We Will Still Rock You: The Queen and Ben Elton musical will rise again in 2021
THE 2020 tour of We Will Rock You bit the dust with the Coronavirus
pandemic lockdown, but the show must go on for the Queen and Ben Elton musical.
Not only have many of the original dates been re-scheduled for 2021, but
several venues have been added too, not least the Grand Opera House, York, for
a run from March 22 to 27.
“The producers did not want to disappoint fans who had bought tickets,
so they have been working hard to reschedule as many of the shows as possible,
giving people something to look forward to in these unsettling times,” says the
official statement.
“We are delighted to announce the good news that the musical
extravaganza will once again rock theatres across the UK from January next
year, playing many of the original 2020 dates and several additional venues
too.”
Kicking off in Cardiff on January 18 2021, the tour will then play Milton
Keynes; Southend; Stoke; Bristol; Wimbledon; Bournemouth; Ipswich; Bromley; York;
Newcastle; Northampton; Peterborough; Norwich; Reading; Liverpool; Birmingham
and Southsea, with more dates to follow. Details of how to exchange tickets
will follow in the coming weeks.
Queen guitarist Brian May said: “Happy to say our magnificent UK tour of
We Will Rock You, the rock theatrical, will rise again. The Coronavirus has had
us all on the run, but live theatre will win in the end. Keep hold of your
bookings and the vibe will be yours in 2021.”
Drummer Roger Taylor added: “This is great news, I’m so pleased to see
the show on the road again.”
Writer Ben Elton agreed: “I was so pleased to get the great news that We
Will Rock You is to be remounted next year, after being forced to close mid-tour,
and I hope Queen’s incredible music can help to make us feel like champions
again.”
Tickets for the York run are on sale at atgtickets.com/york.
The National Theatre’s Jane Eyre: on the NT’s YouTube channel
THE National Theatre’s celebrated production of Jane Eyre will be shown on the NT’s YouTube channel for free on Thursday at 7pm.
This will be the second in the two-month series of
National Theatre At Home screenings that was launched with One Man, Two Guvnors
last Thursday, since when more than two million people have watched Hull playwright
Richard Bean’s comic romp.
Cookson’s re-imagining of Charlotte Brontë’s inspiring Yorkshire
story of trailblazing Jane was first staged by Bristol Old Vic in 2015 and
transferred to the National in the same year with a revival in 2017.
In May that year, the National Theatre’s touring
production visited the Grand Opera House, York, for a week’s run, winning the “Stage
Production of the Year in York Made outside York” award in the annual Hutch
Awards in The Press, York.
Cookson’s bold, innovative and dynamic production uncovers one woman’s fight for freedom and fulfilment on her own terms. From her beginnings as a destitute orphan, spirited Jane Eyre faces life’s obstacles head on, surviving poverty, injustice and the discovery of bitter betrayal before taking the ultimate decision to follow her heart.
During this unprecedented time of the enforced shutdown of theatres, cinemas and schools in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, National Theatre At Home is providing access to content online to serve audiences in their homes.
Audiences around the world can stream NT
Live productions for free via YouTube every Thursday at 7pm BST and
each one will then be available on demand for seven days.
Coming next after Jane Eyre will be Bryony Lavery’s adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island from April 16 and Shakespeare’s comedy Twelfth Night, starring Tamsin Greig as Malvolio, from April 23. Further titles will be announced.
Alongside the streamed productions, National
Theatre At Home will feature accompanying interactive content, such as question-and-answer
sessions with cast and creative teams and post-stream talks. Further details
of this programme will follow.
National Theatre Live turned ten on June 25 last year: the date of the first such broadcast in 2009, namely Phédre, starring Helen Mirren. Over those ten years, more than 80 theatre productions have been shown in 3,500 venues worldwide, reaching an overall audience of more than ten million.
NT Live now screens in 2,500 venues across 65 countries. Recent broadcasts include Cyrano de Bergerac with James McAvoy; Noel Coward’s Present Laughter with Andrew Scott; Fleabag with Phoebe Waller-Bridge; Arthur Miller’s All My Sons with Sally Field and Bill Pullman; All About Eve with Gillian Anderson and Lily James; Shakespeare’s Antony And Cleopatra with Ralph Fiennes and Sophie Okonedo; Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar with David Morrissey and Ben Whishaw and Tennessee Williams’s Cat On A Hot Tin Roof with Sienna Miller.
Here is Charles Hutchinson’s review of the National Theatre’s Jane Eyre when it played the Grand Opera House, York, in May 2017, published in The Press, York. Please note, the cast differed from the one to be seen in the National Theatre Live performance on YouTube from Thursday.
Nadia Clifford as Jane Eyre in the National Theatre’s touring production of Jane Eyre at the Grand Opera House, York, in May 2017
YOU will not see a
better theatre show in York this year, and you won’t have seen a better theatre
show in York since The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time.
For those who want
their National Theatre to be for everyone, and not only for London, then the
Grand Opera House is doing a fine job of bringing the NT north, thanks to the
pulling power of the GOH’s owners, the Ambassador Theatre Group.
Your reviewer
cannot urge you enough to see Sally Cookson’s remarkable interpretation of
Charlotte Bronte’s no less remarkable novel. Yes, some of the ticket prices are
on a Premier League scale, but this is Premier League theatre. What’s more,
Jane Eyre is a Yorkshire story, back on home turf after Cookson’s premiere at the
Bristol Old Vic and subsequent transfer to the South Bank.
Rather than being
adapted for the stage with a plodding narrator, this is a devised production of
vivid, vital imagination. Michael Vale’s set is rough hewn, gutted to the
minimum, with wooden flooring and walkways, a proliferation of ladders, a sofa,
and yet it evokes everything of Bronte’s harsh world.
Cookson’s cast is
multi role-playing, aside from Nadia Clifford’s Jane Eyre, who never once
leaves the stage in three hours (interval aside), changing costumes in full
view with the assistance of fellow cast members.
The story hurtles
along so fast, the ensemble company runs on the spot between scenes to the
accompaniment of thunderous drums, and they even take a mock piddle at one
point in the rush to crack on: one of the comic elements to counter the
grimness up north.
Energy, energy, energy!
And that applies not only to Clifford’s feisty, fiery Jane Eyre, whose accent
may curve towards her native North West, but that in no way lessens her performance.
The cast as a whole is
magnificent, be it Tim Delap’s troubled Rochester, Evelyn Miller’s triptych of
Bessie, Blanche Ingram and St John; Paul Mundell’s austere Mr Brocklehurst and
tail-wagging Pilot the dog; Lynda Rooke’s chalk and cheese Mrs Reed and Mrs
Fairfax or surely-too-good-to-be-an understudy Francesca Tomlinson’s five-hand
of roles.
There is so much
more that makes Cookson’s production so startling, movingly brilliant: the
sound design of Dominic Bilkey, the inexhaustible movement direction of Dan
Canham; the beautiful, haunting compositions of Benji Bower for the on-stage
band of David Ridley, Alex Heane and Matthew Churcher, who join in ensemble
scenes too and never take their gaze off the action.
Last, but very
definitely not least, is Melanie Marshall, the diva voice of Bertha Mason, a
one-woman Greek chorus whose versions of Mad About The Boy and Gnarls Barkley’s
Crazy will linger like Jane Eyre in the memory.
YORK Open
Studios 2020, the chance to meet 144 artists at 100 locations over two April
weekends, has been cancelled in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.
However,
with doors sadly shut for the April 17 to 19 and April 25 to 26 event,
CharlesHutchPress wants to champion the creativity of York’s artists and
makers, who would have been showcasing their ceramics, collage, digital,
illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, sculpture
and textiles skills.
Each day,
in brochure order, five artists who now miss out on the exposure of Open
Studios will be given a pen portrait on these pages, because so much art and
craft will have been created for the event and still needs a new home.
Addresses will not be included at this time.
Meanwhile, York Open Studios artists are finding their own way to respond to the shutdown by filling windows with their work instead. Look for #openwindowsyork2020 to locate them. “If you see one in your area while taking your daily exercise, take a picture and let us know,” they urge.
Jill Ford: Her ceramics mirror the seasons
Jill Ford, ceramics
JILL began working as a potter in 2002, converting her garage into
a studio and establishing her company Jill Ford Ceramics.
Her contemporary white porcelain encompasses innovative
textural wall pieces, vases and bowls thrown on the wheel and a
range of candlesticks, her work marked by richly
textured decoration inspired by mountains and coastal rock formations.
Jill’s ceramics mirror the seasons, both in the processes she
uses and the changing nature of her landscapes, with winter’s extreme temperatures
making for a particularly impactful time of year.
Jill Ford at work in her studio
A year spent trekking and sketching in the Scottish Highlands has provided
inspiration for a range of Mountain Edge pots that gives a sense of exposure
and drama.
Jill, who is a member of the Northern Potters Association and East Riding
Artists, exhibits widely in galleries and shops around Britain and abroad,
including New York, and she shows work at ceramics and craft fairs too. She also delivers masterclasses to
potters’ groups and teaches ceramics in workshop sessions. Find out more at
jillford.com.
Cafe scene: a documentary-style photograph by Danny Knight
Danny Knight, photography
AFTER participating in York Open Studios in 2017 with works from Berlin, documentary-style photographer Danny was all set to feature his street photography collated from New York and his home city of York in the 2020 event.
“Old York/New York is a series of still images documenting the mundane events of the people who walk the streets of these two famous cities, while contrasting their similarities/differences.”
Danny Knight: “Capturing the everyday moments in two amazing cities”, York and New York
His work seeks to capture “the everyday moments in these two amazing cities that are quite often missed due to the pace of life we live”.
As well as being a photographer, Danny
works for the creative film production company Hewitt & Walker and is a city
leader for Sofar Sounds York, the monthly venture that “reimagines live events
through curated secret performances in intimate York settings”. For more info,
seek out info@dannyknightphotography.co.uk.
Honesty, linocut, by Carrie Lyall
Carrie Lyall, printmaking
CARRIE is a self-taught printmaker, based in Stamford Bridge, from
where she runs her Rose & Hen business.
Her linocut prints, illustrations
and handmade books are inspired by nature. Using botanical themes, she creates
delicate silhouettes and patterns in contrasting colours, employing oil-based
inks.
“I connect with nature while out walking, taking photographs or
collecting subject matter, to be sketched and transformed into design ideas at
home,” she says.
Carrie Lyall: Connecting with nature in her art…and her clothes
“My favourite part of the process is cutting the designs, and I
often get completely immersed in creating marks and lines.”
Carrie is a member of York Printmakers and a volunteer team
leader for Etsy Team York. 2020 would have been her first year as a York
Open Studios artist. Check her out at roseandhen.etsy.com
Between You And Me And The Gate Post, needle felting, by Alison Spaven
Alison Spaven, textiles
ALISON’S passion for needle
felting started six years ago during a chance encounter with the craft.
“I’ve been painting and drawing
for a lifetime, and even flirted briefly with ceramics, before a day out with
friends to a felting workshop on a canal barge changed my creative drive
forever,” she recalls.
“I was inspired to create and work with wet and needle felted wool by some great tuition from friends and professional tutors. Needle felting, in particular, rapidly became an obsession and the husband indoors insisted that new homes had to be found for things, as falling over yet another hare is not his favourite pastime!”
Alison Spaven: hare today, gone today, when her work sells!
Alison’s experience with
sculpting in clay gave her the initial skills to work in 3D, before developing
her own textural technique when painting with wool. Created with
rare breed wool, using a single felting needle, Alison’s pictures consequently
have a sculptural quality, a deliberate carry-over from her initial 3D work.
Alison, who trades as The Crafty
Wytch from her Wytchwood Gallery and Studio, is a familiar face around Malton and
beyond from her work as a stalwart of The Press and Gazette and Herald advertising
team. Head to thecraftywytch.co.uk to discover more.
Compulsive printmaker Kevin McNulty
Kevin McNulty, printmaking
KEVIN describes himself as a compulsive printmaker, who explores
themes such as identity and the human condition in his bold limited-edition
printed collages, wherein he combines photography, arbitrary images, texture
and abstract pattern.
“Experimenting with process and technique, I interweave
modernity with the absurd to build complex and captivating designs,” he says. “I
find inspiration in the everyday. I build layers for my prints using anything I
can lay my hands on, including found items.” Even mobile phone parts and
discarded teabags.
Millennium Bridge, York, by Kevin McNulty
Kevin’s
working practice is underpinned by a desire to make “pure prints by pulling each
image by hand and embracing the fortuitous accidents that evolve each design as
it transitions from laptop to ink and paper”.
Those prints were to have featured for the first time in this month’s now cancelled York Open Studios. Find his work at kevinmcnultyprints.com.
TOMORROW: Gail Fox; Jane Atkin; Amy Stubbs; Emily Stubbs and Elliot Harrison.
“During this period, it is critical that we continue to support our staff, artists and creative partners,” says Pocklington Arts Centre director Janet Farmer
POCKLINGTON Arts Centre’s crowdfunding appeal has raised more than half
its target already.
Launched in the immediate aftermath of the Market Place venue closing its
doors to the public on March 17, in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, the
crowdfunding page has accrued donations of £3,060
towards the £5,000 goal.
What’s more, Pocklington Arts Centre (PAC) has received £2,000 in ticket
refund donations from customers for cancelled events.
Now PAC has thanked everyone for their support in
helping the venue ride out the tempest and come back stronger than ever, with
the hope of a good majority of shows being re-scheduled for the autumn and winter.
Director Janet Farmer said: “With the health and
safety of our staff, visitors, artists and volunteers being of the utmost
importance to us, Pocklington Arts Centre has temporarily closed its doors to
the public while we weather this storm.
“During this period, it is critical that we
continue to support our staff, artists and creative partners. We are working
closely with our peers across the region, and indeed the country, and are
determined that PAC will emerge from this challenge stronger and more vibrant
than ever.”
Janet continued: “The crowdfunding appeal will play an important part in this re-emergence, so we want to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has donated so far. Your support is greatly appreciated and we look forward to seeing you all again when we re-open.” To make a donation, visit: justgiving.com/crowdfunding/pac.
“Deep regret and sadness”: Sharon Canavar, chief executive of Harrogate International Festivals, announcing the cancellation of the 2020 summer season
THE Harrogate International Festivals summer season will not go
ahead, a decision with “huge financial implications that place the future of the
festivals at risk”.
The Coronavirus pandemic has put paid to the Harrogate Music
Festival, Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival, Berwins Salon North,
Spiegeltent and Children’s Festival, as well as several outdoor theatre and
community events.
Announcing the cancellation with “deep regret and sadness”, chief
executive Sharon Canavar said: “This difficult decision was made after
carefully assessing several factors, but most importantly the health and safety
of everyone involved: our audience, artists, suppliers, partners, volunteers,
staff and the wider community.
“Many months of dedicated work went into planning this exceptional
season and we share in the disappointment that will be felt by the many
writers, musicians, thinkers, performers and festival-goers who were set to
join us in Harrogate.”
Her statement continued: “As a not-for-profit arts charity, we are reliant on our events programme and ticket income, alongside sponsor support and donor philanthropy, and so the cancellation of our main season has huge financial implications that place the future of our festivals at risk.
“But despite the unprecedented challenge we now face, our mission
to bring immersive and moving cultural experiences to as many people as
possible remains unchanged.”
Harrogate
International Festivals will continue “our unparalleled celebration” of crime
fiction with the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year 2020, alongside
an extensive online programme of author interviews and more besides ahead of
the award announcement in July.
In addition, the HIF Player will be launched to allow everyone a virtual festival experience at home. This free online hub will bring together archive event recordings, digital book clubs, learning resources for children and activities for little ones, and it will be updated regularly with new content to keep audiences entertained.
The chief
executive’s statement continued: “Since 1966, we have proved an artistic force
to be reckoned with and a key cultural provider for the North of England with a
diverse year-round portfolio that celebrates world-class artists, champions new
talent and plays a vital part in the community with education outreach and
inspiring activities.
“Art
and culture help us understand what it means to be human and how to make sense
of life, and festivals are a vital part of this ecology. When this troubling
time passes, we will need – more than ever – the transformative power of the
arts to bring communities together, to inspire hope, to lift spirits and change
lives. We thank you for your support.”
The festival website, harrogateinternationalfestivals.com, now
carries the request Please Consider Making A Donation: “Support our arts charity
in this challenging time”.
The Slung Low team outside The Holbeck Slung Low in Leeds
LEEDS theatre company Slung Low are to
open a new art gallery with a difference this month.
Based in Holbeck, South Leeds, the
company will be setting up the LS11 Art Gallery to showcase the best
paintings, drawings and photographs created and chosen by the people of Holbeck
and Beeston.
However, instead of displaying the
images on gallery walls, they will be placed on lamp posts for all to
see.
Slung Low have asked people from the
two Leeds areas to email their image to the theatre company. Slung Low will
then arrange to come around and take a copy of it and then print the images on
special plastic board for display on lamp posts around Holbeck and Beeston.
Artistic director Alan Lane says: “Our
instinct at Slung Low is always to be useful and kind. For the last few weeks
that has primarily been about delivering food-bank parcels and helping people
get their prescription.
“We know that a hungry soul will find it
hard to be creative, to find joy, so the first part of our response has to be
making sure that people have their basic material needs met: and we will
continue that work until this is all over.
“But as
theatre makers we also understand the importance of storytelling and that there
are different ways to be useful.”
Alan continues: “LS11 Art Gallery is us
telling the story that this area – like all parts of this nation – is full of
creativity; that in every house are people who are brilliant, creative and
capable of profound beauty. We need to make sure we keep telling that story in
these challenging times.
“We’re going to open an art gallery on
the lamp posts of LS11 and the people who live here will make what we exhibit.
Let’s cheer ourselves up a bit.”
Founded in 2000, Slung Low specialises
in making epic productions in non-theatre spaces, often with large
community performance companies at their heart.
The company has relocated to The
Holbeck in South Leeds, the oldest working men’s club in Britain.
There, they run the bar as a
traditional members’ bar and the rest of the building as an open development
space for artists and a place where Slung Low invite other companies to present
their work that otherwise might not be seen in Leeds. All work presented at The
Holbeck is Pay What You Decide.
In Autumn 2018, Slung Low launched a cultural
community college based in Holbeck; a place where adults come to learn new
cultural skills, from stargazing to South Indian cooking, from carpentry to
singing in a choir. All workshops, supported by Paul Hamlyn Foundation, are
provided on a Pay What You Decide basis.
Slung Low are now volunteer guardians
of the city wards of Beeston and Holbeck, taking referrals from the Leeds City
Council Covid-19 helpline (0113 378 1877).
In turn, with help from the staff of
other arts organisations in Leeds, including Opera North, they are
delivering food and medicine to the vulnerable, elderly and those in
isolation.
How to take part in the LS11 Art
Gallery:
IF you live in the Holbeck or Beeston
areas of Leeds and want your drawing, painting or photograph to be featured,
please take a picture of it.
Then send it to Slung Low by email at theholbeck@slunglow.org or by text
on 07704 582137. Slung Low will then arrange to come around to take a copy of
it for you.
YORK Open
Studios 2020, the chance to meet 144 artists at 100 locations over two April
weekends, has been cancelled in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.
However,
with doors sadly shut for the April 17 to 19 and April 25 to 26 event,
CharlesHutchPress wants to champion the creativity of York’s artists and
makers, who would have been showcasing their ceramics, collage, digital,
illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, sculpture
and textiles skills.
Each day,
in brochure order, five artists who now miss out on the exposure of Open
Studios will be given a pen portrait on these pages, because so much art and
craft will have been created for the event and still needs a new home.
Addresses will not be included at this time.
Toffee Tin, Elephant And Blue Glass, by Ruth Beloe
Ruth Beloe, painting
RUTH Beloe finds equal fulfilment
in figurative sculpture and still life paintings in oil.
She trained for three years at Charles H Cecil Studios in Florence, Italy, a fine art school modelled on the ateliers of 19th-century Paris, where she studied portrait and figurative drawing, painting and sculpting, using the “sight-size” technique.
On opening her studio in Ely, she began accepting portrait commissions in both charcoal and clay and was appointed artist-in-residence at the King’s School, Ely. She then worked in an artists’ foundry to better understand the processes and practicalities of lost wax casting for bronze to inform her own work in bronze.
Ruth Beloe at work by the window in her studio
She returned to Florence in 2009 and 2010 to develop her oil-painting technique at Studio Santo Spirito. Now she works from a studio in York, taking inspiration from Chardin and William Nicholson as she explores the inherent beauty of everyday items and objects from nature.
Note the reflective qualities of surfaces, the use of directed light to form appealing shadows and the play of refracted light in her paintings. Discover more at beloe.biz.
“My aim is to awaken the feeling of wonder and awe,” says printmaker Milena Dragic
Milena Dragic, printmaking
BORN in Zagreb, Croatia, and now
living in York, polymath Milena is a printmaker, animator and performing artist.
She studied printmaking at Zagreb’s
Academy of Fine Arts, from 1971 to 1973, and combined arts at Brighton Polytechnic’s
faculty of art and design, from 1973 to 1976. Residencies and placements
ensued, along with more than 20 solo shows
in Britain, Croatia, Germany and Switzerland and participation in print exhibitions
in Britain, Poland, Brazil, Spain and South Korea.
“I perceive my work as a
dynamic representation of forces underlying physical reality and their
manifestations within everyday life,” says Milena, who prints on hand-made
paper. “My aim is to awaken the feeling of wonder and awe that I have
experienced during the process of gathering ideas and executing them in the
prints.
“My colour prints are all
relief prints: woodcuts, wood-engravings and linocuts. I like the simplicity of
the process. I print without a conventional press. My colour prints are done by
a reduction method, which means that all the colours are printed from the same
block. At the end of this process there is no lino left, so the edition is
truly limited.”
Her contemporary, colourful
abstract work combines relief prints, animation and mixed media. Wearing her
other hats, she has worked as an art director and animator at Leeds Animation
Workshop, now works for Artlink West Yorkshire and is part of the York Dance
Collective. Paint the full picture at milena-dragic.co.uk.
Expressionist interpretation of York Minster, by Russell Bailey
Russell Bailey, mixed media
RUSSELL invited putative York Open Studios 2020 visitors to expect “a range of expressionistic interpretations of York Minster in mixed media”.
“The main work results from over
12 months’ work on cathedrals – York Minster in particular – involving many
site visits, plein air and studio-based work,” he says.
Favouring charcoal and mixed media, Russell embraces experimental ways of working and gestural mark-making. “Working expressively with freedom of marks with more considered drawn elements is key to how I process my experiences artistically,” he says.
“The work I do is often experimental, often part destroyed and then re-created,” says Russell Bailey
“The work I do is often experimental,
often part destroyed and then re-created to produce a very personal
interpretation. In that respect, the work tends to reside in the hinterland
between the literal and pure abstraction. Mixing media seems to have become a
natural way through which I express myself.”
Russell
has exhibited previously at York Open Studios, the Great North Art Show, Kunsthuis
Gallery at The Dutch House, Crayke, and Blossom Street Gallery, York. His
latest artwork also embraces small abstract pieces based on beliefs and others
from art retreat locations. Take a look at russellbaileyfineart.co.uk.
Barcelona skyline, by Anthony Chappel-Ross
Anthony Chappel-Ross, photography
ANTHONY is a familiar face behind the camera around York and beyond for his photojournalism for The Press, York, where he was an outstanding staff photographer, and other print media outlets too.
Since leaving journalism college in Sheffield in 2002, he has been shortlisted for more than 20 regional and national press awards: testament to his truly eye-catching talent.
Anthony Chappel-Ross: A face more often to be found looking through a camera lens
For the past few years, he has
started to work for himself, choosing his clients and commissions. “This
freedom has allowed time for my own personal photographic interests to be
explored,” says Anthony.
For his second York Open Studios
exhibition, he had selected photographic images, predominantly in black and
white, that explore the contrast, form and pattern of Barcelona, Antoni Gaudi’s
Catalan Modernist architecture et al.
Check out
anthonychappelross.co.uk…and snap to it.
Silver stone, by Helen Drye
Helen Rye, jewellery
JEWELLERY designer and maker
Helen Drye works full time from her studio south of York, her designs inspired
by nearby Skipwith Common National Nature Reserve.
Establishing her Silver and Stone
Jewellery Design business in 2012, Yorkshire-born Helen’s collections have
their roots in this woodland, especially the birds and hares, her favourite
mushrooms and the moonlight.
While much of her work is made in
sterling silver, some is designed and carved in silver clay, adding unusual
features to the jewellery.
“My imagination is sparked
by the woodland and common beyond my studio, wondering what the ancient Bronze
Age people did, or the farmers grazing their sheep on the common land, or the Second
World War pilots who trained here before going off to fight their battles in the
sky,” says Helen.
“My imagination is sparked by the woodland and common beyond my studio,” says Helen Drye
“I try to imagine those
people walking between the trees, through that same mist, in the morning light
or the moonlight many years ago. I reflect this as though looking through my
windows; ‘windows’ that look through the woodland, the trees and the birds and
make you wonder what else is through there.”
Helen, by the way, also runs
jewellery-making workshops and wedding ring workshops. More info can be found
at info@silver-stonejewellery.co.uk.
TOMORROW: Jill Ford; Danny Knight; Carrie Lyall; Alison Spaven and Kevin McNulty.
Easter activities organised by Scarborough Museums Trust are going online. Picture: Tony Bartholomew.
SCARBOROUGH Museums Trust is taking its fun Easter activities online.
Amid the Covid-19 lockdown, the trust has had to suspend its usual drop-in activities at the Rotunda Museum, Scarborough Art Gallery and Woodend, instead making them available via its website, scarboroughmuseumstrust.com, and on social media.
From Thursday, April 9, you can have a go at making your own “Roarsome”
Easter bonnet to wear with pride.
The Rotunda Museum, Scarborough. Picture: Tony Bartholomew
From Wednesday, April 15, you can gain inspiration from the trust’s
springtime artworks and make a flowery print to decorate your home.
Scarborough Museums Trust’s learning officer, Christine Rostron, says:
“All the activities are inspired by our collections and use everyday art
materials.
Scarborough Art Gallery. Picture: Tony Batholomew
“We hope you have fun making things at
home and would love to find out how you’re getting on. Please share your
creations with us on social media: @Scarboroughmuseums (Facebook), @scarboroughmuseums
(Instagram) and @SMTrust (Twitter), using the hashtags #MuseumFromHome
#loveScarborough.
“We’re really going to miss seeing all the families
and children who normally visit our venues over the holidays. Sending us
pictures is great way for us to keep in touch.”
YORK Open
Studios 2020, the chance to meet 144 artists at 100 locations over two April
weekends, has been cancelled in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.
However,
with doors sadly shut for the April 17 to 19 and April 25 to 26 event,
CharlesHutchPress wants to champion the creativity of York’s artists and
makers, who would have been showcasing their ceramics, collage, digital,
illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, sculpture
and textiles skills.
Each day,
in brochure order, five artists who now miss out on the exposure of Open
Studios will be given a pen portrait on these pages, because so much art and
craft will have been created for the event and still needs a new home.
Addresses will not be included at this time.
Academia, by Zosia Olenska
Zosia Olenska, painting
ZOSIA finds inspiration in
everyday landscapes, looking to find beauty in our daily surroundings. This
translates into “optimistic representational art” across the mediums of pen and
ink and acrylic painting.
“Most of all, I would like people
to come away from looking at my work feeling in some way uplifted,” says this
self-taught artist. “Painting, for me, is a self-reinforcing cycle of noticing the
beauty around us, then looking more to find it.”
Zosia Olenska: Likes her art to be uplifting
The daughter of two artists, Zosia
came to work as an artist gradually through illustration, developing her
practice by experimenting in different media. She has exhibited at the New
Light Prize exhibition in North Yorkshire and with the Society of Women Artists
at the Mall Galleries, London, in 2018 and 2019. Last year too, she was a heat
artist in the Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year 2019 competition.
In another string to her bow,
Zosia designs hand-drawn pen-and-ink illustrations for the eco-friendly Niche Snowboards.
Head this way for more info: zosiaolenska.com
Anna Cook: paper cut artist
Anna Cook, paper cuts
ANNA is a self-taught paper
cutter with a background in design and printmaking, whose work captures the
personalities of the natural world’s inhabitants.
Layering intricately cut sheets
of paper that she folds and sculpts and presents in deep box frames, she
continually challenges herself to achieve more detail with each piece.
When creating a new design, Anna
seeks inspiration from contemporary surface and pattern design and old
botanical illustrations, as well as “the magical world of nature”. Contact her
via a.cook77@yahoo.co.uk.
Cloisonne enamel lotus bud earrings, by Leesa Rayton Design Plus
Leesa Rayton Design Plus, jewellery
AFTER many years of working in health research,
Leesa has made the leap into becoming a full-time jewellery designer. Now a
member of the Guild of Enamellers and British Society of Enamellers, she would
have been participating in York Open Studios for the first time this month.
“I use time-honoured
techniques to design and create unique pieces of jewellery from precious
metals, vitreous enamels, gemstones and beads,” she says. “My designs are
inspired by architecture and the natural world.”
Leesa Rayton: Inspired by architecture and the natural world
Leesa is always seeking to expand her knowledge and to learn new
techniques at York School of Jewellery, where she has studied over the past 12
years.
She is also a director of the Beautiful Splint Company CIC, a Tadcaster
business that makes orthotic splints for fingers. Check out leesaraytondesignplus.co.uk.
Blue topaz necklace, by Karen J Ward
Karen J Ward, jewellery
LOOKING to escape the world of finance and return to her passion for creating art, Karen finally found her calling six years ago, re-training with Nik Stanbury and Julie Moss at York School of Jewellery, where she is now based.
Jewellery designer Karen J Ward
Working with precious metals and
gemstones and using traditional skills, she first takes elements from her
drawings to then transform flat sheets of metal into “beautiful wearable art”
inspired by nature’s textures, shapes and curves.
Like Leesa Rayton (see above),
she produces orthotic splints for hands, wrists and fingers in her work as co-director
of the Beautiful Splint Company. Head to karenjward.co.uk to discover
more.
Mark Azopardi at work in his studio space
Mark Azopardi, painting
MARK works mainly in pure watercolour, on occasion incorporating other media to produce highly detailed paintings and drawings.
His main inspiration comes from the colours and textures of all elements of the natural world, sometimes finding beauty in the simplest of things. Discover him via markazopardi@gmail.com.
A fleet of feathers, by Mark Azopardi
TOMORROW: Ruth Beloe; Milena Dragic; Russell Bailey; Anthony Chappel-Ross and Helen Drye.
YORK Open
Studios 2020, the chance to meet 144 artists at 100 locations over two April
weekends, has been cancelled in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.
However,
with doors sadly shut for the April 17 to 19 and April 25 to 26 event,
CharlesHutchPress wants to champion the creativity of York’s artists and
makers, who would have been showcasing their ceramics, collage, digital,
illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, sculpture
and textiles skills.
Each day, in brochure order, five artists who now miss out on the exposure of Open Studios will be given a pen portrait on these pages, because so much art and craft will have been created for the event and still needs a new home. Addresses will not be included at this time.
Analogue photographer Claire Cooper
Claire Cooper, photography
CLAIRE’S work explores women represented through the medium of analogue photography, screen print and intaglio printmaking techniques.
“Portraits are special because, by definition, there are at least two people involved in their making: the artist and the sitter,” says Claire.
“Neither has complete control
over the other; portraiture becomes a negotiation between parties, a dance of
wills that results in a collaboration of sorts.”
Trudy, Hove, 2012, photographed by Claire Cooper
Claire, who completed an BA in
Photography in 2000 and an MA in 2013, uses sitters both known and unknown in
her experiments with different formats of photographic portraiture.
She has shown work in group shows
across the country, and away from photography, she has a background in the
community arts sector, predominantly with DARTS in Doncaster. Find
out more via missccooper@gmail.com.
Portrait Of A Friend, by Zoe Catherine Kendal
Zoe Catherine Kendal, painting
ZOE is a multi-disciplinary
artist and jewellery maker from a family steeped in artistic pursuits.
Great-granddaughter of Bernard Leach,
“the father of British studio pottery”, she attained a BA in jewellery design from Central
Saint Martins, in London, the city where she was raised before moving to York.
Her York Open Studios show would
have focused on her paintings: works that combine experimental, abstract
approaches with colourful, contemporary representations of portraiture,
seascapes and cultural heritage, capturing feeling, narrative and identity
across varied material and media.
Zoe Catherine Kendal: Capturing feeling, narrative and identity
Overall, her experimental practice is material-led, combining pastel and paint on canvas, paper and wood; precious and non-precious metals, ceramics and beads with leather and yarns.
Zoe’s paintings have been exhibited at According To McGee, York, and Bils & Rye, Kirkbymoorside; her jewellery at CoCA at York Art Gallery, Lottie Inch Gallery, York, and Kabiri, Marylebone, London. Cast an eye over her work at zoekendall.com.
Flying Low, by Cathy Denford
Cathy Denford, painting
BROUGHT up with wild nature in
New Zealand, Cathy trained and worked as a director in theatre and television
in England.
Since settling in York in 1998, fine art has been her strong focus, shaped by
initial study in printmaking with Peter Wray and painting with Jane Charlton at
York St John University and later at Chelsea College of Arts and the Slade.
First exhibiting at York Open
Studios in 2006, she creates oil and mixed-media paintings suggestive of movement,
set against stillness, often of birds in landscape.
Cathy Denford: “Movement, set against stillness”
Combining figurative and abstract
styles, with elements of Cubism, her work explores space and time passing.
Cathy’s paintings have been shown at galleries in Leeds, Scarborough and Leeds, Zillah Bell in Thirsk and the Norman Rea Gallery and music department at the University of York. More info at cathydenford.info.
Milet plate, by Hacer Ozturk
Hacer Ozturk, ceramics
HACER is a Turkish ceramics and
iznik tiles artist from Istanbul, now settled in York, where 2020 would have
marked her York Open Studios debut.
Her work combines traditional and contemporary free-style Turkish ceramics, both formed with the same techniques that were first applied thousands of years ago.
Hacer Ozturk: artist and researcher
Latterly, she has started painting, drawing on traditional iznik tile motifs. Aside from her ceramic creativity, she works as a researcher in Istanbul. Seek out hacer.yldiz@gmail.com.
Yorkshire, by Chrissie Dell
Chrissie Dell, printmaking
CHRISSIE is a printmaker inspired
by the environment, making multi-layered monoprints, monotypes, collagraphs and
Moku-Hanga (Japanese woodcuts).
She uses such techniques as
collage, chine collé, viscosity, stencils, natural pigments and materials to create
textural prints that interpret the forms,
colours and textures of the natural world.
Chrissie Dell at work in her studio
Growing up in Edinburgh and on the west coast of Scotland, Chrissie first studied printmaking in the early 1970s at the Froebel Institute, London, but only set up her studio in 2013 after further study at Leith School of Art and Edinburgh Printmakers, her studies taking in painting, drawing, artists’ books, printmaking and creative textiles.
Chrissie has exhibited in Edinburgh, as well as at Blossom Street Gallery and Pyramid Gallery in York, and she is a member of York Printmakers and York Art Workers’ Association.
2020 would have been her third participation in York Open Studios. Still in the diary, however, is the York Printmakers Autumn Print Fair at York Cemetery Chapel on September 26 and 27.
TOMORROW: Zosia Olenska; Anna Cook; Leesa Rayton Design; Karen J Ward and Mark Azopardi
