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July 9, 2021July 9, 2021

Can Piccadilly Pop Up find permanent home rather than be a snap, crackle and pop-up?

Art attack: Shark, mural by Replete, at Piccadilly Pop Up, Piccadilly, York

EACH Saturday, Piccadilly Pop Up’s artists and writers at the old Tax Office at 23, Piccadilly, York, open up their shared studio as a gallery.

From 12 noon to 6pm, the public can view and buy paintings, drawings, graffiti, murals, fine art, sculpture, prints, postcards, collage and poetry. Entry is free, no ticket or booking is required, and Covid safety precautions are in place.

Piccadilly Pop Up is operating as part of Uthink PDP (People Developing People), a charity that is borrowing the building from City of Council until its redevelopment.

Uthink does all kinds of social work up and down the country, not least renting such premises to artists at affordable rates to help fund its activities.

*Halloweenery, mixed-media collage, by Richard Kitchen*

“Eventually, however, we will be given one month’s notice and lose our studios,” says Richard Kitchen, one of the pop-up founders and artists. “Suitable premises are increasingly hard to find, let alone afford, both despite and also because of the amount of redevelopment going on in the city.

“Many artists in York have private means, but what about those who don’t? Some of us at Piccadilly Pop Up work there full time, the complication being that we do not necessarily make ‘commercial’ work, yet depend on sales to make a living.

“Our angle is that living artists are a vibrant part of the cultural attraction of York and should be valued and nurtured. We feel the council would benefit from providing for creatives who show initiative and enterprise as part of the city’s resources. Artists are an asset!”

After that rallying call, CharlesHutchPress felt compelled to pop down questions aplenty for Richard [@richardkitchenart] on the present and hopefully the future of Pop Up Piccadilly as he seeks to address what he calls “an imbalance in the council’s priorities”.

When did Piccadilly Pop Up start and who has been the driving force?

“The charity Uthink PDP moved into the vacant former Tax Office at 23 Piccadilly two years ago, putting on a photographic exhibition and some workshops and renting studio space in the building to artists until its redevelopment.

“Since then, quite a few artists have joined and some have gone, mainly due to Covid. Now there are four core artists working there, who have been running the Saturday open days off and on since August 2020.

Bare Bones, ink and watercolour, by Steve Beadle

“We’re a team. Steve Beadle and I look after promotion, publicity and networking; Terry Aaron takes on the upkeep of the building and Patrick Dalton designs our flyers and posters. Some tasks require more time than others, but it takes everyone to make it work.”

How long do you have left at the former Tax Office before needing to move elsewhere?

“All we know is that at some point we will be given one month’s notice to clear out. Uthink took over the premises from the council on a temporary basis but it has now been sold to developers.”

Despite being a pop-up, will the aim be to have a permanent base?

“We hope so. It’s as permanent as possible in Piccadilly although sadly it can’t be permanently permanent. The name was chosen because Uthink often do pop-ups in various cities and we weren’t sure how long we’d be there.

Will Whittington’s corridor mural at Piccadilly Pop Up

“It sounds a bit lightweight, but people know us by that name now, so it’s better not to change it until we have to move. We open the entire first floor as a public gallery every Saturday.”

How may an artist become involved in Piccadilly Pop-Up?

“Most of the display space is spoken for right now, certainly the walls. We make a lot of work and some of it’s quite big! We have a couple of students from York St John helping out on Saturdays and they also have some pieces on show. One will be renting studio space with us too.

“We do show work by guest artists sometimes and we like to encourage people and make new connections, so the best thing would be to get in touch and enquire via facebook.com/piccadillypopupart.”

Portrait, from a photo series, by Gary Pate

How many artists are involved at present?

“Eight people work and/or exhibit there, including the four core members. Between us, we produce a wide range of work: painting, drawing, sculpture, collage, murals, graffiti, street art, photography, prints and even poetry and history books!!”

What is the mission statement of Piccadilly Pop Up?

“As well as supporting Uthink’s own practice, I’d say our mission is to enhance cultural life in the city, to promote art as a living, relevant force and to make it accessible to as wide a range of people as possible.

“By doing that, we’re not only providing entertainment and stimulus but also contributing to people’s wellbeing and positive outlook in terms of mental health and social values. We’re showing what can be achieved when a creative, community-minded enterprise takes over a space that is otherwise going to waste. We’re setting an example for others to follow.

The Natrix, oil painting, by The Medicine Man

Who is involved in the Uthink PDP charity?

“PDP stands for People Developing People. Uthink started as a charity in 2012, giving opportunities to disadvantaged young people and the homeless to encourage and enable them to find their feet.

“Among other good works, it takes over buildings like ours and rents studio space to local artists at affordable rates. It started operating in York in July 2019.

“Gary Pate is the managing director and our main contact. We’re privileged to be part of such a generous, forward-thinking, grassroots organisation and proud to contribute to its work. We give Uthink a percentage of any sales we make.”

How will you make your case to City of York Council for premises for York artists? Sadly, Bar Lane Studios have closed, but PICA Studios run from Grape Lane and Westside Artists have formed a collective, with Southlands Methodist Church as a fulcrum. What would suit you best to complement these studio spaces?

“These are our thoughts at the moment: Uthink rents out studio space at deliberately affordable rates, which means we can make the work we want to make without necessarily bowing to commercialism.

“The irony is that we tend to sell a lot less than other galleries, partly because our work differs from what one normally sees in York galleries and pop-ups, and partly because Piccadilly – at least beyond Spark: York – is slightly off the beaten track, unless you’re a Wetherspoons client!

“So, it’s all a bit ‘Catch 22’. We’re quite unique in that, unlike many artists in York and elsewhere, most of us do not have private means or other jobs and cannot afford the rents that other places charge. We aren’t ‘weekend artists’.

Tree, gouache and watercolour, by Steve Beadle

“Two of us do a dedicated 9-till-5 stint (or more) at the studio every day and one often works late at night, but it’s all unpaid. We either compromise and make stuff to sell – the production line of making variations on what you know is popular – or we stay true to ourselves, value our integrity and creativity, and risk getting nothing in return.

“It’s not that the work is weird or bad or ‘difficult’, far from it, but it isn’t mainstream. I’d say we’re a very interesting place to visit for that reason and we should appeal to a wider audience than regular gallery-goers, but because of our location it’s not that easy to attract visitors.”

The solution is…?

“Could City of York Council develop the mindset to see artists like us as assets to the city and its cultural appeal? We think we can contribute a lot to a positive experience of the city for both tourists and residents.

Needle, spray paint on board, by Replete at Piccadilly Pop Up

“With all the development going on and what many residents see as an emphasis on money-making and tourism at the expense of much else, could a few buildings be earmarked by the council for use by artists, at least temporarily?

“At the moment, organisations such as Uthink and Blank Canvas find such places when they can and charge what they feel is appropriate, but there are surely more opportunities out there.

“If it were an initiative on the part of the council to offer premises to genuinely needy and enterprising artists at rock-bottom rates, there would be so many vibrant things going on. Why not promote art as a living, thriving, meaningful cultural force in the city that can enhance being in York for residents as well as visitors?”

Over to you, City of York Council. Pass on the baton, not the buck.

In Memory Of Ken, detail from a collage by Richard Kitchen

Here are the key Instagram links for the Piccadilly Pop Up enterprise:

@replete_art
@richardkitchenart
@stevebeadleart
@themedicinemanart
@uthinkpdp
@yorkcreatives

instagram.com.piccadillypopupart

July 9, 2021July 9, 2021

Who are the NEW artists in 2021’s York Open Studios? The final fab four to find

Here Be Monsteras potter Kayti Peschke working in her Fangfoss garage studio

YORK Open Studios’ 20^th anniversary celebration of the city’s creative talent begins this evening with a 6pm to 9pm preview. Head to yorkopenstudios.co.uk to find out which artists and makers will be “warming up” for the two weekends ahead.

After the Covid-enforced fallow year of 2020, York Open Studios returns with 145 artists and makers opening 95 studios, homes and workplaces tomorrow and Sunday, then July 17, from 10am to 5pm each day.

Among them will be 40 debutants, prompting CharlesHutchPress to highlight newcomers in a week-long preview, in map guide order, that concludes today with the final four as York prepares for this month’s showcase of ceramic, collage, digital art, illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, furniture, sculpture and textiles skills.

Reg Walker, sculpture, Kiln Studio, Arnup Studios, Panman Lane, Holtby, York

REG crafts abstract sculptures, sometimes contemplative, sometimes playful, mostly in Corten steel, together with small pieces for the hand in bamboo and distinctive collages in natural materials.

He took up sculpture when inspired by volunteering at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, near Wakefield, where he then took part in hot and cold metal courses.

Reg Walker: Moved into Arnup Studios two years ago

Originally from Ireland, Reg settled in Yorkshire in 1988, working in social research and organisation development. He had a studio at Kildale on the North York Moors before moving to Arnup Studios in Holtby in 2019.

He will open his studio for this evening’s preview.

Michelle Galloway: Loves experimenting with different techniques

Michelle Galloway, painting, The Pottery Studio, Arnup Studios, Panman Lane, Holtby, York

MICHELLE moved to York to study art, developing a lasting interest in art history, archaeology and architecture.

Her artwork took a backseat when she retrained as a teacher, but she continued to pass on her passion for art through children’s workshops.

When the opportunity for a temporary studio arose, Michelle rekindled her own creativity and love of experimentation with different techniques. She now has a permanent studio at Arnup Studios.

“My latest work is oils on large canvases,” she says. “Using small brushstrokes to build up layers of colour, the variation of colour and tone achieved creates an abstract and ethereal quality.”

Michelle describes her oil paintings as having an intensity to them, whereas her watercolours are “mostly calm, harmonious, quiet and contemplative, atmospheric, yet gentle and light”.

“I work from my own sketches and photographs of the location, meaning that all my senses are engaged with the subject,” she says. “I sketch and make notes to myself, decide what to include or subtract, and use a camera to record both the larger scene and tiny details, an instant where the light changes or a fleeting glimpse of something of intrigue.

“Back in the studio, I can take my time and work at my own pace. I can combine all the information with my personal and emotional response to create a visual interpretation.”

Michelle will be welcoming visitors to this evening’s preview.

A brace of ceramic trios by Judith Glover

Judith Glover, ceramics, Brambles, Warthill, York

JUDITH specialises in sculptural ceramics, using the technique of coiling.

“My work is often presented as trios, thus emphasising the relationship between the pieces,” she says.

“Inspired by Italian still-life artist Giorgio Morandi and British painter, designer and illustrator Rex Whistler, I often incorporate different strata of clays in the same piece to give a painterly quality.

“Ceramic artists Jennifer Lee and Ashraf Hanna influence my unglazed hand-built work with clean lines that enhance the interior design of homes.”

Judith Glover with one of her sculptural ceramics

Judith learned the basics of pottery through studying with Su Rogers in Guildford. “Re-locating to North Yorkshire in 2010, I continued to develop my practice, specialising in sculptural hand-building,” she says. “My base clay is generally a Potterycrafts recipe, which contains a red clay from Derbyshire and buff fireclays from Shropshire.”

Her latest pieces, developed in the 2020-2021 lockdowns, are of imaginary landscapes and seascapes. “They use flattened coils and inserts of different clays to create painterly pieces,” says Judith, who is a member of the Northern Potters Association and an associate member of the Craft Potters Association.

All proceeds from sales of her work go to IDAS, the North Yorkshire charity that supports those affected by domestic violence.

A couple of cups, made by Here Be Monsteras ceramicist Kayti Peschke

Here Be Monsteras (Kayti Peschke), ceramics, Ashtree Lodge, Gowthorpe Lane, Fangfoss, York

KAYTI creates ceramics under the name of Here Be Monsteras from her garage studio in her garden in the Wolds, east of York.

Her background is in photography and magazine design, but two years ago she started making pottery and now she has converted full time. “It has become an obsession,” she says.

Kayti makes wheel-thrown ceramics with stoneware clays, “all with a lovely speckle and texture that are wonderful tactile”, to create functional objects for the home.

“Brushstrokes form the decorative styles using a mix of glazes, hand-coloured clay and wax-resist techniques,” says Kayti. “I also screen print pots, using my own hand-cut designs and I love working on colour palettes, with limited runs for each season.”

She has worked on screen-printing ceramics with artist Jade Blood, creating travel cups and a full dinnerware set, as well as collaborating with restaurants and cafés that serve their menus on her tableware.

“A cup of tea in a handmade cup really does taste better, maybe because the process feels more special or you take more time over it? I’m not sure why, but it’s true,” says Kayti.

Taking shape: Kayti Peschke in hands-on mode in her studio

In her home studio, the cups of tea flow and her dogs hang out in the sunshine as she listens to BBC 6Music or podcasts. “I absolutely love being out there, creating, and hopefully this shows in the things I make.

“All the pieces I create are made to be practical and often multi-functional. It’s so important to me that they’re used and enjoyed and bring a little bit of extra joy to the day!”

As testament to that, her ceramics can be found in York at Kiosk, Fossgate; Sketch By Origin, York Art Gallery; Jolly Allotment, Walmgate; Flori, Walmgate; Melk, SparkYork and Clifford Street, and Botanic York, Walmgate.

Beyond York, Yorkshire stockists include The Hispanist and Two Gingers, both in Paragon Street, Hull; Plant & Paint, Humber Street, Hull; The Gallery, Malton; The Art House, Wakefield; Flavour Like Fancy, Meanwood, Leeds; Mr Cooper’s, Whitby, and Mlkwood Studio, Bridlington.

Kayti will be giving throwing demonstrations at 1pm and 3pm each day during York Open Studios.

A painting by Ian Cameron, one of 145 York Open Studios artists in 2021. Find him – but maybe not this bird – in his back garden at 65, Green Lane, Acomb, York

TO find full details of all the York Open Studios artists and makers, their studios, opening hours and examples of their work, go to: yorkopenstudios.co.uk.

The 95 locations will be highlighted on a map of York to help visitors navigate their way to as many studios, workshops and homes as they wish.

Visit yorkopenstudios.co.uk to look at the York Open Studios map. Alternatively, free printed brochures with the map can be picked up from Visit York, on Lendal, or in shops, restaurants and visitor attractions around the city.

2021’s York Open Studios will be Covid-compliant, with artists adhering to Government guidelines on social distancing, ventilation and sanitisers, keeping themselves and visitors safe throughout.

July 8, 2021July 9, 2021

Who are the NEW artists in 2021’s York Open Studios? Six in the city to seek out

Serious advice from Joanna Lisowiec in her lettering series

AFTER the Covid-enforced fallow year of 2020, York Open Studios returns this weekend for its 20^th parade of the city’s creative talent.

Preceded by tomorrow’s preview evening, from 6pm to 9pm, the event will see 145 artists and makers open 95 studios, homes and workplaces on July 10 and 11 and July 17 and 18, from 10am to 5pm.

Among them will be 43 debutants, prompting CharlesHutchPress to highlight six newcomers a day over the week ahead, in map guide order, as York prepares for a showcase of ceramic, collage, digital art, illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, furniture, sculpture and textiles skills this month.

“Soothingly immersive”: Fiona Love’s art in her own words

Fiona Lane, painting, 8 Claremont Terrace, Gillygate, York

SELF-TAUGHT artist Fiona paints seascapes and landscapes, mostly on canvas.

“Most of my work is seas and trees,” she says. “I’m inspired by the beautiful and diverse Yorkshire countryside, which is so accessible to me.”

Favouring mixed media, she loves working with colour and light, creating pictures that she describes as “almost 3D” and “soothingly immersive”.

“I prefer to paint outside,” says Fiona Lane, not least in her flower-filled courtyard

“I’m always developing my style,” she says. “I stretch and smooth paint which I apply with palette knives and brushes, adding details with other media. I prefer to paint outside, whether in the woods, by the sea or in my flower-filled York courtyard.”

Fiona will be taking part in tomorrow’s preview evening.

Creating textile designs is a form of meditation for Ealish Wilson

Ealish Wilson, textiles, PICA Studios, Grape Lane, York, second weekend only

TEXTILE designer Ealish has lived and worked in many places around the world, spending 15 years in the USA before making her way to York and joining the PICA Studios arts hub.

However, Japan was where her work was transformed. “Japan taught me that art exploration and practice is a lifelong journey from which we constantly learn,” she says.

“Experience informs the creative process over time, enhancing and developing an artist’s expression. It’s about seeing creativity in the everyday.”

She brings this philosophy to making her sculptural textiles, using a variety of substrates and techniques, including print, drawing, photography and stitching.

Ealish Wilson’s artistic philosophy: “Seeing creativity in the everyday”

“I repeat this process to create multiple iterations and layers to my designs,” she says. “Much of my process investigates pattern and its transformation through surface manipulation. I use many traditional hand methods of stitching, such as pleating and smocking, to physically alter my original designs.

“Frequently my work starts in the digital realm: whether photographing an object or one of my own paintings, it serves as inspiration for new work. Many of my images are everyday scenes or objects of purpose that appear mundane but feature a beautiful shape or colour that’s a perfect jumping-off point to create a textile.”

Ealish, who sees the craft of making as “my form or meditation”, is also exhibiting in the Westside Artists’ Momentum Summer Show at Blossom Street Gallery, York, until September 26.

Amy Butcher, textiles, 1 Carlton Cottages, Wigginton, York

FOR Amy’s applique-based hand embroidery, a collage of intricately cut fabric shapes creates a foundation. This is then stitched and embellished to make illustrative pieces rooted in nature and animals.

“My love of art and textiles started at school and has been a passion ever since,” says the largely self-taught Amy.

“The support and inspiration from an embroidery class enabled me to continue to develop my work and confidence, and in 2014 I was fortunate to get the opportunity to work with the greetings card company Bug Art.”

She now works on developing her own range of greetings cards, prints, cushion panels, coasters and embroidery stitch kits, printed from her original textile art for Beaks & Bobbins.

Tomorrow’s preview evening will be the first chance to catch her York Open Studios debut.

*Golden Orioles, an illustration, by Joanna Lisowiec*

Joanna Lisowiec, illustration, 40 Hempland Drive, York

JOANNA’S prints and illustrations look to nature, classical art and mythology for inspiration, as she focuses on birds and animals in her bold, clean and distinctive linocuts, drawings and paintings.

“My aspiration is to capture truths that make one ponder the beauty of life,” she says.

Originally from Poland and brought up in Colorado, USA, and Switzerland, she first came to Britain to study illustration at Edinburgh College of Art, falling in love with the wild Highlands and later with the “quaint English countryside” when she moved to Yorkshire for her MA in advertising and design from the University of Leeds.

“As an illustrator and printmaker, I’m known for a bold style of illustration with lots of texture, usually focused on the beauty of nature and narratives inspired by folklore. I love reading books and would love to illustrate a classic novel one day,” says Joanna, whose surname is pronounced “Lease-oviets”.

“When I’m not working, I can be found with my nose in a book, taking long walks in the countryside, drinking tea and listening to the rain.”

She will be opening her studio for tomorrow’s preview.

Dee Thwaite, painting, 10 Bedale Avenue, York, second weekend only

DEE uses acrylic paint, inks, graphite, oil pastels and charcoal in her sea and landscape paintings and drawings, marked by stormy skies, movement in the clouds, shifting light and the changing seasons.

Mainly self-taught, this contemporary abstract artist expresses her love of the North Yorkshire coastline on canvas, board and paper in works that combine both a physical and emotional response when she paints, predominantly with her hands, as opposed to brushes.

“Painting has become such a healing and therapeutic part of my life and one of my greatest passions,” says Dee.

A Tabitha Grove painting on handmade paper

Tabitha Grove, painting, Arnup Studios, Panman Lane, Holtby, York

TABITHA uses bold colour, contrast, ink, watercolour, gold leaf and collage on handmade paper, fabric and even garments to explore perceptions of the body and how they can be challenged and celebrated.

Her career as an actor and costume designer for film and theatre has informed Tabitha’s passion for storytelling and her fascination with the way our bodies interact with our environments.

*Tabitha Grove: Actor, costume designer, art therapist, piano restorer….and artist*

Tabitha’s career portfolio career extends to co-managing Look Gallery, in Helmsley, being an art therapist in hospitals and now working in piano restoration, where she learns rare skills that influence her art.

Each experience has informed Tabitha’s style, she says, leading to her “bringing diverse technique to a new perspective”.

TOMORROW: Reg Walker, Michelle Galloway, Judith Glover and Here Be Monsteras Ceramics (Kayti Peschke).

July 8, 2021July 8, 2021

REVIEW: A Splinter Of Ice, The Original Theatre Company, York Theatre Royal

Withholding the truth: Oliver Ford Davies’s Graham Greene and Stephen Boxer’s Kim Philby in A Splinter Of Ice

A Splinter Of Ice, The Original Theatre Company, York Theatre Royal, until Saturday. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk

WHAT’S this? A proper printed programme to peruse. Another sign of a return to theatre’s old normal ahead of Monday’s Step 4 pronouncement and its promise of the resumption of full-capacity shows.

What’s this? A not particularly busy first-night audience for spy story A Splinter Of Ice, even making allowances for social distancing in masked times. We could romanticise how theatres will be crammed to the gills once “Freedom Day” arises, but audiences are selective. Always were, always will be.

In between the mothballed lulls in lockdown, we have grown accustomed to seeing theatres and theatre companies adapting to Covid rules with social-bubble casts of one, two or three on main stages. In truth, Ben Brown’s three-hander would have been equally at home on a studio or Edinburgh Fringe stage, where it would have gained from added claustrophobia.

A Splinter Of Ice has its own cases of social distancing and mask-wearing: Brown’s subject matter is the first meeting in 35 years of The Third Man writer Graham Greene (Oliver Ford Davies) and Cold War-era spy Kim Philby (Stephen Boxer) in 35 years, whose friendship had been forged in Greene’s days in Philby’s office at MI6. Greene professed to loving him, maybe explaining the play’s inclusion in the Theatre Royal’s Love Season.

British intelligence officer and double agent Philby’s defection to the Soviet Union ensured an enforced social distancing, despite Philby’s invitations to his old friend to visit him. Greene finally does so when attending a peace conference at Gorbachev’s initiation, along with the likes of Yoko Ono, Gregory Peck and Peter Ustinov.

The date is February 15 1987. Greene arrives for dinner at Philby’ rudimentary Moscow flat, home to the terminally ill spy, his charming fourth wife Rufa (Karen Ascoe) and books and a chair given to Philby by fellow Cambridge Five spy Guy Burgess.

Michael Pavelka’s set is skeletal, bare scaffolding framing the drab flat contents, much like Brown must fill in the blank pages of exactly what went on that night as Greene would later only affirm that the meeting had taken place.

Likewise, Boxer’s Philby opens by saying he will not answer any of Greene’s questions, although subsequently he does, but who knows where the truth lies in his answers. Greene had had the first word, addressing the audience directly to warn that “perhaps he was just playing with me, as he did with others”. Philby’s mask-wearing had been so adroit that he was, in Greene’s words, “the greatest spy of the 20th century”.

The ghost in the writer: Oliver Ford Davies’s Graham Greene, there but not there

“Though they are great friends, they withhold things; they’re not always honest with each other,” Ford Davies forewarned in his interview, and indeed Greene is, in his own way, as a writer, an outsider, an observer, who has to keep his anti-social distance from his quarries. Are his reasons for finally agreeing to see Philby entirely honest, or is there a hidden agenda?

Just as Philby is still in the service of his Russian masters, albeit only sparingly, so Greene still attaches himself to “the firm” (MI6).

The British love a spy story, whether in book or film form, and here we have two of the brightest minds of their generation locking intellectual horns over wine, whisky and a dinner of coq au vin cooked by Rufa (although Philby normally does the cooking).

Tonight, however, he is on washing-up duty, a task that facilitates Brown the opportunity to have a conversation between Greene and Rufa, to bring a third, more sympathetic, perspective into the reunion, a device that also loosens up what might otherwise be all rather too stifling and monochrome.

Brown conducts the first half as Philby sketching in some of the blanks under Greene’s questioning, telling the story his convivial, urbane way, before all that politesse truly turns to politics post-dinner when Greene’s probing becomes more of an inquisition, as Philby starts to show his true colours in “vodka veritas” with what Greene calls his “chilling certainty” – and no sense of guilt. Greene turns out to be the more mysterious character, the ghost in the writer, there but not there.

There is a little brittle wit , there is intrigue, history and mystery too, and then there is the big question: would you choose to be loyal to your friend or your country? Yet A Splinter Of Ice ultimately leaves you as cold as the Cold War; for all the surface finesse of Alan Strachan’s direction and the consummate stage craft of Ford Davies, Boxer and Ascoe, it should reveal and say more, rather than play a chess game in words. From Brown, amid the display of superior grey matter, the play is too grey without enough of his own voice beyond the detailed research.

Truth be told, An Englishman Abroad, Alan Bennett’s marrow story of a defector and British visitor, Guy Burgess and actress Coral Browne, meeting in Moscow in 1958, was more fascinating, more rewarding too.

Given the subject of two men who took such risks, whether in word or deed, A Splinter Of Ice feels just too safe.

Review by Charles Hutchinson

July 8, 2021July 8, 2021

Briefer Encounters for 2021 York Early Music Festival but it will still be jam packed

And now there are seven: The Gesualdo Six ,with director Owain Park, centre, back row, as they step into the 2021 York Early Music in a late call-up for an Early engagement

ENCOUNTERS, the 2021 York Early Music Festival, will be briefer than first trailered.

Already cut from its usual ten days under Covid constraints, the live festival will now run from July 12 to 15, rather than until July 16 after the Government’s Step 4 lockdown easement was delayed from June 21 to July 19.

This has ruled out the participation of Spanish Baroque ensemble L’Apothéose, winners of the 2019 York Early Music International Young Artists Competition, along with Ensemble Clément Janequin, from France, and the Italian-Spanish trio sonata ensemble La Vaghezza. In their stead come two late additions: British vocal ensemble The Gesualdo Six and Florilegium.

“The festival may have shrunk from ten days to four, but it’s still jam-packed with concerts, which will be one hour in length, with no interval and no reserved seating, audience members being seated on arrival within social bubbles” says festival director Delma Tomlin.

“Because any musicians who lived outside of the UK had to consider the need to quarantine or the consequences of a positive Covid test once here, it just wasn’t worth the complications for them or us.

“The good news is that L’Apothéose will now play their Young Artists’ Showcase and record here next March; we hope to carry EEEmerging artists La Vaghezza over into the 2022 festival, though that will not be possible for Ensemble Clément Janequin, and the York Early Music International Young Artists Competition will definitely return at next summer’s festival, after the competition couldn’t happen this year.”

Rachel Podger: Performing works by JS Bach, Tartini and Biber in The Violinist Speaks at St Lawrence’s Church, Hull Road, York, on July 13 at 9.15pm

Delma expects that plenty of international musicians who had to forego performing in the 2020 festival, after being booked for the aborted original programme, will now play at the 2022 event. “The festival is filling up already, but not yet with a theme in place!” she says.

In another sign of Covid-times, the 2021 festival is a non-brochure event. “We had boxes and boxes of brochures that we then had to recycle, once everything changed, and since then we’ve doing everything online,” says Delma.

“So we’ve been reliant on people looking online constantly for updates and programme details for our 2020 Christmas festival, the Awaken concert series, the Beverley and East Riding Early Music Festival, and now this summer’s festival, but I can confirm we’ll produce print in the autumn for the 2021 York Early Music Christmas Festival.”

Roll on Monday’s opening concert “At last, we’re able to welcome audiences back to York in person,” says Delma. “The theme of Encounters, most vitally between audience and artists, seems particularly pertinent at this time when we can celebrate the joy of music making and being back together again to appreciate these glorious sounds together.

“For over a year, our home of St Margaret’s Church has been missing the energy and excitement that live audiences bring to us and we can’t wait to throw our doors wide open again.”

Delma Tomlin: Director of York Early Music Festival and the National Centre for Early Music, Yorkl

Both the opening and closing concerts will be performed twice at the National Centre for Early Music, Walmgate: Monteverdi String Band, led by Oliver Webb, on July 12 at 6.30pm and 8.45pm and The Gesualdo Six on July 15 at the same times.

“We’ll clean everything down and put the same concert on 90 minutes later,” explains Delma. “The 6.30pm concerts are sold out but we still have tickets available for the later performances.

“Oddly enough, The Gesualdo Six were meant to be playing at a festival in France at this time but couldn’t go, so we’ve been able to accommodate them, and Ensemble Clément Janequin, who can’t come here, will now be playing in France!”

Florilegium step into the festival breach to perform a Celebrating Bach programme at the NCEM on Wednesday at 7.30pm, joining a line-up of guest artists such as harpsichordist Steven Devine with Robin Bigwood (St Lawrence’s Church, Hull Road, Tuesday, 1pm) and violinist Rachel Podger (St Lawrence’s Church, Tuesday, 9.15pm).

The Society of Strange & Ancient Instruments present their weird and wonderful Trumpet Marine Project (The Citadel, Gillygate, Wednesday, 1pm, sold out); lutenist Jacob Heringman celebrates Josquin des Prez in Master of the notes II: Inviolata (Merchant Adventurers’ Hall, Fossgate, Wednesday, 9.30pm, sold out) and bass Matthew Brook, in tandem with York classical leading light Peter Seymour, performs Amore Traditore – Cantatas for bass and harpsichord (St Lawrence’s Church, Thursday, 1pm).

Delma is particularly delighted to announce that the festival will be working in partnership with the Alamire Foundation, in Flanders, to present a long-awaited concert at York Minster by renaissance vocal ensemble Stile Antico in Tuesday’s 7.30pm programme of Josquin des Prez – Master of the notes I: Missa Sine Nominee on the 500th anniversary of the Franco-Flemish genius’s death.

*The Society Of Strange & Ancient Instruments: 2021 York Early Music Festival concert will be recorded for BBC Radio 3*

The live festival may be shorter, but the event will still run to Sunday in an online festival, YEMF ’21 Online, available from Thursday to the weekend, after the success of last summer’s first online package.

“This will include concerts recorded during the festival alongside specially commissioned highlights by the Rose Consort of Viols and the University Baroque Ensemble,” says Delma.

“The Gesualdo Six will open this four-day online festival with a live streamed concert from the NCEM on Thursday at 6.30pm.

“The online festival provides us with the opportunity to share some of the festival highlights with the widest possible audience, presenting concerts filmed by digital producer Ben Pugh and sound engineer Tim Archer in some of the city’s stunning venues: Merchant Adventurers’ Hall, St Lawrence’s Church and St Margaret’s Church,” says Delma.

“Going online extends the festival’s reach internationally, giving us the chance to boost our ticket income possibilities, so while we use small venues, such as lutenist Jacob Heringman playing to 60 people in candlelight at the Merchant Adventurers’ Hall, the decision to embrace online opportunities means others can enjoy it too. This provides a new stream of income at this time, turning around our business strategy on a pin.”

All next week’s concerts will be streamed, except for Stile Antico, whose Josquin des Prez programme instead will be available online at Laus Polyphoniae 2021, part of the Flanders Festival that runs in Antwerp from August 20 to 29.

Stile Antico: Renaissance vocal ensemble to perform long-awaited concert at York Minster, presented by York Early Music Festival in partnership with the Alamire Foundation, Flanders. Picture: Marco Borggreve

The NCEM and York Early Music Festival have embraced the need to explore digital opportunities since the pandemic took hold. “The acquisition of Tim Archer, who I’ve known through our relationship with BBC Radio 3, has been key to this. When Tim left Radio 3, I asked him to work with us as our sound engineer, and he’s since worked alongside Ben Pugh on our festivals and the Awaken spring event,” says Delma.

“On top of that, we’ve been very grateful to have been granted Culture Recovery Fund funds to support our sustainable strategy,” says Delma.

“We’ve received two funding boosts, the first for the acquisition of digital equipment, the second to help to cover the loss of income after we lost £100,000 from our usual revenue streams because of the pandemic lockdowns.”

Reflecting on the changes brought on by the need to react to Covid times, Delma says: “It has pushed us very specifically into a whole new world of digital sharing and income generation, running parallel with that, and all our staff have been willing to adapt and embrace the changes. We’ve also been determined to make the online service as simple to use as possible, requiring only your email address.

“The other very positive thing has been our blossoming relationship with The Crescent [community venue] and The Fulford Arms, especially with Harkirit Boparai and Chris Sherrington, and the Independent Music network, putting on the Songs Under Skies concerts in the NCEM garden last summer and this summer.”

Post-festival, the YEMF ’21 Online concerts will be available to view on demand until August 13 2021 and tickets will be on sale until August 6 at ncem.co.uk. Live festival tickets are selling fast, with social distancing measures still in place to limit numbers, so hurry, hurry to book at ncem.co.uk before you are too late to be Early next week.

Did you know?

THE 2021 York Early Music Festival concerts by Rachel Podger, The Society Of Strange & Ancient Instruments and The Gesualdo Six will be recorded for broadcast on BBC Radio 3’s Early Music Show in late-July.

Copyright of The Press, York

July 8, 2021July 8, 2021

More Things To Do in and around York as 145 artists and makers open studio doors. List No. 40, courtesy Of The Press, York

Minster, by textile artist Carol Coleman, who is taking part in York Open Studios at 1 Carlton Cottages, Wigginton

AHEAD of Monday’s already trailered Step 4 pronouncement, Charles Hutchinson unmasks events aplenty, from Open Studios to heavy metal heaven, theatre comedy to theatre tragi-comedy, musical celebrations to a triple exhibition.

Big art event of the next two weekends: York Open Studios 2021, preview night tomorrow, 6pm to 9pm; July 10/11 and 17/18, 10am to 5pm

AFTER the Covid-enforced fallow year of 2020, York Open Studios returns this weekend for its 20th parade of the city’s creative talent.

The event sees 145 artists and makers open 95 studios, homes and workplaces, and among them will be 43 debutants, with full details at yorkopenstudios.co.uk.

York’s biggest annual art showcase spans ceramics, collages, digital art, illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, printmaking, photography, furniture, sculpture and textiles.

Still feeling their Old Selves after lockdown easement: Yorkshire four-piece look overjoyed at the prospect of headlining tomorrow’s very heavy metal bill at The Fulford Arms

Hardcore gig of the week: Old Selves, Blight Town, Cast Out and Realms at The Fulford Arms, York, tomorrow, 7.30pm.

“WHAT at an absolute heavy metal treat,” enthuses Fulford Arms supremo Chris Sherrington, ahead of tomorrow’s headbanger fiesta, headlined by fiery Yorkshire four-piece Old Selves.

Playing loud too will be Nottingham progressive post-hardcore/math rock quintet Blight Town, York punk’n’roll/metalcore crossover band Cast Out and Yorkshire post-hardcore act Realms, who “make music for people who never grew out of their emo phase”. Tickets: thefulfordarms.bigcartel.com/ or on the door.

Lead actors Sandy Foster and Tom Kanji in rehearsal for Laura Wade’s comedy of domestic bliss turned to blister, Home, I’m Darling. Picture: Ellie Kurttz

Make a trip to Scarborough for: Home, I’m Darling, Stephen Joseph Theatre, July 9 to August 14

SWEET peas in the garden; homemade lemon curd in the kitchen; marital bliss in the bedroom, Judy and Johnny seem to be the perfect couple. Sickeningly happy, in fact, in Laura Wade’s domestic comedy-drama.

Is their marriage everything it seems, however? Are there cracks in their happiness? What happens when the 1950s’ family values they love so much stop working in the 21st century as the couple discovers that nostalgia ain’t what it used to be.

Liz Stevenson directs this co-production between Theatre by the Lake, Keswick, Bolton’s Octagon Theatre and the SJT. Box office: thesjt.uk.com.

Back together in Beulah: Actor-musicians Jim Harbourne and Ed Wren reunite next week, having first performed the show for The Flanagan Collective in 2012

Theatre resurrection of the week ahead: The Flanagan Collective in Beulah, Summer At The Mill, Stillington, near York, July 14 to 16, 8pm to 10pm

AN island sets sail into the sunset; a boy watches a lion running out of the sky, and an old man is sleeping as Alexander Wright’s Beulah reawakens in Stillington.

Inspired by William Blake’s world of a “mild and pleasant rest”, Wright plays with notions of reality, of the permeable times of day and liminal states of being, in a show woven with storytelling, puppetry and soaring live music, first staged at York Theatre Royal in the bygone summer of 2012.

Directed by Tom Bellerby, Beulah is performed by actor-musicians and composers Jim Harbourne and Ed Wren. Box office: atthemill.org.

Father Of The Flowers, by York artist Linda Combi, from her exhibition The Last Gardener Of Aleppo at Pyramid Gallery, York

Exhibition launch of the week times three: Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York, Friday to September 5

ERUM Aamir, Debbie Loane and Linda Combi form the suitably triangular structure of Pyramid Gallery’s summer show. Not one, but three exhibitions will run in two upstairs rooms.

For Celestial Garden, Manchester ceramic artist Erum Aamir has made intricate porcelain sculptures that fuse her scientific research and artistic imaginations, complemented in the front room by seascape and landscape paintings by Easingwold artist Debbie Loane under the title of The Peace Of Wild Places.

York artist Linda Combi presents The Last Gardener Of Aleppo, a series of original collages and mixed-media artworks and giclee prints that form a moving tribute to Abu Waad in aid of The Lemon Tree Trust and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees agency.

Not having a ball: Luke Dickson as doomed Leeds United manager Brian Clough in The Damned United at York Theatre Royal

Second time lucky: The Damned United, Red Ladder Theatre Company, York Theatre Royal, July 15, kick-off 7.30pm

THE Damned Pandemic curse struck again when June 16’s performance of The Damned United was postponed after one of the actors had an inconclusive lateral flow test. Tickets remain valid for the post-Euro 2020 new date.

Anders Lustgarten’s darkly humorous adaptation of David Peace’s book about Brian Clough’s 44 days in purgatory as Leeds United’s manager is built around the double act of tortured genius Clough (Luke Dickson) and father figure/assistant Peter Taylor (David Chafer).

The beauty and brutality of football, the working man’s ballet, bursts out of a story of sweat and booze, fury and power battles. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

No, that’s not England manager Gareth Southgate, second from left, front row, in Black Sheep Theatre’s line-up

Raise the roof booster: Black Sheep Theatre, For The Love Of Musicals, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, July 24, 2.30pm and 7.30pm

MUSICAL director Matthew Clare and his merry band, plus a heap of York singers, present a concert programme packed with musical delights as they seek to prove that “There’s No Business Like Show Business”.

The song list for this Black Sheep Theatre fundraiser for the Joseph Rowntree York, spans Annie Get Your Gun, the classics and more recent shows, such as Dear Evan Hansen. Box office: josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.

Joshua Burnell: Live At Forty Five gig in August. Picture: Stewart Baxter

Intimate gig announcement of the week: Joshua Burnell, Live At Forty Five, Forty Five Vinyl Café, Micklegate, York, August 14, 7.30pm

JOSHUA Burnell, progressive York purveyor of folk-fused baroque’n’roll for the modern world, performs in a three-piece line-up, including Frances Sladen, at Forty Five Vinyl Café next month.

Expect a showcase for latest album Flowers Where The Horses Sleep and his new EP, Storm Cogs, featuring songs about a folk singer who went missing for 30 years (Shelagh McDonald), a storm-chasing flying machine and a childhood memory, “written and recorded in lockdown and released as the world recovers”.

Elsie Franklin supports. Tickets are on sale at fortyfiveuk.com/events/joshua-burnell-live-at-fortyfive.

July 7, 2021July 8, 2021

Who are the NEW artists in 2021’s York Open Studios? The joy of six more to find

An exploration of line and colour by Nick Kobyluch

AFTER the Covid-enforced fallow year of 2020, York Open Studios returns this weekend for its 20^th parade of the city’s creative talent.

Preceded by Friday’s 6pm to 9pm preview evening, the event will see 145 artists and makers open 95 studios, homes and workplaces on July 10 and 11 and July 17 and 18, from 10am to 5pm.

Among them will be 43 debutants, prompting CharlesHutchPress to highlight six newcomers a day over this week, in map guide order, as York prepares for a showcase of ceramic, collage, digital art, illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, furniture, sculpture and textiles skills this month.

“I love the decisiveness of the pen when committing pen to paper,” says Mark Druery

Mark Druery, drawing, 63 St Paul’s Terrace, Holgate, York

YORKSHIREMAN Mark is inseparably both an architect and an artist.

Trained at Canterbury School of Art and Design, where he developed his love for art, architecture and Italy, he works mainly with technical pens directly onto watercolour paper, to which he applies watercolour wash and accents “if I have the time”.

“I love the immediacy of mark-making and the decisiveness of the pen when committing pen to paper,” he says, ahead of showing sketches and drawings of such favourite places along his travels as York, Yorkshire and Venice in his York Open Studios debut.

“There is always a risk factor when using pen directly and you must constantly adapt when drawing and evolve and change with the process, just like being an architect; I cannot take my building down and start again!”

More of Mark’s pen and watercolour sketches are on display in the Momentum Summer Show, the Westside Artists’ exhibition at Blossom Street, York, until September 26.

“I never forget the place where I sat and passed the time and sketched and painted,” he says. “The concentration required in this process to capture a place on paper commits the details to memory far better than any photograph and remains with you forever.”

He will be among the YOS artists welcoming visitors at Friday’s 6pm to 9pm preview.

Kate Akrill’s ceramics, made for “those who love the spookier side of life”

Kate Akrill, ceramics, 14 Caroline Close, Holgate, York

BY day a librarian, by night Kate is a self-taught potter, burning the midnight oil to make skulls, cauldrons and shadow-box altars.

Under the guise of Skullduggery Ceramics, she creates “lovely and unusual, handmade, ceramic homeware and jewellery for those who love the spookier side of life”.

Drawing on strange and peculiar themes from gothic literature, witchcraft, superstition and Victorian mourning, she makes subtly unusual jewellery, combining traditional motifs with unexpected imagery and textures.

Kate Akrill: Diurnal librarian, nocturnal potter

Kate uses hand-building techniques and distorts the original purpose of found objects and moulds to turn clay into striking – and sometimes unsettling – designs.

Like Mark Druery, she is taking part in the Momentum Summer Show, mounted by Westside Artists at Blossom Street Gallery, and will be opening her home studio for the YOS preview evening.

Lisa Lundqvist, mixed media, garden studio behind 55 Green Lane, York

LISA uses foraged and found objects in nature to create art that reflects her love and respect for the natural environment around her, whether expressed through mixed-media assemblage, installations, eco-printed textiles or paintings in oil and cold wax.

After pursuing an international career in portrait and wedding photography, Lisa expanded her creative skills by completing an Access Art & Design diploma last year, attaining a distinction.

Lisa Lundqvist: Developing work in both fine art and textiles

An emerging body of art in mixed media led to her acceptance onto an MA course in Creative Practice, where she is now developing work in textiles and fine art.

“My main focus of research is in discovering environmentally conscious techniques for eco-dyeing and printing textiles using local plants,” she says.

The first chance to visit her garden studio will be at Friday evening’s preview.

Nick Kobyluch: Saw the light; left London for York

Nick Kobyluch, drawing and painting, 73 Acomb Road, York

NICK moved to York in 2018 from London, where he had been part of Skylark Galleries.

His drawings and paintings range from landscapes and portraits to both representational and abstract, experimental mark-making in an exploration of line and colour.

“There will be a range of framed and unframed pieces, as well as sketchbooks, on show to view,” says Nick, who has taken part in many shows and art fairs over the past few years and has his work in many private collections.

“My work preserves precious, fleeting moments,” says portrait artist Lucy McElroy

Lucy McElroy, portraiture, 24 Manor Drive South, York

PORTRAIT artist Lucy combines traditional techniques of drawing and painting with expressive mark-making to create beautiful, emotive images with a realistic likeness to her subjects.

She takes commissions as well as dedicating time to developing her own creative practice in her home studio. “Deeply aware of the transient nature of life, my work preserves precious, fleeting moments,” says Lucy, who works in oils, charcoal and soft pastels.

“My present practice looks at family relationships and explores how our family histories shape who we are today.”

Lucy McElroy: Exploring how our family histories shape who we are today

Lucy, who studied Fine Art at Leeds University, has enjoyed 16 years of teaching art and now balances her time between the joys and challenges of being a mother to a young family, teaching at All Saints RC School, in York, and her artistic creativity.

You can see more of Lucy’s portraits at the Westside Artists show at Blossom Street Gallery, York, through the summer.

Glass bobbin, “invisible” work, by Liz O’Connell

Liz O’Connell, glass, 53 Plantation Drive, York

LIZ is an emerging artist of Irish and Yorkshire heritage, who uses many techniques and processes in glass, making objects in her York studio.

Fascinated by textiles and issues of “invisibility” and “skill value”, she completed a degree in Contemporary Craft at York College and then studied for a Masters at the National Glass Centre in Sunderland, where she expanded her practice to incorporate film and performance.

“I explore domestic narratives by making glass textiles and using them performatively, exploring complex ideas about gender and ‘invisible’ work,” says Liz. “I re-appropriate domestic detergents and materials; subverting domestic chores by filming the process and by creating film stills and canvases.

“I explore domestic narratives by making glass textiles and using them performatively,” says Liz O’Connell

“I want us to consider the psychological impact of constant caring, giving and invisible labour. The films and stills capture the process and the domestic sphere in which I work. The failure to measure or acknowledge unpaid labour is the biggest data gap in collecting economic statistics.”

Liz will give demonstrations of her working practice each day, preceded by opening her studio for Friday’s preview evening.

TOMORROW: Fiona Lane, Ealish Wilson, Amy Butcher, Joanna Lisowiec, Dee Thwaite and Tabitha Grove.

July 7, 2021July 8, 2021

Pyramid Gallery to launch three exhibitions at once by Emur Aamir, Debbie Loane and Linda Combi in triple celebration of nature

Father Of The Flowers, York artist Linda Combi’s memorial tribute to Abu Waad, The Last Gardener Of Aleppo

ERUM Aamir, Debbie Loane and Linda Combi form the suitably triangular structure of Pyramid Gallery’s summer show in York.

Not one, but three exhibitions will run in two rooms at the Stonegate gallery from Friday (9/7/2021) to September 5.

For Celestial Garden, Manchester ceramic artist Erum Aamir has made intricate porcelain sculptures that fuse her scientific research and artistic imaginations.

“Nature is a source of inspiration for me,” says Manchester ceramic artist and scientific researcher Erum Aamir

Erum was awarded first place for excellence at the 2020 British Craft Trade Fair in Harrogate by Pyramid proprietor Terry Brett, winning a solo show at Pyramid as the prize.

“I’m a ceramic artist and nature is a source of inspiration for me,” she says. “I enthuse by the details in depth, therefore I explore through the eye of a microscope. Sometimes the compositions found in the microscopic study and my imagination’s interpretation bypasses what is found in nature.

“This blurred line between reality and created reality intrigues my practice. If only for a moment, one might lose oneself in the curiosity of the composition, perhaps creating a personal narrative with the piece.

Pyramid Gallery’s poster for Erum Aamir’s exhibition, Celestial Garden

“This process of creation and exploration forms a shared experience between us. In my work, there’s always a repetition of single or more than one element which mimics the process of growth by repetition. I like this repetitive action – it’s not a thoughtless activity but is meditative.

“Moreover, the repetitive nature of bringing together many components creates a rhythm and facilitates an active trance of intention.”

Seascape and landscape paintings in assorted sizes by Easingwold artist Debbie Loane will complement Erum’s intricate sculptures in Pyramid’s upstairs front room under the title of The Peace Of Wild Places.

Easingwold artist Debbie Loane at work on the North York Moors

“As a painter, I’ve always sought out wild expanses, the vast open moorlands of the North York Moors or dramatic coastlines of the North for artistic inspiration,” says Debbie, who works from a farm home and studio in Alne Lane, just outside the market town of Easingwold.

“Over the past 18 months, when all our freedoms have been restricted, like so many I found myself seeking solace in the wild places I could find on my doorstep: a morning coffee taken on the doorstep in the morning sun watching a spider methodically weaving its web between a plant pot full of neglect and a wellie boot.

“The spider was completely at one with its environment knowing at once in that moment what it was supposed to be doing. How that spider taught me a lesson!”

Pyramid Gallery’s poster for Debbie Loane’s exhibition, The Peace Of Wild Places. Ignore the closing date: it WILL be September 5, not September 3!

During the past lockdown when home-schooling and simply staying afloat financially became Debbie’s priorities, her creative endeavours shifted to focus on wider things. Such as? “Tree planting 1,400 new native trees on our land; sowing seeds; teaching myself new things to do with my hands, like crochet (maddeningly); making paints with natural materials and running for many miles through the landscape, both around my home and on my beloved North York Moors,” she says.

“Consequently, my relationship with nature has deepened, as has my understanding of why I paint and what I’m painting. That spider has taught me to trust my creative instincts, to pause when I need to, to explore when it is calling. Most importantly of all, I have discovered the landscapes and wildness that I need are as much within me as out there.”

In 2005, Debbie established Lund Gallery in converted farm buildings next to her studio. “To give me time to concentrate on my own practice, the gallery no longer has regular opening hours; it opens for pop-up exhibitions and events,” she says. To keep up with her gallery news, sign up to her mailing list via mailchi.mp/648cd8024ee3/debbieloane.

York artist Linda Combi will complete the trio of exhibitions with The Last Gardener Of Aleppo , a series of original collages and mixed-media artworks and giclee prints that form a moving tribute to Abu Waad in a charitable show in aid of The Lemon Tree Trust and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

In 2016 Krishnan Guru-Murthy presented a Channel 4 News story about “The Last Gardener of Aleppo” that introduced viewers to Abu Waad, whose name means “The Father of the Flowers”.

“This genial Syrian ran the last garden centre in the besieged city of Aleppo, assisted by his 13-year-old son Ibrahim,” says Linda, who first exhibited these works in a Covid-curtailed run at the Angel On The Green, Bishopthorpe Road. “Abu Waad told us of his love of flowers and plants; about how their fragrance, beauty, and resilience were life affirming and joyful.

Linda Combi’s poster for The Last Gardener Of Aleppo fund-raising exhibition for The Lemon Tree Trust and the UNHCR

“We watched his large hands gently planting seedlings, pruning trees and making bouquets of roses for his customers. Despite the on-going bombardment, the growth and renewal within Abu Waad’s garden made it a ‘small oasis of colour and life’ amid the death and destruction.”

The Channel 4 film portrayed the bond between Ibrahim and Abu Waad as they worked together in the garden centre. “We see the father stretched out on an old settee during a tea break laughing with his son; a picture of relaxed contentment. But one can also detect fear and stress in the eyes of both of them,” says Linda.

The story closed with the death of Abu Waad, killed by a barrel bomb that landed near the garden centre. “His oasis is now closed, and Ibrahim is left without a father, lost and tearful as he visits his father’s grave,” says Linda.

“It is a devastating end, and so it felt important to me to celebrate Abu Waad and Ibrahim and their work in the oasis they created. I’ve illustrated the words of Abu Waad, which so perfectly describe the joy that plants and flowers can bring to us all.

Blue Flower, from Linda Combi’s series of collages, mixed-media artworks and giclee prints

“However, hope returned earlier this year when I was contacted with news that Abu Waad’s son, Ibrahim, had been found and is living with his sister and an uncle in Syria.”

Ibrahim hopes to continue his father’s work as a gardener. “So far we’ve helped him buy a solar energy system,” says Linda. “The Lemon Tree Trust is aiming to help Ibrahim with seeds and equipment for his life as a gardener. My piece, Ibrahim’s Hope was made after receiving this good news.”

A percentage of proceeds from picture and card sales will be divided between the UNHCR [the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees agency mandated to aid and protect refugees] and the Lemon Tree Trust charity that helps refugees create gardens in migrant camps.

Pyramid Gallery’s opening hours are: Monday to Friday, 10am to 5pm; Saturdays, 10am to 5.30pm; Sundays, 12.30pm to 4.30pm, but please check by texting Terry Brett on 07805 029254 to check a specific Sunday opening.

July 6, 2021July 6, 2021

REVIEW: Clive, alias Phil Grainger, Music At The Mill, Stillington Mill, near York, July 2

“The second cut is always the deepest when Phil Grainger sings”. Picture: Fair Dinkum Film

BEST buddies since Easingwold schooldays, Alexander Flanagan Wright and Phil Grainger reeled off a series of At The Mill double bills back home in North Yorkshire in the first summer of Covid after their Australian tour was aborted.

New York and Edinburgh Fringe plans were scuppered too, after old York called them home, and more than a year later, they are still here, making magical theatre, song and spoken word.

Oh, and building an outdoor theatre too on Stillington Mill’s disused tennis court, with Alex’s father, Paul, and mother, Maggi, playing a prominent role too in establishing the new and impressively diverse At The Mill enterprise (more of which in a CharlesHutchPress interview with Alex later this week).

Last August’s set finished with Phil announcing that wood had arrived for Alex and Phil to start work on converting that summer’s marquee into an outdoor theatre. “If they build it, we will come,” vowed CharlesHutchPress, and sure enough, this summer finds that theatre in full sail for concerts and theatre shows.

For one night, Phil and Alex teamed up with two friends in Foraged & Forged, a showcase of new material written specially for the occasion. Friday night put polymath Phil in the solo spotlight, in the guise of Clive, and while the pre-show rain enforced a late decision to abandon the plan to do one set from one stage, and a second from another, the format of an acoustic first half and electric second set was retained.

“It’s been a bit of an hour,” he said, putting on his bandana in readiness for adopting Clive mode. “It’s ‘look at how good this would have been. Now is what you’re getting’!”

What we were getting was the solo music project of singer, songwriter, musician, sound engineer, magician, actor, Gobbledigook Theatre director and event promoter Phil Grainger. Why Clive, you ask? Phil is not a name for a singer, he reasons. Er, Phil Collins? “Exactly,” said Easingwold Phil in a typical shard of attractively blunt Yorkshire wit that peppered his performance. “Clive is the name for the thing that’s me doing this.”

Phil Grainger, in Clive mode, performing Under The Sea from the Disney songbook. Picture: Fair Dinkum Film

Clive is his middle name, and his father’s name too, so Clive it is, and tonight the Stillington Mill’s a-Clive with the sound of music. Beautiful, poignant, happy, sad, funny, heart-felt music, sung in one of those surging soul voices where the second cut is always the deepest when Phil, sorry, Clive, lets rip. One of these voices where you ache waiting for those transcendent moments.

Clive would divide his sets, he said, between songs he had been writing for a long time, others that were new, and some so new they were only half written. He would stop them at the point they were half-finished, with no pretence of finesse.

You cannot help but warm to such candour, or indeed to his off-the-cuff sporadic dips into a newly acquired Disney songbook. Or his seemingly rudimentary, yet deeply affecting guitar, that recalls Billy Bragg’s less-is-more playing.

Clive, his dad, was there, and so was his mum. “I didn’t know they were coming,” said Phil, promptly deciding to change his “emotional set-ender” to his “emotional opening number”. “This song is about my mum. It’s called My Mother,” he said, whereupon mum raised a knowing eyebrow.

Soon we learned she does better Sunday roasts than a Toby Carvery, she effing hates swearing and is no fan of tattoos either. Under Alex’s encouragement, Phil’s lyrics are coming on apace, matching his gift for melody, and built around a winning line in couplets and a desire to take the advice of The Streets’ Mike Skinner to always end with a memorable pay-off.

His hymn of praise to the lure of York’s welcoming arms, whenever he is away, is awaiting both completion and confirmation of its title – “it might be Angel Of The North,” he speculated – but already it is completely moving.

Alex and Phil had vowed never to return to the pieces they wrote in a day to perform to an audience that night, but promises are made to be broken, and so out came Home, the one with 14 houseplants acquired by Phil’s girlfriend Angie for their cottage nest and Alex’s poetic “tatty clattering” as a home is found inside a house. “With you I’m two-up; I was one down on my own,” finished Phil. Mike Skinner would surely approve.

Phil Grainger and Alexander Flanagan Wright last August, when they mounted a week of The Flanagan Collective and Gobbledigook Theatre shows at At The Mill, by the 18th century corn mill. Picture: Charlotte Graham

After a pleasingly erratic stroll through Disney’s Can You Feel The Love Tonight, the acoustic set concluded with two of Phil’s finest, Little Red and Colour Me In: one pulling at the frayed edges of a disintegrating relationship; the other, from Phil and Alex’s show Orpheus, a ballad that would fit perfectly on Guy Garvey’s Finest Hour on BBC 6Music. “I’m drunk on colour and I’m drunk on soul,” Phil sang, and how we drunk it in.

Electricity was thankfully restricted to Phil’s switch of guitar and not lightning for the second half, introduced by storyteller Phil with his recollection of trying to pay the £600 required for the instrument in £2 coins gathered over time ten years ago. Bank the coins, he was told, but eventually the guitar was his.

A decade later, he finally chanced his arm at a guitar solo in Safe Travels, Hurry Back, words by Alex, title and soar-away tune by Phil. The solo? Grainger’s transition into Jimi Hendrix is on hold.

Best title of the night award went to Hallelujah For The Hell Of It, best couplet to: “I’m hard to read like a broadsheet; you’re hard to keep like the off-beat”.

That made it back from Australia in February 2020, as did another Alex and Phil composition, If Destroyed Still True, written late into the night after their last supper before the urgent flight home, this one composed with Aussie friend Jamie on laptop.

“Just to be clear, we’ve never done this one live, since we wrote it in an hour that night,” said Alex, duly doing his Kae Tempest-style spoken words live, interwoven with Phil’s yearning vocal part and Jamie’s infectious recorded instrumental refrain.

One-man band and his bandana: Phil Grainger performing his Clive show. Picture: Fair Dinkum Film

It could have gone wrong at any moment, instead it went beautifully right, and it is in such unpredictable, knife-edge moments that Summer At The Mill is creating its distinctive alchemy.

Do check out the Aussie video at: facebook.com/orpheuseurydicethegods/videos/2254587891515753; the chorus will be your new earworm within minutes.

The Little Mermaid’s Under The Sea survived its Big Phil DIY – Does It Yorkshire – reinvention, and then it was time for Phil to revisit the “wise and gorgeous” recording of Easingwold Players’ stalwart Bronwyn Jennison, who passed away last year.

It had been a highlight of last summer’s Clive show and now, reactivated for the first time since then, Bronwyn’s rendition of Alex’s words had even greater weight after the year we’ve all had. “You carry on, wild child, and I’ll carry on,” said Bronwen through the ether, and Phil and Alex will indeed carry that flame.

Phil’s finale was a humdinger: an audience hum-along to the anything but humdrum Hum, “another song we said we’d never do again, but it’s too special not to!”.

Last August’s review ended with a call to Phil to record an album, and indeed the Half Man Half Bull download has since emerged, but that is a team creation, not the full Phil, and so, Phil, even more than last year, please head into the recording studio. Your mother, for one, would be chuffed.

“I’m so glad I could be here to sing to the benches I made,” he signed off. So we were, so we were.

Review by Charles Hutchinson

July 6, 2021July 7, 2021

Who are the NEW artists in 2021’s York Open Studios? Meet another six-pack…

Pamela Thorby: Recorder virtuoso turned ceramicist

AFTER the Covid-enforced fallow year of 2020, York Open Studios returns this weekend for its 20^th parade of the city’s creative talent.

Preceded by Friday’s preview evening, the event will see 145 artists and makers open 95 studios, homes and workplaces on July 10 and 11 and July 17 and 18, from 10am to 5pm.

“My work aims to abstract the modern, decaying landscape with textures and geometric composition,” says Mick Leach

Mick Leach, painting, 3 Thorpe Street, Scarcroft Road, York

AS a self-taught artist and full-time worker, Mick’s side-career in painting has been taking shape steadily since early 2016. “I’m still learning,” he says.

He works mainly with acrylic paint and chalk powder, along with other media, that he applies to MDF board to achieve a layered, industrial aesthetic in his abstract paintings.

He draws inspiration from El Lissitzky, the Russian artist, designer, photographer, typographer, polemicist and architect, and Kazemir Malevich, the pioneering fellow Russian avant-garde artist and art theorist.

“Pursuing my urge to create, my work aims to abstract the modern, decaying landscape with textures and geometric composition,” says Mick, who won the 2019 Art& York Best Raw Talent award.

Look out too for Evie Leach’s jewellery designs in the same house. Both Mick and Evie will take part in the preview evening from 6pm to 9pm.

Pietro Sanna, ceramics, 44 Dale Street, York

BORN in Sardinia and now working and living in York, Pietro has always been interested in art. During his degree studies in Contemporary 3D Craft at York College, he started to focus on the use of the ceramic medium.

Since graduating, he has taken part in The Kunsthuis Annual Ceramics Show, at the Dutch House, Mill Green Farm, Crayke, and in exhibitions at the Silson Contemporary Gallery, in Harrogate, where he is a gallery artist.

Pietro creates hand-built vessels as carriers for broad types of narratives; his practice taking inspiration from experimentation with clay and the possibilities it offers during the act of making.

Charlotte Dawson: Artist and facilitator

Charlotte Dawson, painting, 44 Dale Street, York

PIETRO’S partner, Charlotte is a vital player in York’s art scene, organising the York River Art Market, by Lendal Bridge, where artists and craftspeople set up stalls on Dame Judi Dench Walk at weekends in the summer months.

In her own work, facilitator Charlotte is a multi-disciplined artist, focusing on abstract painting and jewellery. She began her formal arts education in 1996 at Westwood Art College, Scarborough, later taking a short course at York School of Jewellery in 2010.

After completing an Access course in Art & Design at York College in 2012, she gained a BA Hons in Art & Design Interdisciplinary at Leeds University of Art in 2015.

“My painting seeks to create a visual language, working intuitively to discover interesting compositions and colours through energetic mark making, while my jewellery designs are led by technique and colour to create contemporary and everyday pieces,” says Charlotte.

Caroline Lewis, collage, 24 Hob Moor Terrace, York

LANDSCAPES and ghosts vie for centre stage in Caroline’s artwork.

Scenes of (mainly) Yorkshire inspire the landscapes, depicted in collage, lino print and paint. As for the ghosts, images sparked by Covid-19 and abandoned places are captured in collage, transfer printing and paint.

Caroline Lewis: Ceramicist, jewellery designer, delicatessen owner, gardener, pianist and collage artist

Caroline has a BA Hons in ceramics from West Surrey College of Art and studied on a one-year jewellery course full time at Maidenhead College of Art.

She owned a delicatessen for 30 years until taking early retirement in 2017 to give her more time to take up art again, along with gardening, re-learning the piano, walking and just enjoying life full stop.

David Bowie, portrait, by Lucie Wake. “It’s all about the eyes,” she says, and indeed the eyes have it

Lucie Wake, painting, 15 Slingsby Grove, York

ART runs like a seam through the life of Lucie, who has a BA Hons in Ceramics.

She built up a successful licensing company, Hocus Pocus, her designs adorning many products across most of the high-street stores. In 2005, she ventured into painting, concentrating on portraits, both of people and animals.

Lucie captures the soul of her portrait subjects through her expressive use of delicious slabs of oil paint on canvas. “It’s all about the eyes, they capture your attention,” she says.

Lucie Wake: Portrait artist for people and canines alike

Lucie, who promotes her art via Facet Painting, will be participating in Friday’s preview night from 6pm to 9pm and will be giving demonstrations over the two weekends.

Her work also can be found in the Momentum Summer Show, presented by the York art group Westside Artists at Blossom Street Gallery, by Micklegate Bar, York, until September 26. Gallery opening hours are: Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday, 10am to 4pm; Covid safety measures are in place.

Stoneware-fired porcelain sculptural vessels by Pamela Thorby

Pamela Thorby, ceramics, 11 Middlethorpe Grove, York

PAMELA left behind a distinguished career in music as a recorder virtuoso and academic to pursue a new path in fine art.

Her stoneware-fired porcelain sculptural vessels are “imagined but reminiscent of a multiplicity of organic forms”: whether interstellar, fossil, micro-organism or coral.

“I aspire to make work light enough to be hung in the air; strong enough to be placed piece inside piece, creating new possibilities of form and meaning,” says Pamela. “My aim is to translate the dynamism and sensitivity of my former career as a musician into a ‘visual music’ in clay.”

She is “so excited” to have been selected for her first participation in York Open Studios. “This was another one of the goals that I set myself and here we are, in my third year as a ceramicist, and I’m working towards a major body of work for this month’s fantastic event,” she says.

“I aspire to make work light enough to be hung in the air,” says Pamela Thorby

During lockdown, Pamela worked intensively towards a collection of thrown functional stoneware to partner with her sculptural hand-built porcelain forms. “The concentrated discipline of daily wheel practice has provided meditative solace and structure in extraordinary times,” she says.

In her esteemed career in music, Pamela was professor of recorder at the Royal Academy of Music in London until 2019; the regular recorder player for Welsh composer Sir Karl Jenkins’s projects and a member of such groups as La Serenissima, New London Consort and Palladian Ensemble with Baroque violinist Rachel Podger.

In May 2007, she performed a radical fusion of jazz and folk music with Perfect Houseplants at the National Centre for Early Music in York, an innovative experience she described memorably as: “I’m a bit like a gherkin on a salad plate: I’m adding piquancy to the mix.”

She will give demonstrations during the two YOS weekends and will be opening up her home studio for the Friday preview too.

TOMORROW: Mark Druery, Kate Akrill, Lisa Lundqvist, Nick Kobyluch, Lucy McElroy and Liz O’Connell.