Category: Art for sale

#871 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art, Art for sale, Coffee Hunters1 Comment
©Tim Rhizome Artist

Concatenation is a wonderful thing. Post proper job I have dabbled in admin and writing for Arts organisations and now in a strange twist of concatenation as a non-tennis  player I do admin for a tennis club.

Not ‘just’ a tennis club but a coastal garden and Clubhouse that is available to host community events.

One such community is Rhizome Artists who meet once a week in the clubhouse. Rhizome are Exhibiting locally and the venue of the exhibition has a cafe that does great coffee and cake so a visit was the obvious thing to do.

So coffee, and cake but not concatenation were my anticipated outcomes of the visit.

Early on I met Tim who was taking some standard photographs of the whole exhibition. We had a small natter and he left. I enjoyed my coffee and cake and a lovely wide-ranging conversation with my gentleman companion. We then spent a lot of time enjoying the art, some of which is in the pictures below.

©Lynn Clynch
©Nuala Taylor
© Jane Athron
©Antonia Texidor

But then Tim returned. He is a stop start animation artist and had bought with him two of his posable figures and a panorama image of the exhibition.

©Tim, Rhizome Artist.

Really hard to believe that these two figures were not genuinely in the gallery with me. Or is this actually me and my gentleman companion!

Now this blog was always going to be about the collaborative work that Rhizome create in the Tennis Club clubhouse.

Fabulous as it is. The serendipity of meeting Tim altered the direction of the blog.

If you are local and can visit. Manor Street Gallery is open  during cafe hours.

#859 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale, Serendipity1 Comment

Two of my favourite things. Spring sunshine and a complicated image. The Thursday before a long weekend is always a little bit exciting. For my art group, it is the final weekend of a very successful exhibition. This is the view from our sales desk. Sunshine and showers, caught in a colourful moment.

©Debra Parkinson

Here is a Sea Otter caught in a different sort of moment.

Exhibition ends at 4pm on Easter Sunday.

#854 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale, Serendipity1 Comment
©Peter Ursem

What is your favorite type of weather?

You might not think that a lovely old chair and my favourite type of weather are connected. But they both occupy liminal space in my mind.

Derived from the Latin word “limen” which means “threshold,” liminal space is a concept that may sound unfamiliar, but it’s something you’ve likely experienced in your daily life.
Liminal space can best be described as going through a change or going from place to place—from one thing to the next.

I like the weather of May and September. Slightly changeable  with the chance of moderate warmth and no need for too many layers of clothing

Perfection would be twenty minutes  in a chair like this. With a small mug of black coffee or a cup of tea. Sat at an open french window overlooking the sea or at a garden that is not screaming for attention.

A chair like this in gently warm weather would encourage me to read or listen to the radio or a podcast. Or natter. This is not the time or space for TV or devices.Possibly something gently productive like sketching or crochet. Or maybe I could just be. Twenty minutes of not much in particular.

©Peter Ursem

Peter Ursem is currently showing work at Ocean Studios in Plymouth.

#854 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale, Drawn to the Valley, Drawn To The Valley Artists1 Comment

Who was your most influential teacher? Why?

Too many to mention but sometimes the most influential teacher of the moment is the last person I spoke to. Always so much to learn from others. Particularly this week as I have curated a Print Exhibition in a Gallery Cafe.

Here it is, on the morning after the night before. Spic and span and ready for the coffee and art-loving public to flood in.

Last night was a hubub of bubbles, and artists/printers/art- lovers having ernest, fascinating and sometimes wildly inappropriate conversations.

What did I learn last night?

That if I just shortened my beads they would sit better. They do.

#853 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for saleLeave a comment

Blog readers. I left you hanging, while I was hanging.

A full day of receiving , unwrapping and hanging prints at Ocean Studios for the Drawn to Print exhibition that runs from this evening until Easter Sunday. Gorgeous nuggets of colour and some striking monotones.

Two racks of print bargains on washing lines.

Mounted but unframed works all arranged by four artists who worked through the day to be ready for the Private View tonight.

As the exhibition runs through the Easter break it would have been foolish not to have one rabbit available. Ours does not know the words fluffy or cute.

©Debs Bobber

His axe is tipped with real gold. Cutting down the infection risk when he catches the small children who steal his eggs.

#839 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale, Serendipity1 Comment

Playing the parking lotto got me a big win yesterday. But I have to play against my better judgement. Normally I am an early bird shopper, but if I need to park in the old part of the city the parking charges work against me. Arrival before 9 pm and the meters are still on the overnight tariff. Rather expensive. Arrive soon after 9, and everyone is in a parking mood. The best plan is to arrive mid-morning after the first wave of early birds is done. I am an early bird, leaving things until mid-morning is not my thing.

Yesterday at 11 am I got a two hour, FREE, parking space next to the printers who were printing my C*****mas cards. Two hours free for a five minute job is a fabulous achievement. I was giddy with excitement. Even better I had done all the domestic admin prior to my arrival. What a gift.Time on my hands with no ticking meter. The sun was out and the dogs needed a walk.

Which took me to a Plymouth institution for lunch. Cap’n Jasper’s and their famous 1970’s smoked glass mugs.

The mugs disappeared for so long after Covid, I worried that they had been replaced forever by something less iconic. A twenty pence deposit is returned when you take the mug back. Albert gave me a look and the 20 pence was not returned to my pocket.

Tea finished.

And it was time for the main event. A bacon butty with fried onions.

An unexpected lunch out and still an hour of free parking left. I figured I could walk to my next planned destination, an art materials shop and the library. The sun was out, it was a bit of a walk, but both of the destination tasks were quick.

Back to the car with five minutes to spare…

The parking spot was only actually free for an hour. Who’s the idiot now.

But I had not been caught.

Oh frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! * I chortled in my joy.

I had saved £3.60 and spent £20, 2 hours of unexpected pleasure in the sun. A lovely bit of old boat on the way.

And still some afternoon printing achieved.

* words of celebration from Jabberwocky by Lewis Carol.

#837 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale, SerendipityLeave a comment

How has a failure, or apparent failure, set you up for later success?

I failed to write an early blog today, hopefully this apparent failure will set me up for later success, now, as I gather my words. Blogging at a snails pace I believe. There are many reasons I should have got my printing on the go more than a month before the exhibition opens. Today is a case in point. Real life still goes on, cars and vans need servicing and M.O.T’s. Life admin needs attending to and dogs need walking. Then the sun popped up in the studio and printing embellishment needed to be embellished.

Some embellishment is just a bit of type writing and a little bit of twinkle.

My mother would be ashamed,  she was a very accomplished typist. Speed and accuracy. I am slow and inaccurate. Good enough in the digital world of a laptop but truly I have sausage fingers on my old typewriter. Sometimes I forget the gap between words. Either a whole mistress piece goes in the bin or I have to hope that people are charmed by my typos.

#833 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art, Art for sale3 Comments
Gelli print, direct print and watercolour.

Do you believe in fate/destiny?

March is here. My fate or destiny for the day is set. The first sea swim of the new month awaits. I have spent the week mistressing* a new printing technique. Gelli printing. My shoulders are tight from concentration and need the morning swim. I wouldn’t be in this tight time constraint with tight shoulders if I had used the last 18 months wisely. I hadn’t printed since Art School when I planned and curated a print exhibition in a local gallery.  In the summer of 2022. The printers I worked with were inspirational and I vowed to take up printing, to be well prepared when the next exhibition happened. I am rubbish at long deadlines. A sensible woman would have done printing courses. Not me! I did a watercolour course and fell back in love with the serendipity and subtlety of pigment in water. I do have a print course booked in two weeks, exactly one week before the exhibition. Meanwhile I am trying to invent a method that involves printing and watercolour. Madness.

This morning a swimming friend sent me the video at the end of the blog. Oh dear!!! My tight shoulders got an early work out as I chuckled and was appalled. I have used those smug phrases.

” I swim all year actually “

Even worse for me, in a distant life I moved from London to Brighton

” Well, Hove, actually” **

In other printing news, next year’s Christmas cards are with the printers. Last use of the C word until the other side of Autumn.

Happy St Davids Day, enjoy the vid.

* I like to rehabilitate the word ‘Mistress’ from its philandering connotations. I don’t need to master anything I am a woman trying to create a mistresspiece.

** ‘Hove actually’ is another, possibly smug, statement known to all who live or have lived on the South Coast.

#827 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale, Plymouth Sound1 Comment

I am a mucky watercolour painter. I am also a procrastinator, so sometimes I see disaster as a lovely excuse for a tidy-up.  Yesterday afternoon I discovered something messy had occurred in my watercolour storage box. Despite needing to get on with a painting I set about resolving my disaster. Meanwhile, outside, my home city of Plymouth was dealing with a much more serious potential disaster.

BBC News – Plymouth WW2 bomb found in a garden, detonated at sea. Read link below.


https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-68385962

Not an everyday driving job. ©Cyberheritage

The outdoor potential disaster had given me a few daylight hours to start a new painting. All waterfront areas were closed to the public, and many local roads. No trains, busses or ferries. The perfect excuse.

Paints all tidied up. My models were arranged.

And I began the painstaking task of painting and printing a cup of mint tea resting on a bistro table, standing on a tiled floor.

I think there is a delicious irony in painting a cup of calming mint tea; while not 500 yards from my home a bomb weighing over 1,000 pounds or 500kg is being towed out to sea.

Daylight failed me, eventually and I have not managed to finish. Just the dregs of the tea have been painted into the cup. Two disasters resolved successfully.

One day later and the job is done.

#825 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale, ExhibitionsLeave a comment
©theoldmortuary

What bores you?

I have no idea what bores me. I seem to have made it my life ambition to avoid boredom. I wonder if that is just the way some people are. The painting above is hot off the press and depicts clothes dropped on a bathroom floor. Black jeans, blue jumper and an off white silk shirt. It is possible that a woman who could spend 3 hours doing such a painting maybe has no grip on boredom and really should not be commenting.

The technical challenges of painting such a dull subject were fascinating and kept me busy planning how to go about it.

The first stage was to paint the shadows that would fall on the tiles, then print the tiles but masking off the area that would be the clothes.

Have I bored you yet?

Clothes dropped on a bathroom floor. Who would ever choose to paint such a thing?

On a less boring note my greetings cards for an upcoming exhibition have just been printed. I am pleased with the way they look.