Let's Do Nice Things take over SHOP

From the 26th to the 30th of July Lets Do Nice Things take over SHOP on Christmas Steps with films, art and naked people, as well as a pop up gallery on Friday, in which I shall be featuring. I'll be showing the Thermochromes, not sure exactly where and how yet...

back in overalls

First day back in the studio yesterday, making a model for the new Lanterns for End of the Road. I pulled out my trusty overalls, immaculate and untouched for quite a while. Two hours in there were 50 pints of plaster leaking all over the floor, much of which ended up all over me. Its good to be back.

The End of the Road.....

VERY exciting news!

I've been commissioned by the lovely folks at End of the Road festival to make an group of lanterns to be installed at the festival site, Larmer Tree Gardens in Dorset. The lanterns are an evolution of Thermochromes ( colour changing candle holders) using the same heat-sensitive coating and candles as a heat source. A group of lanterns will be suspended from a huge tree throughout the festival, and when the candles are lit they will change colour from hot pink to delicate translucent white. All I have to do now is make them...

Pottery shards excavated from my back garden last week. The sixties printed pattern was about two feet down, the blue and white a few feet deeper. Digging a hole for a post became an impromptu archaeological dig.

Stokes Croft Streetfest

Saturday the 22nd of May

Kings Square (just off Jamaica Street)

This Saturday I'm having my very first market stall at the very local Stokes Croft Streetfest, just down the road! I'll be selling products and prints from a fold up table (if indeed I manage to procure one).

Sweat Shop

Just returned from my trip to London, where I took part in 'Construction Line', I live performance and exhibition exploring the ownership of artworks and the idea ow creativity as work.

The project space that was to be our 'factory' was a sweatshop in a former life. Having spent almost six hours working in the space, fingers numb with cold and back aching from leaning over the work, I was very glad the [DoR]s artists sweatshop was a one off affair.

Seated at a row of desks one behind the other, with a single naked bulb dangling above, the other artists and I lay out our materials and tools and prepare to work. We begin by making our own work, and although this should be the easy part, I feel pretty reluctant to make anything. I havn't prepared properly and my clay slabs are too soft to build with. Now the demand to produce really kicks in and time limit becomes a pressure.

The buzz of the timer signals the changeover. Sitting at the front of the line, I can't see anything the others are doing. While I relinquish my work to the artist behind, a construction of wood and fabric is deposited on the the desk before me. Its big, it blocks my view, a pyramid shape with foil ribbon and fabric walls. I no idea what to think.

Each new object appeared before me met by a feeling either of excitement, curiosity and a desire to get to work, or one of dread. It felt a lot like school, the kind of feeling when you are met with a project that you cant wait to do, or one that you cannot bear, but know that you have to do. The obligation to work on something you did not choose, and may not like, is an unusual experience for a creative person, and definitely a valuable one. Being part of the Construction line was a challenge.

The work produced with be part of a showcase until Wednesday.

Construction Line

This weekend I'm off to London to take part in a live exhibition 'Construction Line', staged by [Details on Request]. Pieces of work will be produced by a production line of artists and makers, with each objects passing through many hands. I'm very excited about taking part, and hope that it will raise some interesting questions for my own practice.

For more info about [DOR] and 'Construction Line' exhibition, visit their blog

pot shop

On this potentially less than glorious bank holiday monday, I will be heading to Redland Fair, selling pots.

Since February I have been volunteering at Orange Street Pottery, teaching ceramics techniques and skills to a group of complete beginners. After 12 weeks of building, throwing, moulding and making a mess, all the wares will be sold so we can do the whole thing over again.

family history

My mum has added her recently completed quilt to the Victoria and Albert museum's virtual 'quilt of quilts', an online project that accompanies their new exhibition Quilts: 1700- 2010.

'it has pieces from dresses that my mother made for me as well as some that I made for myself as a child and folows on to some pieces from my own children's clothes that I made for them when they were small'

up for sale

the cosy's are my very first items up for sale in my new etsy shop, soon to be followed by plates, although I think they will be a bit more difficult to post.