Spring Energies!

'Paphos Glimpse,' oil and acrylic on canvas, 60 x 45cm

As I followed friends' posts on Facebook, I saw their 2013 albums start to bulge with lively new paintings. Finally, two weeks ago, I was able to get back to painting. Six new paintings emerged, with a clear division thematically. Cyprus sunlight still buzzes behind my eyelids, and prompted a series of paintings about light and colour. (Above is one of the two I have finished so far.) By contrast, the other paintings reflected the muted tones of a wet and grey winter environment. As I dwelled on my Winter Blues, I decided to paint them!

'Winter Blues,' oil and acrylic on board, 20 x 16ins

It's a real struggle currently, because some of my new paintings are pushing beyond certain parameters, and I'm finding it hard to judge them! But it's all good experience, and I'd rather end up destroying something than accept less than I want.

I never heard anything from the other two residencies I applied for, so I'm guessing I didn't impress the selectors. Like a painting that has 'gone wrong,' there's always tomorrow.

A Mixed Bag!

(Nicosia Evening with Church Spires, oil on board, 122 x 61cm)

I'm adding a very bright painting, to try to banish my winter blues! January is always my worst month, and I'm telling myself that now we are into February, it won't be long until until the first signs of Spring. As I am spiritually still in Nicosia, this seemed the best painting to post today.

I'm just recovering from the worst Flu I have ever had. It was probably caused by the 5 hour arctic wait at Gatwick airport on my return from Cyprus, but I get incredibly frustrated when I can't paint. Finally I am out of bed, my new stretchers arrived, and I can stretch my canvas and start work again. All kinds of colourful threads, landscape imagery, and cityscapes (washing blowing in the breezes) are fermenting in my mind, and I feel that this new work may be a step towards something different.

My bad news was that I didn't get the Cove Park residency. The rejection email was very nice, as she explained that 280 artists applied, and only 4 residencies were available. Again, it depends if your work fits what they want, and previous participants seemed to be quite experimental. She said they had liked my work a lot, which was nice as they don't usually bother to make any comments, and I can always try again next year. The email even thanked me for doing the very lengthy (and technical) digital application. I am very disappointed as the landscape setting was ideal for me, and I could see myself making huge developments if I'd had a month there to explore my ideas quietly, away from my daily constant distractions. I long for at least a month of uninterrupted work! I'm still waiting to hear about my other two residency applications, but hope is fading. It's become obvious that when you first spot the email reply in the long list of daily emails, if it doesn't have an attachment, then it's likely the answer is negative!

This week I also heard that the Mark Rothko Centre at Daugavpils, Latvia (where I did my residency in September), is going to open in April. When we were there, we had a tour around the enormous, golden building, still full of builders and wires, and smelling of new plaster. It will be a big Opening, and I am considering going. I also heard via Facebook that our work is now in the Mark Rothko Centre - GREAT NEWS! One of my ex tutors from Art School is exhibiting at the Centre in April, and will also be at the opening. I really want to go, but my main hesitations are that it is a long journey from Riga airport to Daugavpils, it will be a lot of expense for 3 days, and it doesn't seem as if many of my fellow resident artists are going.

Winter Blue

'Nicosia, Mountains and Washing,' oil on board, 91 x 61cm

We came in to land at Gatwick amid swirling snow. It was a huge contrast to the Spring temperatures of Cyprus. Behind this white void,  I could still see the coast of Paphos shimmering under 25C, and could still feel the warm breezes on my face. An hour later, as we sat outside the airport, with a 5 hour wait until we could take a train home, the arctic blast took my breath away.

It is just under a week since I returned, and winter blues have set in. The snow has nearly all gone, but part of me has stayed in Nicosia, and my inner eye still sees washing blowing in the breezes, the blue of the mountains, and the warm hues of the city. My painting (from a few years ago) embodies the atmosphere and colours I am missing so much.

There has been no word on my residencies, which may be a bad sign. The best thing is to put out lots more applications, and get back to painting.  Now that I have caught up on housework and doing piles of post-holiday washing, I've ordered some stretchers and I can't wait to start work again. In Nicosia I made some black and white paintings, and a lot of drawings. Certain colours and shapes have stuck in my mind and will doubtless find their way into the new work. The greens in Cyprus at this time of year are always stunning, and almost appear artificial in their brightness.

I used the internet cafe in Nicosia several times a week, hoping for news on the residencies, and was thrilled to find an email announcing that I have been put on the artists' register at The Painting Center, New York. I applied last summer and had forgotten all about the application, so the news was a great start to 2013.
http://thepaintingcenter.org/

We are all Nomads

                                ('We are All Nomads,' oil and acrylic on canvas, 110 x 70cm)

As I write my last post of 2012, the window near me frames a grey sky, and torrential rain. The television in front of me is once again showing the extensive flooding in the UK, which underlines some of the reasons for my recent painting, above. This germinated from images of Tahrir square, with its mass of tents, and the shocking videos of places in the UK which resemble swampland. Interspersed with these were reports of world recession, homelessness, and increasingly the fragilites of life flash by on that screen. The idea of tents sparked my painting, and the concept that anything can change from moment to moment.

My application for a 3 month residency in Scotland has to be finished before Monday. It is, like most of these applications, long and complicated, and I spent several hours on Boxing Day writing my statements, proposals, checking travel costs (in case I get to the interview stage), and checking out the paintings of the artist whose name titles the residency. I believe my work fits the ethos, though there will be many painters applying for this amazing, funded residency. It's my last application for this year, and the results of all three will come in late January.

As my happiest artistic event of 2012 was participating in the painting residency in Daugavpils, Latvia, I am attaching a few more photos from those incredible twelve days.

           (At the Theatre: From left to right, Peter, Minas, myself, and my good friend Anna)

          (Hotel Latgola, 10th floor restaurant at night: from left to right, Anna, Madara and myself)

This photograph was taken on 25th September, at the Daugavpils Museum of Art and Regional Studies, where we opened our group exhibition on the date of Mark Rothko's birthday. We are standing in front of my friend Anna's paintings, I am at the far left of the back row. The exhibition Opening was filled with people, shoulder to shoulder, and the speeches went on for at least 45 minutes, and during this each artist was presented with a certificate to confirm their participation in the residency. I had difficulty pushing my way to the front to collect my certificate! The Opening was also televised, and I was interviewed. I was thrilled to find that my 3 paintings had an end wall to themselves, with my largest canvas in the centre. My largest painting really shouted its presence on that wall.

As the year ticks to a close, I'm wondering if 2013 will bring any further surprises.

                                       ('Twists and Turns,' oil and acrylic on board, 60 x 45cm)
                                                   (Click on images for a larger view.)

White Curtains

                                 (My walk through the park to the studio, September 2012)

We had our first snowfall a few days ago. So begins the curtain that separates the old year from the new, as temperatures plunge and my thoughts are on which bulbs to plant. I am remembering the walk to my studio in Daugavpils, as I deal with another rejection. It was half expected, as I had applied to a big company which showcases artists' work, but the slant was that it had to promote an aspect of scientific innovation or relate to something ecologically 'friendly.' I didn't fit the brief. As a friend posted on Facebook today that he had just received a rejection, I was not alone.

                                     (September 16th, our trip into the Latvian landscape.)
I finished my long application for the residency in Scotland, and have half finished an application for a grant, from an American foundation which helps artists. Both are a long shot, but worth the try. Before the white curtain drops and opens into the New Year, another 5 applications will make their way across cyberspace!

                        (View from the 10th floor restaurant, down to the main square at Daugavpils.)

I am closing this post with a recent painting, called 'Seasonal Echoes.' (Acrylic and oil on canvas, 50 x50cm)

Beginnings and Endings

My entry for The Crash Open Salon was unsucessful. Friends on Facebook helped put it in perspective, as this is part of the uncertain territory of being an artist. You never know what the selectors are looking for, or what the tone of the exhibition is. But I have never met any artist, established or beginner, who doesn't feel a slight wobble when a rejection notice arrives! My response is always to begin new work, and in the last week I have worked another two canvases.

I have applied for a residency in the US, and I am racing against a deadline of 7th December to complete an application for a residency in Scotland in 2013. Both of these are set in rural areas, which would be very inspiring for me, as my colourful abstractions often reflect landscape elements, and certainly I feel the energies of the land. I am longing for a period of isolation, in a studio, to focus solely on my work.

The Mark Rothko residency will soon be part of a year past. I can still remember the intoxicating excitement as my aircraft tilted on its approach to Riga airport, and the sight of endless, dark forests. I'll never forget my first night at the hotel near the airport, and the claustrophobic white drapes that obscurred all but a few straggly tree tops swaying against a dismal grey sky. Or how I just wanted to run home! I wondered COULD I cope with being with strangers all day, and would I be the one fraudulent artist among the group? (Because surely it must be a mistake that I had been chosen!) I waited for 6 hours at the airport the next day, until the bus came to collect me (and 3 other artists who appeared from nowhere). Riga shone brightly under grey skies as we walked around and met artists who were waiting there, and got to know each other.

I think that one of the highlights was the evening journey to Daugavpils, and drinking balsam for 3 hours on the bus while chatting non stop about art. I felt so incredibly happy. It's not often that you feel endorsed as an artist, and after years of struggling, I felt I was where I was meant to be. And as we neared Daugavpils in the darkest night, our hotel was illuminated green, blue and red against the sparkle of the city. We had our supper at 10.30pm, at a long table near to the band, whose loud music jarred on us in our tiredness. People were dancing a Russian kind of dance, bumping against us.

I'll never forget going up to the 10th floor for breakfast the next morning, and being told that we had to go down to the second floor for the Press Conference at 10.am. I sat in the row of artists, with the journalists, Mark Rothko Committee, and TV cameras staring at us. Flags denoting our countries lined the table. One by one we were asked what we planned to paint, and would it relate to Latvia? I said that I was already buzzing with colour ideas spun by the previous day's journey. I looked at my colleagues and they all appeared so calm!

I'll also never forget how, when I pulled my room curtains aside on that first morning, my only view was a puce-coloured wall just beyond a narrow ledge littered with pigeon feathers. I was on the 4th floor and up against the side of the Mall. Mario was in the next room and he asked to change his room. I thought he couldn't stand the sound of my phone calls every night after midnight, but he couldn't stand that wall.

So this post is a re-visiting of my Latvian residency, as I am feeling rather self-indulgent today!

         (Photo: The Press Conference on Saturday, 15th September - I am the 6th from the left.)

On that first day, we also went to see our studios, and chose some art materials from the art shop, which was near the hotel. I was surprised how easily we all bonded, and it was as if we had known one another for years. Sunday was our day-long trip out into the landscape (which I will include more photos from in another post), and Monday was the first studio day. My husband had bought me sachets of 3 -in-1 coffee (sugar and milk included) so I had a reminder of him, and also my own supply of coffee to take to our coffee room, which was just along the wide, bright corridor. We were also asked that day if we had decided who would do their presentation that night, and who would do it on the Tuesday.

It was a very intensive programme. We were given schedules and every evening we had some activity - ranging from Presentations, to a visit to the Theatre, to a wonderful meal in an unforgettable local restaurant (on the Saturday night). It was all within a walking distance, and I have some lovely memories of walks back in the dark, chatting to friends as colourful interiors and warm-stoned buildings vied for attention. We passed through a park one night and were shown benches designed by local artists. They were amazingly creative and intriguing, and each one provoked gasps of admiration. I thought how forward thinking these people were, that they commissioned artists and supported them.

                                          (View from the Latgolla hotel, 10th floor restaurant.)
I'll never forget our many lunches and suppers, and how some of the artists became fed up of being served chicken (usually under melted cheese) and fish (also under melted cheese!) and went out to find burgers. I was always so hungry and found most of the meals delicious, apart from the tendency to put blobs of sour cream in the soup. We had a huge choice of food for breakfast, and always unlimited access to coffee and tea. I loved to sit in the restaurant at night, drinking coffee and chatting about art, as the town sparkled around us. The staff treated us as if we were Royalty!

Before I went to bed, my husband called me. Some nights I was not in my room until 1.am, and we chatted for a few minutes before I fell into bed happily exhausted.

More to come.
(Painting: 'Leaving,' oil and acrylic on canvas, 55 x 46cm.)

Just Another Hill

Limited time recently hasn't allowed me to finish describing the residency. Instead I am going to add a few photos of places I saw in Latvia (mostly from the first Sunday, when we had an all-day trip into the landscape, and forests), and try to catch up very soon. Edges of the residency catch on me daily, and still inform my work.

Highlights, for me, were that day trip, when we went to visit a bread museum, lakes, forests, and had a picnic by the river. We also did a wonderful walk in the country, strolling through a museum of old houses, passing fields of sunflowers and gardens full of Cactus Dahlias (a favourite flower). I watched our guides picking mushrooms in an endless forest, with at least seven varieties and colours of mushrooms within a three square metre area. It all fed into the work I made in the studio. Also memorable was the night we went to the Theatre and saw a lively, colourful and very beautiful production based on a novel by Emile Zola. The singing and dancing, and stage sets are something I will never forget!

My life has become a case of constant juggling. I have applied to show work in a large office space where artists can showcase their work. I submitted four oils, including my second, large version of 'Flying into Riga Airport,' and a description of why I would like to show my work in this particular place - great space, great exposure, (and also it frees up space at home for me to paint more canvases, though I didn't add this part.)  Also I applied for the Crash Open Salon 2012, at the Charlie Dutton gallery in London. I submitted four recent paintings, and should hear by the first week of December. I felt confident about the paintings, but you never know how the selectors want to set the tone of the exhibition, so in the end one's work may not fit.

I have been stretching canvases, and working with great energy on seven paintings. And I changed my website design, which necessitated completely resizing all my images - a huge and ongoing task. It is so important to have a good website, and this is the best design I have used so far. Artists have to do a lot more self-promotional jobs than ever before!

(photos: Devil's Lake;  Mushroom picking in the forest; a house in the museum of houses; a recent painting, 'Just Another Hill,' acrylic on canvas, 45 x 45cm)