Cycling Post To The Coast Art Trail

I picked a sunny day to cycle Post To The Coast art trail. An evolving heritage project by Creative Waves Community Arts, this year-long coastal trail covers a 6 mile route starting at Worthing Lido's traditional English seaside sweet shop and ends at the corrugated steel Nissen Hut at Shoreham Fort. The trail shows artwork, seaside memories and poems inspired by postcards featuring the Sussex coastline.

Having taken part in early research workshops for the project investigating historical postcards at Worthing Museum, and subsequent art workshops at Shoreham Fort, I was keen to experience the whole trail. A bright sunny day with a westerly wind blowing towards Shoreham made cycling an ideal way to cover the entire route. Proceeding at a leisurely pace on my upright trusty Dawes bike and stopping to look and think along the way, it took me 2 hours to complete the trail.

I'd looked at the interactive trail map before setting off, so had an idea where the artwork would be, but still found it exciting each time I saw a new piece of art or an information post containing a story or a bygone holiday memory. The section along Lancing seafront from Beach Green to Widewater Lagoon is superb, with artwork hung along the slatted wooden walls defining the beach. This is a perfect place to view art and contemplate the history of the area with ever changing skies and sea as a backdrop – an invigorating experience for the senses.

I was thrilled to discover my own drawn postcard (above) installed on a weathered wooden wall alongside the beach huts at the end of Lancing Beach Green. Another personal highlight was at Shoreham Beach's Old Fort Road where a row of painted wooden postcards hang along a fence outside a corner house (on Ferry Road). These 19 simple, beautiful images are reminiscent of Alfred Wallis and were made by students at Shoreham Academy - a must see.

Finally arriving at Shoreham Fort I found artwork hung on the side of the wooden postbox and in the rear windows of the Nissen Hut, where my drawings are also on display alongside some poignant pieces made by fellow artists at the Creative Waves Wednesday Fort workshops. 

Post To The Coast trail will continue to grow throughout the year and visitors are invited to share their own Sussex seaside memories and contribute postcard artwork. Free trail maps and postcards are available along the route (and at Worthing Museum), and information on how to take part can be found at Creative Waves.

Grand Futurist Concert of Noises

On Sunday I went to the Grand Futurist Concert of Noises at London's Science Museum, an event held by Resonance FM to mark the centenary of the first Futurist Concert staged in Britain on 15th June 1914 in accordance with Luigi Russolo's groundbreaking manifesto The Art of Noises (L'arte dei Rumori).

I wore a dress made of fabric with a print of vintage bus, tram and train tickets (a new creation to be blogged soon) reckoning this would be in concord with Futurist ideas of speed and progress, but later reading Dan Wilson's Art of Noises Centenary Souvenir Supplement in which Marinetti's ideals for futurist clothing are set out I regretted not wearing this dress instead.

Never mind, the concert was brilliant! On hand-built instruments (large scale noise making machines called intonarumori built to Russolo's original designs by Peter McKerrow with modifications by sound artist Daniel Wilson), vintage horns, theremin and playback devices broadcast through Aleksander Kolkowski's immense Exponential Horn, The Luigi Russolo Memorial Ensemble caused a tremendous commotion! It was exhilarating to hear and the audience roared in approval. Afterwards we were invited to try out the instruments and joined the long queue to have a go on Sarah Angliss's theremin.

Instruments included intonarumori, gramophone, 
theremin and the Exponential Horn

The Luigi Russolo Memorial Ensemble

 

The Grand Futurist Concert of Noises is directed by BASCA Sonic Arts Composer of the Year, Ed Baxter and performed by Marcos Gomez, Peter Lanceley, Peter McKerrow, Michael Umney, Dan Wilson plus Aleks Kolkowski (vintage sound effects), Adam Bushell (percussion) and Sarah Angliss (theremin). The ensemble will perform for a final time on Friday 20th June at Cafe Oto, Ashwin Street, London. If you're at all able to travel to London you'd be mad to miss the sonic event of the century!

The Exponential Horn is the UK's largest audio loudspeaker and will be installed at Science Museum until 27th July 2014.

Foliate Heads and Art in Ruins: John Piper's textiles

Artist Textiles at London's Fashion and Textile Museum is an essential exhibition for any vintage fabric addict. Over 200 textile designs for fashion and home furnishings are on display, including pieces by Salvador Dali, Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol. There are exquisite illustrated fabrics by Saul Steinberg, colour pop prints by Zandra Rhodes, an angular line doodled fabric by Henry Moore and some stunning fabrics and furnishings by Eduardo Paolozzi and Nigel Henderson.
     There is so much to see that one visit really isn't enough to take it all in, and there's much too much to cover in a single blog post, so I'm sharing with you the work that excited me the most: John Piper's painterly screenprints.

Foliate Head fabric by John Piper, produced by David Whitehead Ltd in 1954.  

This is based on Piper's stained glass window design of the folkloric figure The Green Man

Chiesa De La Salute - screen printed fabric panel by John Piper, 1960

Northern Cathedral by John Piper - screen print circa 1960

Fawley by John Piper

John Egerton Christmas Piper was a 20th century painter of architecture, landscape and abstract compositions. He is famous for his work as war artist (for his paintings of bombed buildings and ruins). He was also a writer, prolific photographer, etcher, printmaker, a designer for theatre and of stained-glass windows and in later years began making ceramics. 
     In the mid 1950s Piper designed a series of screen-printed textiles for David Whitehead & Sons Ltd, a company renowned for producing contemporary printed fabrics for the mass-market. In 1960 British fabric and wallpaper manufacturer Arthur Sanderson & Sons commissioned Piper to produce five textile designs as part of their 1960 centenary celebrations.
     Piper's fabrics have all the detail and tone of his paintings and really glow with life. To see so many great examples of his textiles at this show was simply thrilling! 

ARTIST TEXTILES: Picasso to Warhol is at The Fashion and Textile Museum until 17th May 2014.

Worthing's William Blake Mini Protest Banner

This afternoon I committed a small act of craftivism. I embroidered and hung a #minifashionprotest banner in Worthing town centre as part of Craftivist Collective's project for War On Want's Love Fashion Hate Sweatshops campaign. 

The Collective has asked people to stitch small banners with messages related to the exploitation of sweatshop workers in Bangladesh and hang them in a location that links to their embroidered message. Regular readers will know that I decided to stop buying clothes following the Rana Plaza clothing factory disaster, so taking part in Craftivist Collective's initiative was something I was keen to do and has strengthened my resolve to say 'no' to fast fashion. 

This week BBC Panorama's investigation into the working lives of factory workers in Bangladesh provided further food for thought and inspired me to make my mini banner in response to the allegations the programme broadcast concerning my mum's favourite clothes shop. A William Blake quote seemed apt. 

Here is my banner in situ! I hung it in the middle of a bench as Worthing has an abundance of poignant memorial plaques on its benches all the way along the seafront. 

I like the idea that someone may sit on this bench and contemplate the meaning of my embroidered message.

Ivy Arch at Mini Moderns REMIX

I am thrilled to be taking part in Mini Moderns REMIX at East London Design Store as part of the 2013 London Design Festival. The project sees Mini Moderns working with British based designers and artists who have been invited to reinterpret their iconic designs.

As a huge fan of their work I was delighted to be asked to contribute and have produced lavender bags cut from Mini Moderns C-60 and Stevie fabric as well as a limited edition range of coin purses.

 

I travelled to London for the launch last night and was completely bowled over to see my crafts exhibited alongside the stunning work of Benjamin Boyce, Brume, Leonhard Pfeifer, Rimmington Vian, Matt Sewell, Group Design and Urban Upholstery. Zoe Murphy's gorgeous Buddha of Suburbia Drawers are a real showstopper!

Ivy Arch lavender bags and purses at Mini Moderns REMIX 2013

Mini Moderns REMIX at East London Design Store opens on 14^th September and runs until 22^nd September 2013.

Eduardo Paolozzi's hands: Collaging Culture at Pallant House

Cycling back from playing a ukulele gig at Lancing Royal British Legion club (they fed us tea and biscuits) with Wukulele's Harriet Booth, she told me that she had once met Eduardo Paolozzi. Harriet remarked on his charming manner and the size of his incredibly large, chunky hands. A photograph of Paolozzi's hands hangs outside the doors to the Level 2 rooms at Pallant House Gallery and it's hard to believe that these jumbo fingers created such intricate Pop Art collages, finely detailed drawings and textile print designs as well as his famous large scale sculptures.

Collaging Culture is a compelling and thorough retrospective of Paolozzi's work. The breadth of media he worked (and excelled) in and the diversity of his art is mind boggling. Exhibits include sculpture, screenprinted fabrics, drawings, prints, ceramics and film, as well as his collages - the main theme of the exhibition.

Postcards from Collaging Culture exhibition and superb free Pallant House Gallery Paolozzi bookmark!

It's difficult to say which parts of the show excited me most as I really loved it all. His printed textiles produced with Nigel Henderson for their Hammer Prints Ltd company are amazing. The fabrics feature pen and ink drawings of junk, fob clocks, toy trains and stuff found at Portobello Road flea market. There's a beautiful barkcloth top coffee table – a collaboration with Terence Conran – and a wonderful mustard furnishing fabric printed with fossils and organic forms produced by David Whitehead (you can still buy pieces of this for a pretty penny on Ebay).

I bought a copy Nigel Henderson & Eduardo Paolozzi: Hammer Prints Ltd 1954-75
at Pallant House Gallery bookshop. An excellent book.

I found it absorbing watching the changing patterns and textures in Paolozzi's black and white film The History of Nothing. It's a collage of sounds and textural images (found photographs, prints, specially created collages). My scrawled notes read back as a fairly accurate description of the film: domino, tower blocks, cogs, scratching music, huge macrame, sound of bells, clocks, Victorian girl doll in long knitted cape, sound of dog yapping, the word 'progress', hideous monkey grinning, skull with teeth, static din, engine starting, man/machine/robot, plinky plonk piano sounds... It's witty and whimsical and I loved the soundtrack of seemingly random bursts of noise.

With a head full of monochrome the next part of the exhibition took me by surprise as I stepped into the themed room Language Games: Prints and Sculpture in the 1960s. This is a riot of colour. Eduardo Paolozzi's art had a huge impact on the international art scene of the 60s and continues to influence artists and designers today – contemporary print designers owe much to his work. Melody Miller's fabulous Ephemera fabric reminds me of his Moonstrips Empire News series, Cilla Ramnek's glorious modern psychedelic patterns recall Paolozzi's As Is Now screenprints and Alison Milner's exquisite decal designs for ceramics reference Paolozzi's Sea Beasts collection of 19th century engravings of marine subjects which were printed onto ceramics, fabric and furniture.

I urge anyone with an eye for pattern, print and design to go and see this beautifully curated and inspirational exhibition. 

Eduardo Paolozzi Collaging Culture is at Pallant House Gallery, Chichester until 13 October 2013. 

Left: Pallant House Gallery from the outside
Right: Jonas Ranson's Paolozzi inspired wallpaper hangs in the foyer Garden Gallery

Screen and Screen Again at Ink Spot Press

On the second day of printmaker Jane Sampson's Thursday morning course at Ink Spot Press I experienced the absolute magic of printing an image onto a piece of paper. The six session course at Brighton's open-access printmaking workshop takes us through screenprinting step-by-step. Last week we looked at some of the inspiring work of printers and artists who'd previously passed through Ink Spot including Jane's own beautiful artwork; learnt how to prepare a screen with photo emulsion; made up a sample stencil; and exposed an image onto a screen.
 

Outside and inside Ink Spot Press HQ

A simple paper-cut tree seemed a good starting point for my first print, with the idea of exploring mark making and printing texture on top of the leaves. I roughly drew and cut out a stencil from stiff black paper then laid a piece of acetate on top and experimented drawing cross hatches, swirls, dots, patterns and making grainy marks. 

The two pieces – black cut out stencil and scribbled-on acetate were then laid side by side onto a prepared screen and put in the screenprint exposure unit. It was a thrill to press the start button and wait for my images to appear on the screen.

A big moment as my first screen emerges from the exposure unit!

This week Jane showed us how to set up, secure and register the screen in preparation for printing onto paper. It's a much more exacting process than I remembered from my previous improvised attempts at printing onto fabric more than 20 years ago! I began using the tree stencil shape part of the screen, and will try printing with the textured/patterned leaf part next week.

Screenprinting is physically demanding but also hugely rewarding – my dormant biceps were put to work in attempting to apply the correct pressure to the squeegee to evenly distribute ink across the screen. I could've happily carried on mixing colours and printing trees all day. 

Seeing my simple first image reproduced in different tones on variously coloured backgrounds was so exciting and the euphoria hasn't faded yet. I can't wait for next week's class...

A Kind of Blue

Until the 16th century woad was the only source of blue dye available to cloth dyers in Europe. The woad plant has antiseptic properties, was used by ancient Britons to heal wounds and is said to have been painted on warriors before going into battle. The monks who illuminated Lindisfarne Gospels applied it as a blue ink and throughout the ages woad has been used as a shape-shifter (no less!) in shamanic rituals. Now a new Anglo-French project Woad – Out of The Blue looks at the importance of the plant in the economic development of Amiens (France) and Southern England since the 12th century and explores its cultural and social heritage.

The Blue Route a breathtakingly beautiful installation by Finnish sculptor Kaarina Kaikkonen, is the first exhibition in this series and takes place at Brighton's Fabrica art gallery. 

The Blue Route comprises hundreds of second-hand shirts hanging from ropes tied to the upstairs balconies of this former Regency church. The shirts were donated by residents of Brighton & Hove and the piece resonates with the memories of these worn garments. It's a composition in tones of blue with one singular yellow shirt at the centre. Standing behind the installation I saw dozens of pale balloons and one solitary yellow balloon lifting into the air. In front of the work with my back to the wall I saw the sun setting over a deep blue sea.

The Blue Route is a co-commission with Brighton Festival and will be on show until 27th May 2013. If you're in Brighton you'd be balmy not to visit.

Eye Couture: Stylish Dress Book - Tunic F

I can't resist the temptation to badly pun my way through this post, even though this demonstrates a lack of vision and a distinctly lowbrow approach to the medium. If you think my sentences can't get any cornea, read on.

Ikea's Vännerna Titta fabric designed by Julia Bernholtz and Helena Svensson could be described as being easy on the eye. It's a nod to Man Ray's Surrealist masterpiece Tears, and a wink to the 1960s pop art of Warhol and Lichtenstein. Ikea (Eye-kea?) only sells this fabric in pre-cut 3 metre lengths and though it's designed as a curtain fabric I thought it was too good to hide away indoors so made a rather eye-catching frock out of it instead.
 

Turning to the Stylish Dress Book for a sewing pattern, dress F "Tunic dress with split sleeves" seemed perfect. I lengthened the hem by 5cms so that it looks more like a futuristic tabard – the fabric demands it!

I love the sharp A-line shape it has in this slightly stiff cotton and can't wait to wear the dress out and about, especially if I make it up to London for the Man Ray show at National Portrait Gallery this Easter holiday.