Rare Nick Park watercolour

A rare watercolour by Bristol-based Aardman Animation’s four times Academy Award winning Animation Director Nick Park is to be sold at a charity auction to be held at the View Art Gallery in Hotwells on 01 September; the auction marks the launch of Unsigned, an anonymous art event being held at View to raise funds for the Prince’s Trust.

Unsigned is a collection of more than one hundred and fifty postcards that have been donated by both professional and amateur artists. Each postcard can be purchased for a minimum donation of £20; the identity of each artist will remain secret until after the purchase has been made.

The event will open on 01 September with a charity auction conducted by local auctioneer Andrew Morgan; the works on sale include a framed watercolour by Nick Park, measuring 35cm by 25cm, the piece has been created especially for the auction and illustrates a scene from the short film Wallace and Gromit: The Wrong Trousers. Nick is an Ambassador for the Prince’s Trust and wanted to produce something very special for the auction, the piece is drawn on a larger scale and is more detailed than Nick would normally draw for such an event. The guide price is £1,500 to £2,000.

The auction will also include work by Karen Barber, Martin Bentham, Florence Blood, Toni Cogdell, Laura Cramer, Huw Richards Evans, Catherine Knight, Stanislav Mitura, Lauren Moorhouse Sale, Christine Norley, Emma Rose Phipps, Mary Rouncefield, George Tute, Caroline Walsh-Waring and Fran Williams.

Entertainment at the auction will be provided by local singer/songwriter Sam Ho; Sam was able to launch his musical career thanks to the support of the Prince’s Trust, he has been nominated for one of the trust’s Young Achiever awards and is now an Ambassador for the trust

Unsigned and the art auction have been arranged by GL Enterprises, a team from Bristol based law firm Gregg Latchams LLP; the events will raise money for the Prince’s Trust, a youth charity which aims to help change young lives. The Prince’s Trust gives practical and financial support; it works with young people aged from fourteen to thirty who have struggled at school, been in care, are long-term unemployed or have been in trouble with the law and helps them to develop workplace skills such as confidence and motivation. The Prince’s Trust is celebrating its thirty-fifth anniversary this year; since 1976 it has helped more than 600,000 young people.

Unsigned opens on 01 September and will run until 04 September; for further information please visit the website and to find out more about the vital work carried out by the Prince’s Trust please visit their site.

Call to artists

We are constantly looking for new talent to include in one of our themed exhibitions, art fairs, or our online presence. We take great pleasure in helping emerging artists fulfil their ambitions and help us keep our art fresh and exciting for our viewers and buyers.

We receive many submissions through all sorts of routes every week and enjoy reviewing the applicability of the work and artists to our gallery. We do our best to provide feedback on all submissions within a few weeks.

We are not prescriptive about how to submit work because there is sometimes a different approach that is appropriate for specific art styles and media. However, to help those who wish to know how we prefer to engage with new artists, we have written a simple online guide to selecting and selling to art galleries.

If after reading the guide you feel you and your art is a good match to our gallery then please make your submission via one of our contacts.

Thank you.

Sitting Images

Sitting Images is a solo exhibition by photographer David Constantine. It is also a book, a project, and a life story.

David travels the world to countries where conditions are challenging for both himself and the inhabitants. He has a unique physical and emotional perspective from which he takes portraits of local people. This, plus a natural eye, captures looks and emotions in people that are rarely seen by others.

David’s personal journey is as equally extraordinary as his artistic one. At the age of 21 he dived into a shallow pool in Australia and was instantly paralysed from the shoulders down. Within a year, David started his 30 year journey to become the outstanding travel photographer that he is today.

Sitting Images is a collection of photographs from this exciting journey, including Cuba, Mexico, Afghanistan, India, Sri Lanka and Africa. The images on show are available in a range of sizes from 1m to post card size, all reproduced in superb quality with colour that has to be seen to be fully appreciated. See sample images here.

Sitting Images runs from August 12 to 28, including a talk by David on Friday 19th at 7pm. Please email us if you wish to be added to the guest list for an evening that promises to be inspiring from both an artistic and human perspective.

 

 

Summer Madness update

Summer Madness is turning out as we hoped – lots of changing art, new artists continually introduced, and the lovely position of customers immediately taking away purchased pieces of art.

We have added some more images on Facebook to show work of the latest artists to join the show – Mark Youd, Diggy Smerdon and Kassie McMahon – and we’ve also conducted our third artist interview of the exhibition. Painter Rico, talks about his painting technique and the subject of his work; there is a suggested relationship, maybe spiritual, between human and animal, that runs as a theme through his collection.

On August 12th its all change when we fill the gallery with the photography of David Constantine. David is described as a street photographer who not only captures extraordinary images but has an equally extraordinary personal story to tell. David is a wheelchair user who became paralysed from the shoulders down following a diving accident at the age of 21. A year later David was travelling the world taking photographs from a unique physical and emotional perspective. This exhibition and accompanying book, called Sitting Images, features 20 years of David’s photography from around the globe.

On September 1st, Summer Madness closes with an Anonymous Art exhibition where artists have contributed a small piece of work that will be on sale at excellent prices. Its not until they are purchased when we will know who the creator is – we hope some buyers will be pleasantly surprised by the name of the artist as well as admiring the work. There will also be an auction of larger work on the opening night. All proceeds will go to a charity that helps young people in the South West develop and enter employment.

We hope you are enjoying the Summer and have an opportunity to join in some of the ‘madness’ with us at View.

Rico Interview

Rico Blanco is another welcome contributor to View’s Summer Madness Exhibition. Having studied illustration at Brighton, Rico later progressed to the realm of painting, combining these two spheres to create ambitious and captivating large-scale pieces.

His technique of working, whereby he begins at a detailed starting point before developing a more abstract background, creates a balance between ambiguity and incredibly descriptive representations. The result produces layered narratives which leaves much up to spectator’s interpretation whilst at the same time alluding to the powerful relationship between humans and nature.  The powerfully fragmented imagery constructed through Rico’s unique method of uniting realism and abstract is highly effective and enthralling, creating a balance between the clear central points of the paintings and the impressionistic background.

We caught up with Rico recently to ask him to expand on his techniques, influences and the captivating relationship between humans and animals so many of his pieces express.

Your process of working is said to begin at a specific point and build up to a natural conclusion. Can you elaborate on the methods and processes you go through to develop your work?

I generally have an idea in my head of what I want to do or at least have a few elements that I’d like to include. This usually evolves from the last painting I’ve completed. When I’m painting and it’s going well I tend to come up with ideas of what I could do with the next painting. For example I’ll mix a colour that works really well or see a potential composition that I could use next. I suppose that’s just me learning or progressing. I’ll either then start drawing things out first or just start painting straight away. The picture is then built up in layers and I choose when and where to add detail and where to leave areas more sparse, I want to show the progression of the painting. Which leaves you with the challenge of when is the painting finished? Which is one of those questions like ‘how long is a piece of string?’

In terms of painting I use acrylic and gouache but am looking into oils at the mo.

 You began as a trained illustrator before turning to painting. How influential do you find your studies in illustration on your paintings. Was it a natural progression from one form to the other?

Its a funny one really, some people say my work seems very illustrative. But that really depends on what you think Illustration is. The definition of illustration has changed, it’s come to mean anything that’s drawn and encompasses so many types of work it’s odd that it’s now seen as a style.

When studying I found Illustration briefs can have a pretty quick turnaround and so can be a little throw away in that you need to get it done by a certain deadline so perhaps have to cut corners. I found this didn’t give me the amount of time to develop a piece as fully as I wanted.

I trained as an Illustrator as I thought this would mean more focus on drawing which was kind of true but I could draw already and actually what I wanted was to develop my skills in painting. I may have known this already but only had the time to focus on painting at the end of my degree. As a result of that, I now devote as much time as I can on one piece to make it work as well I can. I want to improve with every painting I can.

In many of your pieces there appears quite an intense relationship between humans and nature. Can you expand on the significance of this relationship in some of your paintings?

Relationships between animals and humans fascinate me. How wild animals connect with humans. By putting them together it evokes different feelings and narratives. The way Mongolian tribesmen work with and train eagles to hunt, is pretty darn incredible. They have this uncanny connection.  I’ve always liked animals from an early age. I don’t mean pets particularly, I’m not too bothered by hamsters. Though If I could train one to hunt for me then perhaps I’d be more interested. But no, wild animals, especially birds are a joy to paint. My granddad used to buy me books on birds of prey and I would just pore over them. I thought they were ace. Ideally I would of liked to of grown up to be a golden eagle but hey.

What does the future hold for you and your artwork?

To just keep exploring my painting and developing my style. Honing my skills and seeing if I can surprise myself in my painting. Have more solo shows. Exhibit further afield. If it doesn’t go that well I may just change my animals to dragons and become Boris Vallejo impersonator. Who knows.

Thank You

Myth, Magic, Madness – Preview

Our next major exhibition is co-curated by Clare Ferguson-Walker. We first got excited by Clare’s work last year when she made the trip from Wales to show us her beautiful sculptures and we were riveted by the stories behind them. We were even more excited to discover Clare was part of a collective who had a strong connection with each other through their love of myth and magic, with a hint of madness. We were soon planning an exhibition.

The best way to describe the theme of the exhibition is in Clare’s own words…

Throughout history people have told and retold stories, and often through them have passed on covert insights into human nature via fantasy characters and scenarios. Over time a subtle language of metaphor and symbolism has been built up often uniting people of differing cultural backgrounds.

We dream in metaphors, it is how our subconscious mind relates to the world, and perhaps when the barriers between the conscious and subconscious mind break down in waking hours and “normal” reality is experienced from a different perspective we can be called mad, yet some cultures would and do seek out these states, going into trances to retrieve information from the symbolic realm, which can be brought back and used to help the community.

So perhaps the “mad” have something to share, to teach, and perhaps if we learn to decipher the clues we see in our dreams we can become more holistically ourselves.

If we can influence the wider world by manipulating objects of symbolic significance, can we perform magic? Are we the creators of our own destiny if we believe we are? Perhaps truths hidden deep within old myths and fairytales can help to unlock our hidden potential as masters of our own physical world.

“Myth, Magic, Madness” is a show of work by 5 outstanding artists who are each communicating their unique take on these interwoven themes, thus taking on the role of Shaman in our all too often secular western society.

The exhibition opens on September 9 and runs for 8 weeks. The artist line-up is: Clare Ferguson-Walker, Corrie Chiswell, Glenn Ibbitson, Laura Meredith, and Adam White. Here are some images of some of the work for the show. An online catalogue will be available nearer the time.

Fenella Elms wins award

It’s proving to be quite a year for ceramist Fenella Elms. Earlier this year Fenella exhibited at View Art Gallery as part of our White Colour show; her unique ceramic sculptures and wall pieces were admired by everyone who saw them. We followed up taking Fenella’s work to the Bristol Affordable Art Fair where her fan base continued to grow. Now Fenella has added critical acclaim to her highly successful year so far by winning the Ceramic Review Award at Ceramic Art London 2011.

Take a look at this excellent five page Ceramic Review article where Fenella discusses her indirect journey to becoming a highly recognised talent in the ceramic world.

We also caught up with Fenella in March and asked her about her work and inspirations in an interview. Click here for samples of Fenella’s work, and contact us for pricing and availability.