The 8th Beijing International Art Biennale 2019

Painting with ink on rice paper  in my studio in China in 2016

This will be a brief post because I'm on a countdown now to going to China for the 8th Beijing International Art Biennale which opens on 30th August with 125 countries participating this time.

I've also been selected to give a speech at the international art symposium on 31st August at 3.30pm. I submitted a proposal for a speech some months ago and have prepared a PowerPoint presentation with high resolution images. I'm speaking about the ideas behind my painting which I painted specifically for the Biennale based on their theme 'A Colourful World and a Shared Future.' (My painting is posted below). I have a 10 minute slot for my speech, and preparing the PowerPoint and images has taken up quite a bit of time recently, along with getting my visa, finalising many details for the trip, and all the many things you have to do before travelling. Consequently I have not been able to paint for over 2 weeks. Several new ideas are brewing in my mind but they will likely be tweaked by this visit.

I have been selected also to go on a sketching trip on Sunday, in the landscape, along with other artists, so may get the chance to work with calligraphy brushes on rice paper again. I think this will really refresh my work.

I'm going to Heathrow tomorrow night and have an overnight stay and then travel to Zurich at 8.40am with a brief stop and on to Beijing arriving at 5.15am on Thursday 29th August. This for me is the worst part because I hate flying! It will only be a short trip as I return on 3rd September but it will be fun to meet all the other artists, some of whom I may know from 2 previous Biennales. 

Keep checking this blog for my photos of the Beijing Biennale which I will post soon after my return.

'Walking Towards a Shared Future,' acrylic and oil on canvas, 120 x 160 cm

An Artist's Insights in to her Themes and Sources For Painting

'After the Deluge, the Light Rose Over the Mountains,' acrylic on canvas, 70 x 50 cm

This is today's Facebook post:

TWO of my favourite starting points for my paintings are mountains and waterfalls/rivers. I like to use them to explore paint and an idea of space, in particular, to give a sense of the physical space we feel in landscape which is always so different wherever we go. This has fascinated me since I was a child and it took me a while to realise that the actual sensation of space and 'being' in the land is at the root of my abstract-figurative compositions. As a child I used to imagine myself dancing through landscapes and this is what I like to do with paint!
Both of these, from this year, are about being in landscape and feeling the elements and its changing nature, in this case mountains and flooding (which we have had a lot of in the UK), and they are paintings of hope because in the end the light comes through. They are also about the presence of landscape as a being in itself.

I find it really useful to keep thinking about my core values and themes, even if they keep changing, as they always do either step by step or through a sudden insight brought about by trying out a different process.

I would add to this that my work tends to have several areas of focus as I cast out my net to explore the elements I'm interested in. This sense of space is one of the things that has always enthralled me because my earliest memories are of journeys with my parents, often by car, as we travelled to visit relatives in Scotland or Cornwall. These tended to be quite long journeys and I sat quietly feeling the different 'vibes' that came from the land. 

'Three Escape the Deluge,' acrylic and ink on canvas, 70 x 50 cm

I still imagine myself dancing through landscapes and landscape memories. I love that feeling of my own small size in relation to epic landscapes with huge mountain vistas, or being on very flat, open landscape where there is a certain factor of vulnerability. But the theme has widened recently to include the thoughts of environmental concerns, climate change and the eternal precarious aspect of being a human being.

I like to think that my use of paint - bold brush strokes, forms that suddenly appear, an emotional reaction to the paint - are all part of this dance and that I also echo Nature.

To be continued.