Tuesday 25 July 2017

Arts Meridian workshop and Peer Group and Professional Development Workshop.

  Arts Meridian workshop and Peer Group and Professional Development Workshop.

This was a day organised by Arts Meridian at Cleethorpes Discovery Centre.  It began with an artist talk by painter Steve Ingman followed by a Professional Development Workshop and finished with a group crit. 

·         Artist Talk

Steve Ingman is a Nottingham based  artist who works largely with oils, but gains inspiration from the world around him which he explores, like myself by walking when he uses a camera to record his observations which are the interpreted in paint.  He studied for his VS at Lincoln and then in 2014 began an MA at Wimbledon College of the Arts.  He is part of the Arts Meridian sponsored Arts underlined project and is collaborating with local artist Dale Mackie to produce a body of work on Cleethorpes which will be exhibited at The Discovery Centre from January – March 2018.
He moved to Nottingham in 2008 and set up a studio which he admits is messy but allows for creative freedom.  From 2008 -2010 he worked on his first BOW:Night Light which comprises night scenes of cityscapes painted in oils using both brush and palette knife.  I thought the work was reminiscent of Van Gogh although he says he was inspired by Edward Hopper[1] .  One painting: Lego Brick Bollard employs a photographic technique where a car is given an impression of movement by representing it as though it had been photographed with a long exposure.  In Department Store (2010) he tries to portray the idea that the department store is the new church and consumerism the new religion.  Very rarely are people included in his work as he prefers to put more emphasis on the environment in which we live.
Between 2010 and 2012 he moved his focus to the village where he grew up and the woods and old military installations which were his playground; his wilderness.  He produced a series of paintings entitled Widerness.  One particular painting reminded me of the final image of Silver birch trees in my BOW. I had a print of the image which I showed later in the crit and both Ingman and the rest of the group agreed.  The foundations for his works are completely abstract and then he builds his painting onto that abstract base.
Influenced by Peter Doug’s Concrete Cabin (oil on canvas 1994), a painting of an abandoned modernist building which at the time was rapidly becoming rewilded, and also influenced by the recession, austerity and now Brexit, Ingman produced a series of paintings based on empty shops.
Interested in the natural world around him, He began, in 2013, to work on a series he refers to as the Wanderer.  This included paintings of the crash of a B29 bomber in 1947 on Bleaklow above Glossop in the Peak District.
In 2015 he began work on a series that particularly resonated with me: Temples of Ruin.  He is interested in the meanings of wilderness, urban and rural.  He had discovered an old lime kiln in the Peak District near Buxton and was fascinated in the way it was being reclaimed by nature; rewilded.  He saw it as the remains of a modernist temple.  The results of his Labour’s, whilst obviously being a lime kiln is very reminiscent of the ruins of an Aztec or Inca temple.  He researched painters who had worked with ruined archaeology and came across David Schnell from Leipzig.  Ingman's Temples of Ruin series explore the relationship between the natural and man-made (nature v culture?).  He argues that the term ruin can mean different things to different people; there are different connotations.  Research began to centre on ruin: artists and philosophers.   He recommended to me Paul Virilio's Bunker Archaeology. The Nazi architect Albert Speer had developed a theory of the value of ruins.  He argued that a ruin in 1000 years would signify greatness in the past.  Buildings that become runs are a message to future generations of past greatness.  This body of work Temples of Ruin formed his MA degree show.
Another resource he recommended was Ruins published by The Whitechapel Gallery and on the Guardian website Brian Dillon on Ruins.
I felt drawn to Steven Ingman's work and philosophies as I felt that we had much common ground.  Two things sprang to mind regarding my own work is that I would like to make it less figurative.  One current approach is to concentrate on micro-landscapes: micro-wilderness.

·         Professional Development Workshop led by Linda Ingham

1.       Creating Opportunities

·         Building networks are important
·         Group/partnership working; designing a project
·         An element of partnership is present in all of Linda's successful funding bids

2.       Making Approaches and the Importance of Research

·         Galleries and other organisations such as stately homes and outside spaces
·         We need to be confident and ambitious
·         Research of exhibition venues is vital
·         Attend openings and make contacts.  Who you know and what you know is very important
·         Research competitions and opens: gallery, judging panel, previous work selected

3.       Useful links

Group Crits

As always I found it fascinating to discuss other people's work and with me being the only photographer it really broadened my experience.  Work included graphite drawing painting, ceramics, rope sculpture, oil painting,.
Again it was valuable to share my own work.  Ad mentioned previously talking about your own work really helps to get to know what it is about.  I had taken mounted A3 prints of a selection of my BOW.  Remarks bout the quality of the prints were positive and extremely encouraging.   It was suggested that either grey or white mounts would be more suitable with black frames.  I was pleased that I had mounted them as these comments will be useful when it comes to producing the images for my final exhibition.  I had mounted them with no white showing between image and mount, but wondered whether a narrow white border would be more suitable.  All agreed that no white would be better. I also had the introduction to my work with me as I’m SYP A1 and enjoyed talking about it.  This generated an interesting discussion.










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