Pieces Of Eight

Pieces Of Eight Show Card

I’m in a group show at The Dam Gallery in the Alton Mill Arts Centre. The title of the show is Pieces of Eight. There are eight of us (no kidding): Rosemarie Armstrong, John Ashbourne, Iris Casey, Rosemary Hasner, Pete Herlihy, Andrea Trace, Steve Volpe and Freda Wrench. I’ve done some new work for this show that I am quite happy with. The new pieces were done in the two workshops I have attended recently: one with Mary Wood and one with Claudia Jean McCabe.

They represent a new direction for me. I have tried many times, without success to really pare a painting down to essentials. Mirage does that, or at least, is a long-awaited step in the right direction. Big sigh of relief.

The other new work is Festival which is a free-form, palette-knifed composition on raw canvas. Heck, yeah. That was fun. It is sort of festive in appearance, but the real festival was in the making.

It’s adhered with medium to a birch panel but left raw in places. I mean, I did not cover the work with more medium, gloss or matte, so the canvas maintains its quality which I like. Gives the piece immediacy and does not divorce it from its roots. Framing so often formalizes a work beyond where I want it to go.

Headwaters Arts 2011

On A Swing Above The Inferno, Loose Leaf Number 2

I have seven paintings up at the current SGI Headwaters show. One of my pieces has been awarded a Jurors’ Choice which is very cool and makes me quite happy. It’s nice to get feedback like that. I will post that picture in the next blog entry.

I hang out with my paintings for most of the exhibition because I like to talk to people and find out what they think. Additionally, I like to stop people from walking away too soon. My work needs a few minutes to sink in. A strolling viewer offering a passing glance doesn’t always allow the piece time to exude its subtle charm. So I make a bit of small talk and let the work lasso a larger share of attention. We are a bit crafty.