilkinson's Blue Skys, Moira Jarvis by Trees in Autumn in Cannizaro Park, Wimbledon Common and water reflections by Liz Charsley-Joley, a view from water level entitled 'Putney Pier'
The subject 'Layers' included Kim Thornton's vacuum cleaner 'Domestic Alchemist' and Sarah Willet's acrylic where circles are gouged out, creating visual ambiguity, and suggesting an interest in Aboriginal art. Finally Susan finished her talk mentioning the two blue Cyanotypes of Zoe Burt, made at Brixton Lido.

BANKSIDE GALLERY, LONDON SOUTH BANK, EXHIBITION SUCCESS

The South London Women Artists group exhibition Private View was last night. The gallery was the Bankside Gallery, Hopton Street, London near the Tate Modern Gallery.
Masses of people arrived towards the end of the evening.
At first it was just possible to look at the art work, and have wine and salmon nibbles, but later it was just very hectic. Atmosphere electric, everybody talking and enjoying the buzz.
I sold my painting on show, Smithfield Nocture Cycling, which was very good news for me.
This painting you can see on my web site,

http://www.sportsportraitartist.co.uk

The exhibition ends on Monday next, 3 May, so get along quick. A total of 16 works have so far been sold.

BATTERSEA PARK AFFORDABLE ART - MARCH 2010

VISITING THE AFFORDABLE ART FAIR ON THURSDAY LATE AFTERNOON

Finding the free minibus in Sloane Square was easy, but traffic holdups meant it took ages to get to the Park on Thursday evening.
The entry area had interesting photo etchings by Andrew Curtis - very large and black/white. I admired the successful results of what I know to be a very difficult and demanding technique of etching.
Inside the main tent was the usual huge collecting of gallery pitches, luckily mostly named and with a location so you could find London galleries easily. I admired the determination of those people who came from Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands etc.
The ceramics I liked are by Pat Armstrong who works in Lincolnshire. Her work is fired in a raku kiln, and the copper in the glaze results in beautiful reds oranges and golds.

Also the small square paintings in acrylics by Anthony Frost jumped off the wall with their brilliance and texture. They were on show at the Penhaven Gallery from St Ives.
Particularly liked the work of woman artists Sue Stone in the Grimsby based gallery called Gate Gallery. She had a small painting of French's - the famous pub in Soho. Very lively and fresh.

It was exhausting though, and there was nowhere much to sit down and rest. Everything very crammed together. Luckily it was not packed up with visitors and many of the stands had nobody viewing, so I did have a good chance to look carefully at the art.

Noticed a lot of money had been spent by some artists on the most elaborate frames, and even small oils had been framed under glass in some cases.
Prices quite low on the whole, from about £300, so if you subtrace the price of framing - perhaps £70, and the commission, the artists do not get very much.

I admired several works done of urban scenes at night, with a lot of red and black. Seems a fashionable subject at present. Saw some of these on the Amstel Gallery stands, from Amsterdam.

ACRYLIC PAINTING - AT RICHMOND ART SOCIETY

I went to a meeting of the Richmond Art Society last night at the Vestry Hall, Richmond on Thames.
The demo was about Acrylic painting, and was given by the tutor Sue Ribbans.

I am used to painting with acrylics, but found the talk very interesting. Sue Ribbans showed up her method of keeping acrylics wet, by making a home-made wet palette from a lidded plastic box lined with kitchen roll and covered with baking parchment.

The supports she uses vary from primed cardboard, heavy duty watercolour paper, canvas or hardboard. Primer is usually acrylic gesso which is white. To 'fight the white', Sue usually paints an underlying wash of blue or pink, or sometimes red.

She showed us her recent paintings and prints, some of which will be in the exhibition at The Bank Gallery, Chobham, Surrey, from 30 March to 11 April.

SOUTH LONDON WOMEN ARTISTS GROUP LIFE DRAWING

Went to a small group life drawing last night. Luckily it was easy to get to the venue in Merton.

The model was fantastic - she is from Zambia and has a very slim, elegant body. I found it difficult to see my palette of colours as I had a light focussed on my white board but not on the palette. I tried acrylics - a limited range of colours - worked OK as I found on previous occasions. I used the same technique at the Hesketh Hubbard life drawing club.

It was nice having such a small group, and we enjoyed some wine and cheese too, with bread from our local Italian Bakery at The Rush. The others in the group used pencils and chalks.