Sitting Room exhibition is now in Cambridge

Sitting Room
An exhibition dedicated to the art of sitting and reading.
Thursday 13th December 2007 - Wednesday 2nd January 2008
The Ruskin Gallery, Cambridge School of Art,
Anglia Ruskin University, East Road, Cambridge, CB1 1PT

After Cambridge, the books by themselves without the sitting room furniture will be going off to the USA and Mexico in the Spring. I have two copies of my "H on a Train" book in this travelling exhibit.

As it says on The Ruskin Gallery web site:
Sitting Room is a show of artists' books in a domestic environment re-created within the gallery. The setting is a mock sitting room, where visitors are encouraged to choose a book from the bookcase, make themselves at home and enjoy a rare opportunity to handle and interact with the limited edition artist-made book works. Artists from across Europe were invited to create books on the theme of 'sitting room'. Interpretations include: books on domesticity, seated journeys, chair related ephemera, ejector seats and a day in the life of a sofa. This eclectic mix represents work by acclaimed artists of national and international standing.

Cafe Gallery Projects Open Exhibition

This was a beautifully hung show. Lots of different work that was presented really well. See Nov 11 post (2 below) for more info.
My painting is the yellow and red one that is about in the middle of the picture. Click the picture for a slightly larger view.

Winter 2007 Open Studios

The Open Studios have been great this year!
With my group of older work and experiments that had lower prices, many people who had only bought reproduction prints before were able to get an original painting they love. It was quite satisfying to help new collectors get started and to see people so chuffed as they left!
YAY!

Cafe Gallery Projects Open Exhibition 2007

I have a small painting in the Open Exhibition.
21st Nov. to 9th Dec. Wed to Sun, 11am to 4pm (they are shut Mon. and Tues.)
Private View: Sun 18th Nov., 1pm to 4pm
Cafe Gallery Projects, in the Centre of Southwark Park, London SE16 2UA
Entry is free

Open Studios, less than 2 weeks away!

I am framing and varnishing like mad!
I will also be having a Studio Clearing sale. I need to make room and will be selling dozens of small and medium sized paintings on canvas for £30 to £60. These are transition pieces and experiments and colour studies. Come help me get some space back!

Chocolate Factory N16

Halloween rocks

I am one of my own paintings. Couldn't you tell?
I call it "Reds and Blues No. 1"

Artselector Contemporary Fine Art Collective

I have a page with some of my paintings on the Artselector web site. It has good discussions and information as well as a great contemporary gallery.

Save the date - Winter Open Studios

The Winter Open Studios double weekend at the Chocolate Factory N16 will be the last weekend in November and the first weekend in December.
Nov 24 & 25, and Dec 1 & 2

Chocolate Factory N16

There are 25 studios with about 30 artists most of whom will be around for the four days. The variety of practices include ceramics - sculptural and functional, lampshade and windowshade design, paintings - in many media, textile design, graphic design, printmaking, sculpture - objects and installation, photography, artists' books, performance and drawing.

I now have books at The Bookartbookshop

The Bookartbookshop in Shoreditch, East London now carries the following titles of my books:
Have a Nice Day (In the collections of Tate Britain Special Collection, Camberwell College of Arts Library, Manchester Metropolitan Library)
Welcome To the Neighbourhood (In the collections of Tate Britain Special Collection, Camberwell College of Arts Library)
Redundant
cut it out
Some of My Parts
Regret
H On a Train (Touring for the last 2 years with the Sitting Room exhibition)
Have a Nice Day postcard set (set of 10)
Compliments Slips post card set (set of 5)

Sitting Room is now in The Netherlands for a month!

I have books in a travelling exhibition called Sitting Room. It is now in The Netherlands and as always the installation is exquisite. Thanks Tom and Lucy.

The exhibition is being held in the AKI, Academy of Fine Arts in Enschede. The show opens today (10th October) and is on until 12th November.

Opening Night of Rich and Strange

new postcard

I am heading up to Manchester in a few hours to prepare for tomorrow's Book Fair.

Among many other things I will be showing a new postcard of the stages of the making of the altered book Dreamers of Decadence for the Rich and Strange altered books project.
Here it is.

Bookmarks V exhibition

Small artists' bookworks in the form of bookmarks are now exhibiting as Bookmarks V. You can see mine on-line here: Bookmarks V Artists. There is also a world distribution schedule there.
I am in great company, the collection is stunning!
Many thanks to Sarah Bodman of the The Centre for Fine Print Research at The University of the West of England.

Manchester Artist’s Book Fair 2007

I will have a table at the second annual

Manchester Artist’s Book Fair

on Sept 29, 2007.
I will have about 12 different books and some postcards on display.

Sent off painting to auction

Here is the painting I just finished and sent to the Spectrum Autism charity art auction. It is from The Universe in a Drop of Water series. The title is Interior Landscape 26. It is acrylic on 60x60cm deep edged canvas.

Spectrum art site
Spectrum art blog

A studio snapshot

Last week. Lots of work in different stages. It gets crowded sometimes when some work has to lay flat to dry and the oil paint formula is a slow drying one.

Rich and Strange book is finished!

I finally finished the painting and gilding of the Dreamers of Decadence book for the Rich and Strange altered books project. The project is a way to use discarded books (they were all art books). It should have arrived with them on Friday.

Dreamers of Decadence is about Symbolist painters and is an interesting book but I was fascinated by the title. To create a feeling of decadence the pages of the book are extravagantly painted and gilded with an extra thick layer of 24kt gold. This excessive use of gold expands the fore edge of the book and gold shines out.

They have now set up a web site about the exhibit: Rich and Strange

Spectrum Art Auction for autism charity

I am donating a painting to the Spectrum art auction in Cornwall. It is to raise money for the Spectrum autism charity.
Spectrum art site
Spectrum art blog

The Twits in Shoreditch

Last chance to see the Twits in Shoreditch exhibition at Standpoint Gallery. There is one day left. The open evening was Thursday and the MP for Shoreditch who cut the ribbon pointed out that 22% of people in Shoreditch are under 16 and that Hackney has the largest concentration of artists in Europe, so we should do more with our 2 largest groups: kids and artists.
I helped Anna Boggon with a workshop where the kids made small furniture and stuck it on the ceiling upside down like in the book.
I will put pictures on when I get them from Mia, the organiser of the event.

Rich and Strange: Altered Books Project

Flock Gallery Space, Newport School of Art Media and Design
artschool.newport.ac.uk
04-Oct to 18-Oct-2007

A group exhibition of 120 altered books by artists all over the world and the UK that begins at the Flock Gallery. The project is a way to use discarded books (they were all art books).
All books will be exhibited first at flock, the new gallery space at Newport School of Art Media and Design, University of Wales, Newport, from 4th to 18th October 2007. The exhibition will then move to Newport Central Library, from 22nd October to 2nd November, where the public will be able to check the books out on loan.

For 3 months I have been constantly painting and gilding my book Dreamers of Decadence. I will miss the book when it is gone, it is an hourly part of my life, painting and waiting for that page to dry and coming back and painting the next one...

Just finished a big fish

As always my painting revolves around colour. This time I chose a fish to play in the colours. Just finished it yesterday. Acrylic and oil paints on deep canvases. It is 200x120cm, pretty big, so it is over 2 canvases.

Gasworks Poster Show

The Gasworks show begins this week.
Opening Night
Thursday 9 August,
7-9pm

Exhibition Continues:
to Sunday 26 August

Gasworks
155 Vauxhall Street
London SE11 5RH
UK

Pictures from the Holloway Arts Festival 07-07-07

The kids from the Rowan Arts after school art club Art Games did a fantastic job and we had such a great day! It was better than anyone expected. And the people who attended were very interested and asked the children lots of questions and it went really well. Well done everyone!
Also, not only did it not rain but I got a bit of a sunburn! Woohoo!

070707

It is July 7 2007.

Poster in Stick*Stamp*Fly

Stick*Stamp*Fly, 2007
Gasworks
10-26 Aug. 2007

I have had a poster selected for exhibition in Stick*Stamp*Fly. It is an A2 version of my 50% happier flyer.
There will also be events each Thursday at 7:00 during the exhibition.

Another picture of my studio floor

Holloway Arts Festival

The Art Games group of kids and Over 60's will have their work set up on Saturday July 7 for the big day of the Holloway Arts Festival. The art work is really good. They have made sculptures based loosely around the idea of a made-up board game. There are plaster buldings, wishful islands, and trophies (for things like the best limbo dancer). It has been great working with them and the other artists.
Here are the new links available with information:

Holloway Arts Festival
Holloway Arts Festival on myspace
Rowan Arts blog

UK Artists' Book Fairs

At my Open Studio private view last night two lovely people said I should put the dates of book arts fairs on my blog so that new book artists and collectors could see an overview. I will just do the ones I attend for now, and add more later. A good place for this type of information is UWE's Centre for Fine Print Research

March-Until this year there has been one in March in Halifax, this year it moved to Leeds.
The 10th International Contemporary Artists' Book Fair

April-BABE - Bristol Artist Book Event is a weekend affair in April at the Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol. This year was the first one and it plans to be every two years.
BABE website
UWE's website coverage of BABE

September-Manchester book Fair is in September. This will be the second year. (and I better get my table soon or it will be too late!)
Manchester Artist’s Book Fair

November-The London Artists Book Fair is every year in November at the ICA near Trafalgar Square. Very expensive to have a table unless you share or can put your book on the table of your alma mater or something. It is huge and is a great opportunity to see a lot of work.
London Artists' Book Fair

Open Studios Summer 07 !!!

It's that time again! Sunshine and blue skies and walking around visiting the artists in their studios. It is one of the few times when we are all here at the same time and hanging around rather than immersed in work. So it is a perfect time for me to get to catch up with studio neighbours, see what new work people are making and meet new arrivals to our group. Please come along. I would like to know if anyone reads this blog! There is also a new building with lots of new studios in it! (I think the group is about 18 artists in the original building and maybe about 14 in the new one. A few of their spaces are really huge.)
It will be the weekend of June 16 and 17 in North East London.


The Chocolate Factory N16

Afternoon sun pics from the Oxford House exhibit

I went and took some pictures of the exhibition on Wednesday and I love the sun from the glass roof and the architectural interest from the ramps and railings everywhere!
Here is a sort of tour for those of you who can't make it.

These first three are from the lower basement gallery, with Rachel James' breathing sculpture in the back:


These next ones are in the upper gallery:



This piece (there is a detail below) is made of 100 panels and is titled:
Which One's The Pretty One?




And finally, looking down from the upper gallery:

Art Games kids

The group of kids I work with in the Rowan Arts Project is amazing. And Anna Boggon, the artist/teacher/leader of the group is very good at bringing out their best. Here is a picture of some paintings the kids did this week. They are a mixture of acrylic, collage and printing. They look even better in person. We are working towards a big project for the Holloway Arts Festival in July.

Oxford House Exhibition

The private view at Oxford House went really well on the 3rd! Lots of lovely old friends and some lovely new friends, most everyone - managed to come out for the evening!
The work looks great in the space. All the light is amazing and the different levels of railings and stairs make an interesting architectural backdrop.
It is still up for 3 more weeks, through May 29.
A big thanks to H for all her hard work. I could not have done it without her.
Photo credits for the pictures of the private view go to H




These two pictures are from the hanging days:

Five years in Engerland!

My coach arrived in Dover on May 3rd, 2002 from Belgium where I had been visiting my friend Jana. Five years later I still live in London and things are working out well.
Since I arrived I have:
Fallen in love and we've been together almost 5 years now.
Received my MA from Camberwell College of Art.
Had my painting studio at the Chocolate Factory for 3 years and been in some interesting exhibitions.
Found the few acceptable Mexican restaurants in London.
Learned to love the beautiful game. I support Arsenal.
Gained weight from my poor hibernation strategies (lots of tea and biscuits) to get through the winters. I think I may be genetically a hot-house flower.
Learned that ignoring people is a form of politeness in a crowded place; they are letting you have your privacy.
I have also learned patience, moderation and that the other person may be right.
I am obsessed by my work; painting and concepts for books are always in my head. I don't make enough time for people. I feel the results of this sometimes and it makes me sad sometimes but that is how it is.
Quinacridone crimson rocks.

A Picture from BABE

(Bristol Artists Book Event)
Last weekend was the first of many book fairs at the Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol we hope! It went very well. Saw lots of wonderful work and some old friends! This is a picture of my table.
P.S. Happy Birthday Elaine!

Celeste Art Prize public on-line vote

I am in the Celeste Art Prize on-line voting at http://www.celesteartprize.co.uk/2007/publiconlinevote/artist_2.asp
I have a 120cm x 150cm painting called Going Out of Business that is a result of my thinking about Darwin's theory of the survival of the fittest and if it is true anymore.
Voting ends 20 May.

BABE (Bristol Artists Book Event)

BABE (Bristol Artists Book Event)
Arnolfini, 16 Narrow Quay
Bristol BS1 4QA

I will have on display, available for handling, books from my Serendipity Press.

Over the weekend more than 50 artist bookmakers, dealers and small presses from Bristol and around the world, will come together at Arnolfini to show and sell their work. The first ever event of its kind in Bristol, BABE has been organised by Arnolfini in conjunction with the Centre for Fine Print Research at the University of the West of England. BABE provides a great chance to meet and chat to artists about their work and to buy works of art; prices start from just a few pounds.

I make big paintings and little books.

Colour Matters

I will have about 20 large paintings in a 2-person show in East London for the month of May. Some from 2005, one or two from 2006 but most are new ones, some of which I am still working on!
Here is the invitation and press release:

Press Release
(London, April 2007)

Colour and a Breathing Sculpture Converge

A dynamic contrast between the active inflatable sculpture of Rachel James and Julie Caves’ painterly exploration of colour is featured at the Oxford House Gallery in Bethnal Green from May 3-29, 2007.

One is immediately greeted by the visual impact of “Colour Matters” as the gallery space becomes a panorama of colour filled with the painterly and expressive work of Julie Caves that leads you through the high sunlit room and then down to the lower gallery. Of these paintings she says that “Viewers often feel that they are seeing a vast landscape but at a magnified level, like a universe inside a drop of water”.

Julie Caves received her MA from Camberwell College of Art and works in East London where her practice involves an investigation into colour, ways of seeing and the act of painting.

The visitor is ultimately led to the dramatic finale “Col de Alba“, where they are met by the expanse of a living, breathing, imposing sculpture that appears to be alive as it rhythmically inflates and deflates, expanding to fill the space around it. The union the artist felt between the landscape and her yoga practise during time spent in Catalana, Spain, inspires the piece. The breathing effect created in the sculpture echoes the feeling of the expansion of the breath within the body and our own connection with the earth around us.

Rachel James has been exploring the inflatable medium since 1997 and is one of the few artists pushing the boundaries of this medium as an incredibly diverse and exciting form for artistic expression. Incorporating movement into these pieces intrigues her and this quality has individualised her inflatable work.


Venue:
Oxford House
in Bethnal Green
Derbyshire Street
London E2 6HJ
(+44) 020 7739 9001
www.oxfordhouse.org.uk

May 3-29, 2007

9 AM - 10 PM Monday-Friday
10 AM - 6 PM Saturday & Sunday

Private View: Thursday May 3, 6-9

Public Pages Exhibition

The web site is now up for the Public Pages Exhibition.
Public Pages is an exhibition of Text Art and Visual Poetry bringing together contributions from poets, artists and makers of works which explore the visual and cultural impact of the word, the sign, and the slogan in public space. I have my 50% Happier piece in it.

Oxford House Show

I am very excited to say that I have a big show coming up! The curator at OH! Arts loves my paintings and I will have about 25 large ones up in the big space. I will be sharing the space with a sculptor who has one enormous white or colourless inflatable piece that will be downstairs. I am working on 2 very large pieces for the biggest walls and five 150cm paintings for the other walls. There also will be an assortment of paintings from the last 3 years, sort of a survey.

I think I will call it Colour Matters. It is a lovely space with a high conservatory roof for the upstairs, so lots of light. And interestingly 1 wall upstairs and 2 downstairs are different shades of red.

Watch this space for more information. I still haven't met my co-exhibitor yet, so there will be lots more info coming about her! I also have so much work still to do! So excited!

Oxford House is in Bethnal Green in East London. The show will run from May 3 to the end of May 2007. Private view is set for May 3, 6:00 to 9:00.

This is a snapshot of the corner of my studio yesterday, the paintings are piling up and the in-progress work is everywhere. I see many long days of work ahead of me for the next few weeks, materials to be delivered and canvases to stretch, and lots of painting. This show is going to be great!

Rowans Arts - Holloway

This month I started helping with the Arts Games programs put on by Rowan Arts at the Whittington Park Community Centre.
There is an Over 60's art group that could use some more participants. If you know of any seniors in Islington who might like to attend, we would welcome them.
There is also a children's Art Games after school group that is lots of fun. The groups are both run by Anna Boggon an artist whose work I really like.
The two groups meet at separate times on the same day but see and talk about each other's work regularly and at the beginning of the summer the two groups will join together to make a project based on the theme of Games for the Holloway Arts Festival.

Hackney Winter Salon

Pictures of the Hackney Museum show of small paintings and my orange one in the centre of the right wall.

"Where I Go When I Get Wet", 2006, 30x30cm, acrylic on canvas