TWO YEARS ON PAPER– Painting, Drawing and Collage.
These last two years have been very hard in many ways and whenever I find myself in a difficult situation, I set myself a challenge to have something new and positive to take from the experience. I have tackled three challenges in this way.
LOCKDOWN
The epidemic and lockdown affected artists in two ways, for some it gave the opportunity to focus on their work with no distractions, for others it was all so horrific that any creative work came to a full stop. I was in the latter group.
I therefore set myself the task of doing a small painting of a flower from my garden each day. The rule was only one flower, if it went wrong or the weather was unkind, I had to accept the result. The task was initially to finish when the lockdown and pandemic ended!!!
I did 60 flowers and then decided that I needed to move on. I found myself still doing flowers (unexpected) and then some new work based on the ‘Lost Folly’ in Roundhay Park, discovered during lockdown walks. Unusually for me, the latter, were semi abstracted and freer sketches in ink and watercolour, with a resonance to work I had done in the 90’s.
THE STROKE
In September my husband had a stroke which massively impacted on his physical movement. Once again, I was not able to do any work. As things eased, I woke one morning with an overriding need to surround myself with trees. Not trees in leaf but the strong dancing shapes they make during the winter.
The intention was to have them all round the walls of my studio; they were not portraits of trees but whilst doing them I would, in my head, go on the walks we had done, revisiting the landscape, and the feeling of the walk.
During this period, I was diagnosed with breast cancer and some of my trees became very dark.
CHEMOTHERAPY
The breast cancer proved to require surgery, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy. I realised that once again I needed something positive to take away from the horrors I would have to go through, but something that allowed for the limited energy and time I would have for my art. I also wanted to do something that would challenge me and take me out of my comfort zone. I, therefore, signed myself up to a course with Karen Stamper ‘Free up Your Sketchbook and Grow’, this involved collage, line making and a very abstract approach using a concertina sketchbook, not worrying about the end result, but responding to the marks you make. Since then, I have been doing abstracted painted and collaged pieces with a definite Arboreal theme.
I am not sure where I will be going from here, but I am watching it with interest, and I hope I will be able to take you with me on my journey in future Open Studios.
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