Which is worse, the medical problem or the treatment? You can recover from treatment but not from problem without treatment.
I have recovered and am at last painting and printing again. Now a member of the Friends of the Hatton, after having taken my degree in Fine Art at Newcastle University, years ago. I am grateful for the inclusion of my paintings in the Friends’ recent exhibition.
I’ll be showing paintings and then prints this year in two Gracefield exhibitions in Dumfries, then prints also in Castle Douglas 191 Gallery. The only problem with that is that I am first and foremost a painter and most galleries, with their need for sales, like prints these days.
I make etchings, monoprints, cyanotypes (using a UV machine in the gallery print room, we tried unsuccessfully using just sunlight in a workshop at the Hatton Gallery) collagraphs and combinations of all. My favourites are drypoint etchings, paper collages and mixed media.
My work is often a direct response to the work of Kurt Schwitters. But usually based on landscapes and trees. Trees are my passion. When I am in Newcastle I visit the Hatton for exhibitions but also for the [Merzbarn] Wall. I love its shapes and textures, and the spirit of the making . It really is my “Wonderwall”.
I have special memories of a student of mine was writing his thesis on Kurt Schwitters and I took him to see the Wall. He sat there in front of it for ages and said he could “feel Kurt all over it, like he was with him”. I met a woman in the exhibition of collages by Schwitters, a university lecturer of creative writing, she said she always had her students learn the Ursonate by Schwitters from CDs. She performed the piece for me in the Gallery surrounded by Schwitters’ collages. A collage of sounds. Serendipity.
I am part of a group working on our life drawing, we share the cost of a model. I’m trying to “free up” but still feel the need for careful observation and drawing practice, as I was taught when a student at Newcastle University. The [art materials] shop is still there and I am planning a work based on the shapes of the items stacked in the different panes of the windows, I have bought small canvases to be placed together, one for each pane. An idea I like.
My paintings have now developed more into shapes and spaces and less into textures. They’re all about colour too. Sometimes my pictures make statements about the climate crisis, especially trees. I remember a talk by John Heartfield in the Fine Art department when I was a student; he was a charming, funny man, but so vehement in his war time posters against the fascist regime. He escaped from Germany to the Isle of Man. He had many stories. There is a Russian proverb, “ When the cannons are silent, the muses are heard: when the muses are silent, the cannons are heard”.
I recently read a book “How Painting Happens (and why it matters)” by Martin Gayford and “met” again some of my beloved artists and their work, from cave painting to present day. The handprints all over the cave walls are fascinating , they really bring those long ago people to mind and emotion. Gayford also worked with Hockney (much missed) on “The History of Pictures”. Both books have been an inspiration, full of memories and ideas. My favourite painter of all time is Piero della Francesca and I was happy to learn that Hockney loved him too. I now recognise his paintings show this, especially in the Swimming Pools series. Books like this are always an inspiration.
All creative people are included in art: trained or not, using all media , all outcomes.
Making is the vital thing.
Picasso said “It took me four years to paint like Raphael but a lifetime to paint like a child”.
Brenda Procter.
Friends of the Hatton 