Goldfinches - lino prints on gift tags for Christmas

My favourite birds - goldfinches. Up to 10 goldfinches at a time visit my garden to eat sunflower hearts, niger seed and to perch on and peck at teazels. I can see them from my studio window. Unlike blue tits, they sit fairly still for quite a while which helps ifyou are trying to draw them!
  Other visitors include a woodpecker, starlings, blackbirds, great tits, bullfinches, sparrows and, in deeper winter, siskins, fieldfares and redwings.

 

While I was drawing, I was listening to the 'Be Good Tanyas' who sang, 'the littlest birds sing the prettiest songs...'.

 

 

Holding your nerve - wait to see what emerges

I spent a fascinating day on a canal yesterday near Bratch Locks researching for a new project.  A sunny warm day, strong sunlight, branches of golden leaves overhanging the water's edge.   People quietly fishing, sheep grazing nearby and two glimpses of a bright turquoise kingfisher.
 Ideas are growing and changing and it's great to have time to let this happen at a gradual pace.  It's good not to have to know exactly what the outcomes will be just yet. With visual art (and other creative endeavours such as creative writing) you need to hold your nerve and wait to see what emerges.  Your previous experiences and skills are a lifeline...

Friday 13th September - lucky for the artists exhibiting at the Bewdley Museum's Foundry Studio and Gallery

You are invited to the opening of an exhibition of artists' books and original prints.

I hope Friday 13th September is lucky for all the artists who are exhibiting their books and prints during this evening (6-8pm) at Bewdley Museum's Foundry studio and gallery, and there is a good turn out to see this exciting work.
Most of the artists' books are a combination of both image and words and relate to a wide range of subject matter. 
Some of my own prints link to the work of the brilliant ImagetextImage poets - Emma Purshouse, Dave Finchett, Jane Seabourne, Nick Pearson. Subject matter includes garlic, 'Spot the Ball' and a woman losing her mind in Wolverhampton...

If you can't make it to the opening, the exhibition is on:

Saturday 14th to Sunday 22nd September
Open 11.00 – 16.00 at weekends 
(weekdays flexible hours - check before visiting)

 Go to Bewdley Museum website


Book-Arts Workshop with Lin Charlston at Bewdley Museum 
Bewdley Museum - Foundry Gallery and Studio
Sunday 15th September, 10.30am – 2.30pm

 Lin Charlston has been a practising book artist since 2000 when she gained MA Book-Arts with distinction at Camberwell College of Arts. Her artist’s books are represented in public collections including Tate Britain, The National Art Library at V&A, Yale Center for British Art, The Art Institute of Chicago and Collezione Aprile di Cimia in Turin. 

Lin teaches book-arts locally at Westhope College and has run workshops at the Sidney Nolan Trust and further afield including Plas Tan y Bwlch in Snowdonia, Tate Britain and a three day course at the V&A in 2010. Lin was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in 2006. See more about her at www.faction.org.uk.

Cost of workshop is £10 from Bewdley Tourist Information 0845 6077819

'Swimming the Butterfly' - Volume 21 of the Encyclopaedia Britannica - Sidney Nolan Trust Challenge

‘Swimming the Butterfly’ – Volume 21 of the Sidney Nolan Encyclopaedia Britannica Challenge
On receiving volume 21 I flicked through the pages, my mind flitting and flying from one subject and idea to another.

 

Eventually, it was the hot summer, and experiences arising out of it, that led me to my final creation. I have never been swimming as much as I have this year and my garden has attracted more butterflies than usual, including one of my favourites – the Peacock.

Skimming through the text I settled on a section headed ‘SWIMMING’ and read about the butterfly stroke. It led me to think of the phrase, ‘Swimming the Butterfly’ and the surreal connotations of combining butterfly and swimmer. It’s a racing form of the breast stroke, so I felt that it had to be organised in lanes across my book and I had to decide upon a winner … the butterfly that excites me the most – the Swallowtail.

 

 

Finding the Balance Exhibition - opens Sat 20 April at Wolverhampton Art Gallery. Meet the artist 1-3pm

Finding the Balance – exhibition  at Wolverhampton Art Gallery

Meet the artist Saturday 20 April  1-3pm

Exhibition runs from Saturday 20 April –  Saturday 18 May

An exhibition of lino prints, monotypes, mixed media prints and iPad drawings exploring that elusive balance within your own life and environment

Finding the balance is a life’s project.   On a personal level when dealing with knocks, worries and demands how do you stay calm?  I asked Lilly (aged 4) and she told me that at nursery she does meditation, or as she calls it, ‘Ommm time’.   I like boxercise, working in my garden, stopping to smell the flowers, having an Indian Head massage...

Creating work for this exhibition is all part of my attempt at finding my own  balance.  I love printmaking and have used a combination of both traditional methods, that involve using a manual etching press, and digital prints and iPad drawings.

New qualification, (called the EBacc) for 16 year olds doesn't include Art

Today, a letter signed by 100 organisations and individuals representing a broad range of interests, from The National Portrait Gallery to the National Governors Association and including a-n's Head of Programmes and Editor Gillian Nicol, has been handed into Downing Street.

The letter, addressed to the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, is part of a campaign calling for an extended consultation period for the new English Baccalaureate Certificates (EBacc), in order to address the absence of creative and vocational subjects in the proposed new qualification for 16-year-olds.

I hope the letter is considered seriously and the new qualification is changed!

My page on Facebook

Linda Nevill Fine Art Printmaker - my page on Facebook

I haven't written much on my blog recently as I've been posting on my relatively new Facebook page.

For anyone unfamiliar with Facebook pages, you don't have to be 'friends' with someone to look at the page.   This one is about my Printmaking and other art related posts.

I'm looking into whether I can link the 2.

Click on the link above and it should take you there if you would like to look.