NEWSLETTER OCTOBER 2015

FORTHCOMINGMEETINGS IN OUR

NEW VENUE:

Tim Beer ­ painting,ceramings and sculpture.11th November 10.30amCraft Room Leamington ArtGallery

AMA Autumn exhibition.The Jam Factory, Oxford.4th November to 2ndDecember.

Tea at the Jam Factory(AMA Christmas SocialEvent)Saturday 14th November3.pm ­ 4.30pm

Editors;

Katharine Barker & Len Mackin

Diary Dates

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Chairs letter

What a jolly AGM and a record turn out! It was one of thoseexperiments that worked. The venue, my studio, was packed.Every available chair from around the house, and a couple ofback­ups from the garden, had been called into service, canapésand wine were lined up and, somehow the cosiness of it all setthe mood.

We began the evening with the business and in my Chair’s reportI thanked the committee of Margaret Condon, Sheila Graham,Julia Hayes, Moira Lamont, Len Mackin and Tammy Woodrow,but reminded the membership that some of us have done manyyear’s service for the local art community. Some fresh faces (orsome we have seen before) will need to step forward to takeresponsibility for an aspect of the Association’s activities in thecoming months if we are to continue with a lively programme.

Announcements included “Tea at the Jam Factory”, to view andcelebrate our exhibition, and an introduction to our next speaker,the painter/sculptor/ceramicist, Tim Beer. You will find aninvitation to the former and more details about the latterelsewhere in this issue.

Sheila Graham presented the results and conclusions of hermembers’ survey – thank you to all who responded. One of theclear messages was that many of you like consistency in yourbusy lives, but don’t like Sundays! The Sunday afternoonmeeting experiment, supposedly the dream ticket of daylight plusnon­working hours (for most), did not work so I have booked theArt Gallery’s Craft Room for nine, mid­month Wednesdaymorning sessions for 2016 and have pencilled in occasions forevening studio visits, which, in the past, have proved lively andsuccessful. A list of dates appear in this issue, but do keepwatching the “What’s On” column and the web site for furtherdetails.

After the business, we had a fascinating talk by TammyWoodrow, excellently reviewed in the following pages byMargaret Condon. Speaking to Tammy afterwards, she wasdelighted not only to have entertained and informed us, but tohave picked up some useful tips and ideas from the audience.This, to me, is what AMA is about – sharing our expertise andendeavouring to assist one another. If you would like to be partof this conversation, offering to join the committee, speak orpresent your work at a meeting or simply need some help,perhaps physically getting to a venue or want to know how to dosomething connected with our work and lives as artists, get intouch.

Katharine BarkerChair AMA Katharine.texcons@btinternet.com

www.associationofmidlandartists.org.uk

Jeni Neale ­ Botanical Artist

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You know what it’s like, you flick through the Open Studiosbrochure, looking for something different, and suddenly, there it is.The most wonderful tulip, painted in the manner of traditionalbotanical illustration. Some 20 minutes later I was wanderingaround Jeni Neale’s sitting room in Long Itchington, looking at bothher own work and that of her students. It was all impressive, acarefully controlled abundance of floral and plant forms. I was,therefore, delighted to be able to welcome her as our first morningspeaker of the autumn season.

Jeni’s interest in plant life began on her father’s allotment as asmall child and perhaps a first awareness of art came from herportrait artist mother. Later, she was fortunate to have as ateacher Anne­Marie Evans, a well known botanical illustrator, wholit a flame. By the age of 16, she was doing plant illustrations andwe were shown a sketch book with drawings of a rose. Beingbrought up in Leicester, it was not surprising that her artistic talentsled her into designing for the knitwear industry and we sawsketches and colour swatches for a project with Kaffe Fassett,resulting in a Fair Isle waistcoat, which she admitted, her mother

helped her knit!

Jeni explained that plant illustration comes in various forms. Firstly there is scientific botanicalillustration, which requires an academic knowledge of botany. The aim of this work is to enableplant identification and to record details, which it would be difficult to do in any other way.Despite modern technology, Kew Gardens still employs, on a piece work basis, a team ofbotanical illustrators. The need for speed means that work is not coloured and shading is of theminimum necessary to convey information. Jeni has done some work of this type and is a longstanding member of the Chelsea Physic Garden Florilegium Society, whose aim is to record inpaint and drawing, all the plants in the Society’s garden. Jeni’s contribution has been the “LongRed Florence Onion”. She is fond of vegetables and prefers them to flowers.

Jeni’s main way of working is as a botanical artist. This approach maintains accuracy andtraditional white grounds, but allows a little more artistic licence and is less reliant on scientificknowledge. She will rearrange a plant to produce a more pleasing composition, but will alwaysaim to inform by including the full flower, the back of the flower and a bud, as well as leaves andstems. Traditionally, using the Anne­Marie Evans method, there was a strict approach in whichpaint layers were built up, beginning pale, gradually introducing modelling and then furthercolour in a seven stage system. Pages include colour notes and shade samples and are acollection of information about a plant.One of the difficulties in botanic art is that plants, in particular flowers, do not stay in the peak ofcondition for as long as the artist needs to actually paint them. In recent years, computertechnology and digital photography has assisted with this, though colour accuracy has to comefrom the artist/observer. Jeni has created a large collection of annotated colour samples,worked on strips of heavy weight water colour paper, which she uses to match and recordcolours when they are at their freshest and to support digital records.

Jeni Neal

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Jeni’s large tulip paintings all begin with a photograph, but photography is not an instant path tosatisfying composition and achieving the perfect image. Up to 100 might be taken in differentlights and backgrounds, before the right image is achieved.

As a group of artists, we were interested in the practicalities and basic tools of her work. Jeniuses sable brushes with a fine point, but a fat belly, Numbers 4 and 5, which hold a lot of paint.“Raphael” is her current preferred make. Her paints are mainly Windsor and Newton and shehas experimented with Sennelier, but finds them a bit short on pigment. She is beginning towork with an American brand, QoR, which have a high pigment content and include aparticularly pleasing transparent orange, which has brought fiery tones to one of her tulips. Herpreference is always for tubes, rather than pans.

Most of her colours are mixed, especially the greens, using a six colour system andcomplimentary colours. Some colours, pinks and purples, have to be bought. Traditionallywhite is not allowed in botanical work, but nowadays it is often used for tidying up edges andfor putting in veins. One method of tidying is to use white acrylic ink, then over­paint withwatercolour tints, as needed, to match the ground. Traditionally, botanical work is always onwhite, but Jeni has been experimenting with coloured grounds. We saw a part completedartichoke on dark green board. Her usual white surface is heavy weight Fabriano Artistico.The very old herbals were worked on vellum, ie calf skin, which gives a distinctive glow to workas well as being of much greater longevity than paper. It is very expensive, around £100 perskin, but Jeni uses it from time to time. The only remaining producer is William Cowley ofMilton Keynes, whose main client is the Government, as vellum is used for the archive copy ofall Acts of Parliament!

Different surfaces require a different approach. Fabriano will take a fluid, wet way of working.Board and vellum need a dryer method, preventing layering. One advantage of vellum is thatwatercolour can be lifted off, if something is not quite right. Where a wet approach is needed,ox gall is added to paint water, breaking surface tension.

And, by this time, we had all taken in as much as we could at one session and it was time togather round the stunning collection of work, which Jeni had brought with her and, of course,purchase her cards.

Further reading:

Jeni Neale’s inspirational teacher was Anne­Marie Evans, find out about her life and work here,

Remember Kaffe Fassett, knitwear designer? Experience his rich colours and patterns.

Fancy a visit to the Chelsea Physic Garden click here or want to know more about theFlorilegium Society,

Jeni’s amazing orange paint comes from, Qorcolors and the last remaining vellum andparchment makers are, William Cowley ltd

Jeni’s more usual surface is from Fabriano

Finally, if you missed the talk, check out Jeni here,

Katharine Barker.

Jeni Neale ­ Botanical Artist continued

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Tammy is known to many members as a fine andthoughtful curator of AMA exhibitions, but not asan artist in her own right. The AGM gave anopportunity for welcome remedy; and her smalldisplay of abstract sculpture drew an excited andinterested crowd even before the meeting began.By the time you read this it will be too late to seeIncunabula, her first solo exhibition, currently ondisplay at the Rugby Art Gallery, but closing 15October 2015. There will be, however, apermanent record – which came about almostaccidentally. For Tammy’s most recentsculptures were all made with found objects,whose structural core and defining form waswood from a favourite but decaying tree, nowfelled. Small branches and peeling bark add upto a curatorial nightmare – insects! Tammy

belatedly realised that no gallery was likely to be prepared to exhibit her sculptural originals,and photographed them instead, settling after some experiment on a black background thatfurther reinforced her existential message and elevated their abstraction so that the sculpturesappeared to be floating in a timeless space. Tellingly, work from the exhibition has sold in bothforms: sculptural originals, and photographic transformations that are artworks in their own right.

Tammy began her talk with a very brief resumé of her art career and continuing inspiration. Agraduate from Birmingham in 2005, two recurrent themes in her practice have been the passingof time, and the marriage and interplay between art and science. Add in the early deaths of bothTammy’s parents, and you have a powerful undercurrent that is channelled in, but is not overt,in her art, expressing itself in the works’ dramatic tension and its play with metaphors of time.The death of her father resulted in some fragmented photographic images, produced from‘found’ photographs, of sufficient quality to be selected for two local but prestigious ‘Open’exhibitions. The trauma of the death of her mother, as well as the need to produce work for analready scheduled exhibition, was the catalyst for the present work.

It began badly, as Tammy over­thought and intellectualised theprocess. Earlier she had referenced artists who had married artand science, from classics such as Robert Hooke’s Micrographia,an exceptionally beautifully scientific work of 1665 thatreproduced the natural world as seen through a microscope, toSigmar Polke (1941­2010), whose paintings were intended tochange with time through their use of chemicals. Suchconscious approaches stifled Tammy’s creativity at a time ofmore urgent need. She then allowed herself to play, and foundher own sculptural language using materials around her – a deadtree that was charged with personal meaning; metal hardwarediscarded by the builders. The two were married, using herhands and instinct to guide her, and screws, bolts, and wire, tobind, constrain, and embellish. The sculpture became a ‘vessel

Tammy Woodrow

Tammy at Incunabula

'21' by Tammy Woodrow

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for meaning’. Interestingly intellectual content was not abandoned: but it emerged with integrity,as it interplayed with Tammy’s love of language, and her play with the meaning of words. Eventhe tree whose material connotation was death was also connected to life – family tree, familyroots. A phallic­looking sculpture was given a fish­jaw: in a dream world teeth can symbolisedeath. Gingko leaves, from a still living fossil tree, married to earth materials (cement) andwood carry a message of peace, hope, and vitality. These were sculptures in tension, un­named individually, and intended to be seen as a group. My personal favourite was a hangingforked branch, into whose most slender and twig­like arm was screwed an array of windowlatches – an unlikely rib­cage, and perhaps a metaphor for breath. Several people could notresist handling the most substantial piece, a gnarled branch that could be read as the torso of awoman’s body.

To this, Tammy had fastened metal catches in the manner of sutures, holding together the twosides of a split caused by the drying of the wood. These were not sad pieces. Born of play, aswell as grief, they drew the viewer in, and invited contemplation. The photographs – andTammy, aided by Katharine as ambulant easel, showed a few examples – necessarily lackedthe tactile quality and three dimensionality of the sculptures, but added new layers of meaningthrough mystery and dislocation, and qualities of abstraction.

To an audience of artists, the way that Tammy approached her talk was as refreshing, revealing,and inspirational as the work itself. She set herself a series of questions – essentially what,which and why – that she then proceeded to answer in a way that stripped her practice back toits elements and added to, rather than detracted from, the meaning of the work. Interestinglyher reflection on how her work stood in relation to art movements followed, rather thanpreceded the work. The sculptural language was entirely her own, but she found she couldplace it in the tradition of Arte Povera, with its use of humble materials. Some of the best workof artists such as Alberto Burri and Lucio Fontana has an almost shamanic power; Tammy’sanalysis of her own work was not misplaced.

Tammy Woodrow continued

'Extra 6' by

Tammy

Woodrow

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Tammy ended her talk by answering the question ‘Should you curate your own work?’ Herconsidered answer was ‘Probably not!’ But she applied the same rigour that she has shown inAMA exhibitions – more is not better, allow the work to breathe, look at the objects in the space,and think of what you are trying to communicate. Moira Lamont, who had actually seen theexhibition, could no longer contain her infectious enthusiasm, and shared it with the audience.Finally, what of the title of the exhibition? Incunabula is generally understood to mean booksprinted before 1500. Tammy invited us to think further, using the familiar ‘incubate’ as a key toopen up the wider meaning of the word – ‘incunabula’ is earliest stages, infancy, cradle, origin orbirthplace – all of which she could relate to her mother. The exhibition itself was dedicated toboth parents, and some of the sculptural originals had incorporated or used her father’s tools.Nancy Upshall, in her talk to the AMA about her paintings, had reminded her audience about theimportance she placed on titles; Tammy chose not to title individual pieces, but her strikingchoice of exhibition title was as organic to her practice as some of her materials, and absolutelyintegral to the work.

This was a splendid talk, delivered (to its benefit) without the use of Powerpoint. The writerwould like to add a postcript: a thank you to Katharine Barker for the use of her studio which, ona dark night, was a welcoming venue for both the AGM and Tammy’s talk.

Margaret Condon

Tammy Woodrow continued

Our Next Speaker - Tim Beer 11th November

10.30, Craft Room of Leamington ArtGallery

I first met Tim Beer as a fellow student on one of Neil Moore’spainting classes. He had recently retired from a career inmedicine and was aiming to develop his life long passion forcreative artwork. Clearly there was a great talent waiting toemerge and members may recall his series of successful entriesin the Leamington Open over recent years. His recent “openstudio” included abstract landscape painting, sculpture andceramics, so I would expect this to be a talk with wide appeal.Don’t miss it!Katharine

Annual subs fall due at the end of the year. Get a job out of the way now, before the complexities ofthe festive season are upon us!

Full / exhibiting members: £20 Associate / non-exhibiting members: £15

You can now pay on-line to:Yorkshire BankAssociation of Midland ArtistsSort code: 05-05-58A/C number: 45421318Please make sure you reference your payment with your surname, followed by initial.

Annual Subscriptions

or by cheque, made out to “Association ofMidland Artists” and posted to our Treasurer,Sheila Graham, 73, Leam Terrace, LeamingtonSpa CV31 1DE

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It’s not often that English potters have the opportunity to meet their Japanese counterparts.Sheila Graham’s early work was heavily influenced by Japanese ceramics and when I heardthat Sachiyo Kawabe, a well known Japanese potter, was staying in Harbury, I felt I must getthem together to discuss their work.

Sachiyo brought some samples of her work to show Sheila and as she placed them on the tablenext to Sheila’s work the talk was immediately about the clay and glazes they used. Looking attheir work I was struck by the elegant forms of the traditional Japanese pot shapes we are sofamiliar with. Sheila’s work was so different, it has evolved from Japanese influences to moreinventive designs and glazes.

Sachiyo uses a large outdoor hand built kiln to fire her work using wood as the fuel and onlyfiring it once a year. Sachiyo’s kiln had to be rebuilt by herself and her husband after the bigearthquake of 2011, which destroyed it completely as she sat nearby on her pottery wheel.Sheila uses a small electric kiln which she pointed out is so quick end easy to fire at a moment’snotice. Sachiyo then confessed that she now had an electric kiln herself as she knew that,without her husband’s help, she wouldn’t be able to fire her big kiln by herself.I had a fascinating morning admiring their work and listening to them exchanging ideas and aswe left Sachiyo invited Sheila to come and stay with her in Japan. Are you saving up Sheila?

Moira Lamont

East Meets West - Sachiyo Kawabe meets Sheila

Sheila and Sachiyo Kiln Opening

Climbing Kiln

Exhibitions, News and EventsJane Williams had a small exhibition at the Pump Rooms at the beginning of the month. Shewrites, “It was about celebrating violinist Peter Cropper's life. He was passionate about sharinghis vast knowledge of performing to young musicians. I developed some brief sketches I hadmade at one of his workshops in 2011 into ink drawings incorporating some of his comments ­ I'llnever forget it and hopefully the boys won't either! Thanks to AMA for loan of the lights ­ made ahuge difference. “

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Christmas Sale.A Pottery and Glass Weekend.Saturday 14th and Sunday 15th November.

10.30am ‘til 5.00pm each day.

73 Leam Terrace, Leamington, CV31 1DE

Three AMA members have got together to display theirwork this Christmas.

Potter, Sheila Graham – who is hosting the event.

Glass artist, Laura Schlotel and potter Moira Osborne.

There will be lots to view, hold, chat about and, (should youfeel inclined) to buy, in a very informal atmosphere. Mulledwine and mince pies will be served by the artists.

When turning into Leam Terrace from the Willes Rd look out for the bunting.

Sheila, Moira and Laura.

DEADLINE: MONDAY 18 JANUARY 2016

The Royal Watercolour Society’s annualContemporary Watercolour Competitionencourages innovation and experimentation in allwater-based media and provides a platform forboth established and emerging artists. This is theUK's only major watercolour competition open tointernational artists.

The judges are looking for pieces that push at theboundaries of watercolour, promote water-basedmedia at its most accomplished and ask audiencesto see the medium in a new and contemporarylight. Successful entrants will exhibit their work atBankside Gallery, situated next to Tate Modern,which is at the heart of London's cultural quarter.

Prizes include; £1000 cash prize, a feature article inThe Artist magazine, studio time at The HeatherleySchool of Fine Art, art materials and many more.

For further details regarding entry requirements,application procedure and important dates, pleasedownload the application pack. Most otherquestions should be answered in our FAQs.

ENTER HERE - Good Luck!8

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YOUR VERY OWN, “CUT OUT AND KEEP”AMA Events Calendar 2016

The following dates have been booked and periods of time “pencilled in” for AMA events in2016. Further information and details of speakers will be announced as soon as they areconfirmed. Please keep watching the web site and Newsletter for up to date information.

All Wednesday morning meetings will be held in the Craft Room of Leamington Art Gallery. Themain building, library, café and cloakrooms are all open from 10.00 (or earlier). The ArtGallery/Museum, which doesn’t open until 10.30, is, of course, open after our meeting.Parking, alongside the gallery, can be arranged for anyone with a physical need or disability.

10.30 Wednesday 20th January:

10.30 Wednesday 24th February:

10.30 Wednesday 16th March:

10.30 Wednesday 13th April:

10.30 Wednesday 11th May:

Week commencing 23rd May: evening studio talk

10.30 Wednesday 22 June:

Fortnight commencing 4th July: evening studio talk connected with WOS

Week commencing 22nd August: evening studio talk.

10.30 Wednesday 28th September

10.30 Wednesday 19th October (this might also be the AGM)

10.30 Wednesday 23rd November

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