YORK Open
Studios 2020, the chance to meet 144 artists at 100 locations over two April weekends,
has had to be 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 will have been created for the event and still needs a new home. Home addresses will not be included at this time.
Sarah K Jackson: Love of Russian design
Sarah K Jackson, textiles
SARAH specialises in
transforming aged fabrics and precious items into original “keepsake” artworks.
For York Open Studios 2020, she assembled Headstrong, a series of new pieces
inspired by old photographs of Russian women in national dress.
Why Russian women? Sarah
has a special affinity for Russian design from studying the language and
literature at undergraduate and postgraduate level, and she both lived and
travelled there extensively during the 1990s.
After completing a City
& Guilds’ qualification in creative techniques in 2013, she set up her vintage
and handmade textile art business, Winifred Taylor, named after her
grandmother, who taught her to sew.
Sarah presents workshops
and is a member of York Art Workers’ Association and two textile and mixed
media groups, exhibiting with them regularly. Find out more at
winifredtaylor.com.
Kate Pettitt: Painting en plein air. Picture: Olivia Brabbs
Kate Pettitt, painting
KATE’S paintings and drawings on paper explore the natural environment and the human form and are often elemental, instinctive and textural.
She works from life and en plein air, then referencing her sketches, studies, notes and collected objects when back in the studio, where she uses oils, graphite, acrylic and watercolour.
Inspired by movement, emotion, shifting light and changing
weather conditions, her work aims to capture the character and uniqueness of
people and place.
Rain Over Littendale, by Kate Pettitt
Kate’s background and training is in graphic
design and illustration, and she has worked as a designer for more than 20
years, running her design practice, Bivouac, for 12 years.
This year’s York Open Studios would have been Kate’s chance to introduce visitors to her new studio in Holtby. Instead, in the Coronavirus lockdown, she is now working from home. Take a look at her work at katepettitt.co.uk.
Reg Walker: Yorkshire Sculpture Park played its part in his artistic development
Reg Walker, sculpture
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.
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 last year to a studio in Holtby, where he would have been making his York Open Studios debut. Seek him out at reg@elliottwalker.co.uk.
Connie Howarth, Constance Isobel jewellery maker
Constance Isobel, jewellery
CONNIE Howarth, of
Constance Isobel, uses gold, silver and high-quality gemstones, sourced from
ethical UK retailers, in her handmade jewellery. Traditional techniques are
applied to create her exclusive precious metal work, also informed by her interest in ancient adornments and artefacts.
Connie had formal, workshop-based training in traditional jewellery-making techniques. Earlier she studied fine art, which now seeps into her metalwork with use of colour drawing on her love of the natural world. Delicate pattern work and organic shapes decorate her jewellery throughout each collection. Her jewel of a website is at constanceisobel.com
Chris Utley, ceramics
CHRIS creates hand-built pots,
carved, scraped and polished, then painted with slips and underglaze colours.
The finished work is fired several times to achieve a strong depth of colour.
One of Chris Utley’s ceramics
She studied ceramics for three years in college and has been making pots in her stable workshop for many years. She has taught adults, been artist-in-residence in primary schools and run many workshops, as well as exhibiting widely in both Britain and Norway.
Look at chrisutleyceramics.portfoliobox.me for more details.
TOMORROW’S FIVE: Tim Pearce; Linda Harvey; John Watts; Wilf Williams and Jerry Scott.
Swedish lutenist Jonas Nordberg and Irish viol player Liam Byrne in concert at the National Centre for Early Music, York, in 2019
LIAM Byrne and Jonas Nordberg’s 2019 concert at the National Centre for Early Music, York, will be streamed online on Saturday at 1pm.
This follows the NCEM’s live stream of two Early Music Day 2020
concerts, performed behind closed doors at St Margaret’s Church, Walmgate, by harpsichordist Steven
Devine, playing Bach Preludes and Fugues, and later by The Brabant Ensemble in
an evening programme ofA Monk’s Life:
Music From The Cloisters, 1550-1620.
Those concerts drew more than 63,000 views from across the world. “Messages arrived from Japan, Indonesia, South Africa, from people in lockdown in Italy and others waking up to wonderful music in the United States,” says NCEM director Dr Delma Tomlin.
Liam Byrne: viol player with the hipster look
This Saturday’s streaming will feature the 2019 Early Music Day concert by virtuoso Irish viol player Liam Byrne and Swedish lutenist Jonas Nordberg. “The delicious sonic combination of viol and lute from 17th century France made for an incredible evening last year and was also broadcast by BBC Radio 3,” says Delma.
“Now, music lovers can join us again for this fabulous feast by simply logging on to our Facebook page @yorkearlymusic.”
Described by the New York Times as “defying expectations
with an obscure instrument and a hipster look”, Byrne is no stranger to the NCEM,
where last year he collaborated with the Walmgate venue on the NCEM Young
Composers Award 2019, working with the finalists and later performing their
work at a concert in Bristol.
Delma Tomlin: National Centre for Early Music director
Byrne, professor of viola da gamba at the Guildhall
School in London, is regarded by many as the leading viol player
of his generation; lutenist and guitarist Nordberg has performed all over the world,
with many recordings to his name.
“Last year’s concert at the NCEM was one of the highlights of
York’s cultural calendar, with electrifying performances by both musicians,”
says Delma.
“Now, in these strange times, we are discovering more and more how the power of music is bringing us together and lifting our spirits. We hope you can join us for this wonderful concert by these two extraordinary musicians. Our doors may be temporarily closed but we will continue to bring a selection of fabulous music over the coming weeks.”
Imitating The Dog and Leeds Playhouse in the 2020 co-production of Night Of The Living Dead – Remix. Picture: Edward Waring
INNOVATIVE Leeds theatre company Imitating The Dog are responding to the
Coronavirus restrictions by going online with a fortnightly streaming.
Their cutting-edge work from the past 20 years will be made available through
their website, imitatingthedog.co.uk, kicking off tomorrow (April 3) with
projection project Oh, The Night!.
Every fortnight on Fridays for the foreseeable future, Imitating The Dog
will release the next in a selection from their theatre performances and sited
work.
Look out, in particular, for 2020’s Night Of The Living Dead – Remix, a shot-for-shot stage re-creation of George A Romero’s cult 1968 zombie movie, made in co-production with Leeds Playhouse, streaming on April 17.
Further performances will include Arrivals And Departures, a strange and fantastical bedtime story, commissioned in 2017 by Hull: UK City of Culture to look at the East Yorkshire port’s legacy of migration, on May 1, and 6 Degrees Below The Horizon, a macabre and playful tale involving sailors, pimps, barflies, chorus girls and nightclub singers, on May 15. Projection project Yorkshire Electric, on May 29, uses clips from the Yorkshire Film Archive.
Further productions will be announced through social media in the coming
weeks. Each will remain on the website and can be viewed on a Pay-What-You-Like
basis.
Imitating The Dog’s Yorkshire Electric at the Spa Theatre, Scarborough. Picture: Tony Bartholomew
The resulting income will go into a development fund to facilitate the company
supporting freelance artists and practitioners to create new work.
Co-artistic director Simon Wainwright says: “With the end of our own Night Of The Living Dead – Remix tour being cancelled and so, so many events and performances now postponed, we thought we’d make some of our past shows available for people to watch online.
“We’re in a lucky position to have some fantastic
recordings of past work, mostly filmed by our friends Shot By Sodium. It’s
obviously no substitute for the real thing but in these isolated days, and
until we can get together in a room again, we hope these videos will provide
joy, thinking and entertainment in equal measure.”
Fusing live performance with digital technology, Imitating The Dog’s two
decades of ground-breaking work for theatres and other spaces has been seen by
hundreds of thousands of people at venues, outdoor festivals and events across
the world.
Among other past productions are Hotel Methuselah, A Farewell To Arms and
Heart Of Darkness, while their sited work has included light festivals.
6 Degrees Below The Horizon: Imitating The Dog’s macabre and playful tale of sailors, pimps, barflies, chorus girls and nightclub singers
Here are the upcoming productions:
Friday, April 3: Oh, The Night!
ONE wintry night, a bedtime story is being told, but it’s late, time for
the light to go off, time for the story to pause until tomorrow night.
However, one child starts to wonder… one child at first, but then
another… and another. It might be bedtime and it might be late but without the
end to the story how can they possibly sleep?
What’s happened to the characters? Where have they gone? Are they just
stranded there, waiting for earth to turn its circle, so their story can carry
on the next night?
The children decide to find out. They creep past the grown-ups, out of
the house and to who knows where to find out what happens and how their story
ends.
They find bears and foxes, monsters and ghouls, elves and wizards all
stranded in the night, hiding or hunting, not knowing who to scare or where to
run. All stuck in a place between.
Together, they go on a journey through the night, to the morning and to
the safety of the light.
Performed in Hull, Oh, The Night! combined elements of bedtime stories gathered from around the north of Europe to create a new fable for 2018. The work was commissioned by Absolutely Cultured for Urban Legends: Northern Lights and featured a community chorus and soundtrack from Finnish composer Lau Nau.
Night Of The Living Dead – Remix: Imitating The Dog and Leeds Playhouse match George A Romero’s film shot for shot
Friday, April 17: Night Of The Living Dead – Remix
IN 1968, Night Of the Living Dead started out as a low-budget independent horror movie by George A Romero, telling the story of seven strangers taking refuge from flesh-eating ghouls in an isolated farmhouse.
Fifty years on, seven performers enter the stage armed with cameras, a
box of props and a rail of costumes. Can they recreate the ground-breaking
film, shot-for-shot before our eyes and undertake the seemingly impossible?
Requiring 1,076 edits in 95 minutes, it is an heroic struggle. Success
will demand wit, skill and ingenuity and is by no means guaranteed.
Night Of The Living Dead – Remix is an Imitating The Dog and Leeds Playhouse co-production, presented by courtesy of Image Ten, Inc.
Friday, May 1: Arrivals And Departures
IMITATING The Dog’s work for Hull: UK City of Culture 2017 put a poetic spin on the history of arrivals in and departures from the city. The piece looked at the past of migration from a contemporary perspective, exploring the journeys that have gathered a population and moulded a landscape.
Using The Deep, in Hull, as both canvas and building blocks, Arrivals And
Departures pulled together strands of the complex and universal issues of
migration as a wider subject matter.
The work was created as part of the Made In Hull opening
celebrations for Hull: UK City of Culture.
Imitating The Dog’s Arrivals And Departures for the Made In Hull opening to Hull: UK City of Culture at The Deep, Hull, in 2017
Friday, May 15: 6 Degrees Below The Horizon
THIS macabre and playful tale of sailors, pimps, barflies, chorus girls
and nightclub singers is a startling and visually stunning work, where the
audience views the action through windows and moving frames. In doing so, they piece
together a modern fable of failed dreams, lost love and the guilt of absent
fatherhood.
Building on the successes of Hotel Methuselah and Kellerman,
in 2012 the company created an immersive experience for audiences with a
captivating fusion of cinema and theatre.
Part French film, part Edwardian vaudeville, and drawing on the works of
Genet, Wedekind, and Brecht,6 Degrees Below The Horizon undertakes
a delightful and twisted voyage into a shadowy world wherein there are no
certainties.
Friday, May 29: Yorkshire Electric
YORKSHIRE Electric travels from the dales to the coast on board the
footage of the Yorkshire Film Archive.
Using video mapping, intricate lighting and a soundtrack from the Leeds band Hope & Social, the show transformed the Spa Theatre, Scarborough, offering the audience the opportunity to wander through 100 years of Yorkshire lives and landscapes, from the farming hills to the holiday beaches and back again.
Bringing together Imitating The Dog and architectural lighting
specialist Phil Supple, the piece offered the opportunity to enjoy rarely seen
footage of a century of Yorkshire life in your own time.
Twinnie: the northerner takes the road to the American South
YORK
country singer-songwriter Twinnie will go ahead with the April 17 launch of her
debut album, Hollywood Gypsy, even amid the Coronavirus lockdown.
After all,
it took the West End musical leading light, model, Hollyoaks soap star and film
actress ten years to land a record contract with big hitters BMG.
“I feel
very excited and it’s come around really quickly since I released my first EP
[Better When I’m Drunk] last March,” says Twinnie, 32, who first took to the York
stage as Twinnie-Lee Moore at the age of four.
“Given the
current situation with the Coronavirus pandemic, it’s a weird time, but I’m a
new artist, I’ve waited so long to make an album, and right now, more than
ever, I feel I need music, we need music.
“It would
be easy to panic, but I’ve found I’ve connected more than ever with my fans on
Instagram Live.”
Making country inroads: the artwork for Twinnie’s debut album, Hollywood Gypsy
Twinnie was
to have played a sold-out home-city gig at The Crescent on March 22 to showcase
Hollywood Gypsy, but the Coronavirus pandemic put paid to her debut headline tour,
now re-arranged for the autumn. Glasgow, London, Manchester, Birmingham and
Bristol await, before a Crescent crescendo on November 29, with tickets
remaining valid.
Twinnie did
perform, however, at the prestigious Country2Country (C2C) Festival in Berlin
on March 7 and 8, and coming next was a C2C show at the O2 Arena, London, on March
14. “That would have been a really big deal for me, being able to promote my
album and tour, so it’s a real downer, but I’m just really grateful that
there’s still light at the end of the tunnel, and it’s good that we’ve managed
to re-schedule the tour,” she says.
As chance
would have it, the C2C cancellation led to a prompt invitation to fill the void
in Twinnie’s diary with a live set on BBC Radio 2’s The Country Show with Bob
Harris on March 12. “Bob has been a really big supporter of mine,” she says.
“He was the first DJ to support me on the radio, even before I had a recording
contract. I just sent him a track and he played it!”
Bob Harris: supportive host of BBC Radio 2’s The Country Show
Twinnie
first trod the boards in York when attending the late Miss Isobel Dunn’s dance
school, started playing a keyboard at seven and then performed in the Grand
Opera House pantomime dance ensemble. She progressed from roles as Bet in
Oliver! in 2001 and Lilly in Annie in 2002 in the Grand Opera House Summer Youth
Project to playing Dorothy in The Wizard Of Oz in 2003.
“I was 16 and I thought
I might have been too tall for Dorothy but the director, Simon Barry, said I
was the right choice,” she recalls.
A
month later, the former Joseph Rowntree School pupil was leaving behind her Haxby
Road home for three years of dance and musical theatre studies at Phil
Winston’s Theatre Works in Blackpool.
West End roles ensued in We Will Rock You and the short-lived Desperately Seeking Susan, and in April 2009, now 21, she returned home to the Grand Opera House as 1920s’ Chicago double murderess and aloof nightclub singer Velma Kelly in the national tour of Chicago.
Twinnie-Lee Moore in her role as double murderess Velma Kelly in Chicago, on tour at the Grand Opera House, York, in April 2009
Her face greeted the London Underground
throng on Chicago’s trademark black-and-white posters too and she had a year as
the Latino character Jazmin in Flashdance in the original London cast at the
Shaftsbury Theatre from autumn 2010.
Twinnie sang Miley Cyrus’s The Climb when competing on BBC One talent show The Voice in March 2012, failing to hit the heights alas with an early exit. After film roles in Iron Clad 2 and Strangelove in 2014, she made her soap debut as racy Porsche McQueen in Channel 4’s Hollyoaks in November that year, playing her for a year.
A further screen role followed in The
Wife, the Oscar-nominated Glenn Close film, but all the while, Twinnie was
drawn to making music. “To be honest, music was probably the first thing I
started out wanting to do, which people don’t know about. But people pay their
dues to pay their mortgage,” she says.
“Even when I was doing We Will Rock You
at 19 with Brian May, performing eight shows a week, I was playing country
songs in dive bars too at the weekend.”
Twinnie-Lee Moore in her soap-opera days as Porsche McQueen in Channel 4’s Hollyoaks
Now dividing her time between London and
Nashville, Twinnie is living out that wish to put her song-writing to the fore.
“I’ve been on stage since I was four years old, and my dad introduced me to the
music of some of the best songwriters. Like my first gig was Gilbert
O’Sullivan,” she says.
“And I always loved musicals too. I grew
up watching Hollywood movie musicals, especially Judy Garland, which is one of
the reasons I’ve called the album Hollywood Gypsy.”
Determination to succeed marked out
Twinnie from a young age. “Even at eight, I wrote down the addresses of the
Sony Music and Universal record company labels. Then one of my poems got
published at school. I always wanted to tell stories,” she says.
“I got told you have to do everything for
what you do to work. You can’t just stand there and sing. I always want people
to feel entertained when I do a show.
“Coming from the North, I’m always looking to make a real connection,” says Twinnie. “That’s why I write so honestly, talking about all my faults”. Picture: Alex Berger
“I don’t think there are many ‘triple
threat’ performers like me, so I want to tell the story, not just in the song,
but in the performance too.”
Country music might not have been an
obvious outlet for a York singer and songwriter, but Twinnie says: “For me,
country music was always big. Johnny Cash; Dolly Parton, one of the great
songwriters; Shania Twain and now Taylor Swift,” she says.”
Twinnie has been travelling to
Nashville, Tennessee, for the past six or seven years, leading to her co-writing in the capital of country with Grammy
Award-winning writers Nathan Chapman, Liz Rose and Dave Barns.
“I also wrote with Ben
Earle, before he formed The Shires with Crissie Rhodes, and two of my songs
with him, Black And White and First Flight Out, ended up on their first album,
Brave,” she says.
Crissie Rhodes and Ben Earle of The Shires. Twinnie co-wrote two songs on their debut album with Earle
Now, after winning Best
Breakthrough Act at the 2019 British Country Music Association awards and a
support slot on Kiefer Sutherland’s tour, everything comes to fruition for
Twinnie on Hollywood Gypsy.
This is a thoroughly modern country album, made with the likes of Little Mix, One Direction and Britney Spears producer Peter Hammerton, and recorded in Nashville, London and Sweden,with such song titles as Better When I’m Drunk, Type Of Girl, Whiplash, Lie To Me and I Love You Now Change.
“Every genre changes
and country music is now so diverse, but everyone appreciates a good melody,
strong lyrics, and that’s why people really respect country music,” says
Twinnie, who loves the candour of country songs.
“Coming from the North, I’m always
looking to make a real connection. That’s why I write so honestly, talking
about all my faults,” she says.
“When you feel you’re getting out of your depth, that’s when the magic happens,” says Twinnie . Picture: Maximilian Hetherington
“I have no shame in highlighting my
flaws and being vulnerable: there’s a strength in vulnerability when we can all
connect with it. Each song shows a different side of my personality: I either
want to break someone’s heart or make them dance.”
Returning to the album title, Twinnie says: “It
pretty much sums me up. As well as my love of Hollywood musicals, I’m a
traveller by nature and by heritage, so I’m quite free. Hollywood Gypsy is about me, my
life, my artistry.
“I’m representing my dad’s heritage, my mum’s heritage, and I’m very proud of that heritage. It’s who I am and why I’m free spirited.
“All of it, whether I’m acting, dancing, modelling
or singing, I’m just not afraid to push my boundaries because, when you feel
you’re getting out of your depth, that’s when the magic happens.”
Recording in Nashville, London and Sweden adds to
Twinnie being a Hollywood Gypsy, she suggests. “I feel I’m a bit of a musical
gypsy, taking from different genres, growing up listening to Tupac, Gilbert O’Sullivan,
Ella Fitzgerald, Billy Joel, Shania Twain,” she says. “Obviously Queen too: I’m
always so grateful to Brian May for when I did We Will Rock You.”
Dave Stewart: co-writing with Twinnie via the medium of FaceTime
In the Coronavirus
lockdown, Twinnie has set herself a three-week challenge that began a week ago to
listen to an album a day and then pick her favourite song from each one to
learn how to play it. “I never have time to do things like this, so I’m using
this time to grow and get inspired,” she says. “I’m also trying to learn
Spanish.”
Along with many
musicians, she is “trying to find new ways to do things at the moment”. Such
as? “I’ve written a song on FaceTime with Dave Stewart, from the Eurythmics,”
Twinnie reveals. “I’d never met him before, but he’s from Sunderland, I’m from
York, so we had that banter of being northerners together!”
Still in
the diary for July 11 is Twinnie’s appearance at Pocklington Arts Centre’s
Platform Festival at the Old Station, Pocklington (an event subject to further Coronavirus
updates), but what’s coming next for Twinnie? “I was meant to be going to
America to make an EP in Nashville, and that recording will still happen, but I
may now have to find a way of doing it remotely,” she says.
Looking further ahead, she says: “Hollywood Gypsy is the first chapter. Next year will be the next half of the story. So it’ll be like a double album.”
Twinnie’s new video for I Love You Now Change
Did you know?
IN Twinnie’s
new video for I Love You Now Change, she is seen signing divorce papers.
“I put my ex’s name on the papers when we shot
the video for a laugh, but some people actually thought it was real,” she says.
“Just to clarify, I have never been married and Boris killed off the
socialising and dating scene, so looks like I won’t be in a white dress anytime
soon.”
The husband
in the video is played by Gustav Wood. Watch it at twinnieofficial.com.
How did The Press
reviewer judge 16-year-old Twinnie-Lee Moore’s lead performance as Dorothy in
the Grand Opera House Summer Youth Project’s The Wizard Of Oz in York in August
2003?
“Twinnie-Lee displays supremely confident skills in stage movement; her Kansas accent is spot-on too, and once her voice fully warms up after Over The Rainbow, she sings with expression, albeit in the modern pop style that might better suit The Wiz.”
YORK Open
Studios 2020, the chance to meet 144 artists at 100 locations over two April
weekends, has had to be 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 ceramics, collage, digital,
illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, sculpture
and textiles.
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 will have been created for the event and still needs a new home. Addresses will not be included at this time.
Dee Thwaite: painting with hands, not brushes
Dee Thwaite, painting
YORK Open Studios
newcomer Dee uses acrylic paint, inks, graphite and charcoal in her sea and
landscape paintings and drawings, marked by expressive skies, storms 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. Contact Dee via deethwaite@hotmail.com.
Anna Vialle at work with a pen
Anna Vialle, drawing
INSPIRED by the style
and colours of both Japanese woodblock and Victorian prints, Anna limits
herself to drawing insects, birds, landscapes, anatomy and trees.
Anna had trained in art education in 1997. Twenty-two years later, when trying to relax after working difficult shifts as a mental-health nurse, she started a pen and watercolour illustration of 24 individually drawn moths.
Exploring the connection between repetition and focus, she began using dots to create her artwork, whereupon a stress-free style of art emerged. Cue a “more relaxed” mental-health nurse! Visit annavialle.co.uk for more info.
Rosie Bramley surrounded by her art
Rosie Bramley, painting
ROSIE’S colourful paintings explore her devotion and connection to the land and sea. Gestural marks dance around the surface of each painting as she creates abstract works inspired by nature.
Rosie studied fine art painting
and printmaking, graduating from Bretton Hall College, University of Leeds, in
1996. Now head of art at Driffield Secondary School and Sixth Form in
East Yorkshire, where she teaches both fine art and photography, she has exhibited
regularly in York, latterly at Fossgate Social, City Screen and Angel on the
Green.
Her first Open Studios
show since 2011 would have featured new works inspired by the landscape. Her website,
rosiebramley.com, divides her work into Abstracts, The Cruel Sea and Mountains.
A nude by Tabitha Grove
Tabitha Grove, painting
SELECTED for York Open Studios
for the first time, Tabitha uses bold colour, contrast, ink, watercolour, gold
leaf and collage on handmade paper 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, piano restorer….and artist
Tabitha’s career portfolio career extends to having
co-managed Look Gallery, in Helmsley, 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”. Find her work
via tabithamayg@gmail.com.
Peter Heaton: “images that need careful time and observation”
Peter Heaton, photography
PETER specialises in
black and white limited-edition photographic prints of woodlands and dark landscapes:
images that need careful time and observation as the space they inhabit is full
of visual surprises, he says.
Before the camera lens and
digital imaging took precedence, Peter studied fine art at Nottingham Trent
University and later gained an MA in fine art from Leeds Metropolitan
University.
A dark woodland, by Peter Heaton
Over the past few years, Peter’s work has revolved around the complexities of layering visual information and our interpretations of the resulting images. In 2010, he set up Vale of York Darkrooms, where he teaches courses in both traditional chemical-based black-and-white photography and digital imaging. Take a look at his photographs at peterheaton.co.uk.
Tomorrow: Sarah K Jackson; Kate Pettitt; Reg Walker; Constance Isobel and Chris Utley.
YORK drag
queen supreme Velma Cella is to appear in thousands of living rooms across the
country – and around the world – in an uplifting live concert, streamed
tomorrow evening.
Velma’s
Drag Party will be on screen at 6.30pm as
part of the Leave A Light On concert series promoted by Lambert Jackson and The
Theatre Café, St Martin’s Lane, London, to provide financial support for the
performers involved and entertainment for people in self-isolation.
“This
is a tough time for many people, particularly those who regularly attend live
concerts, shows and gigs who are missing the unedited nature of live
performance,” says Ian Stroughair, the West End actor and singer behind Velma
Celli’s spectacular make-up and even more spectacular singing.
“I’m incredibly proud to be taking part,” says Ian Stroughair, alias Velma Celli
“So, it’s
fantastic that Lambert Jackson and The Theatre Café have produced such a superb
series of concerts that can be watched live at home from some of the finest
West End performers. I’m incredibly proud to be taking part.”
Velma Celli’s monthly show at The Basement, City Screen, York, is in abeyance during the Coronavirus lock-down, but devotees and first-timers alike tuning in tomorrow evening can expect “some belted classics and plenty of laughs along the way as we leave reality behind for an hour of camp fun”.
Leave The Light On pays homage to the theatre tradition of leaving a single light burning on the stage of an empty theatre, supposedly to appease the ghosts who reside there.
Tickets
for the live stream cost £7.50 and can be bought up to an hour before the
broadcast. Viewers will be sent a link via email that enables them to
watch the performance live. To buy, go to thetheatrecafe.co.uk/event/leave-a-light-on-velma-celli-live
YORK Open
Studios 2020, the chance to meet 144 artists at 100 locations over two April
weekends, has had to be 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 ceramics, collage, digital,
illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, sculpture
and textiles.
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.
Helen Whitehead at work in her studio
Helen Whitehead, glass
HELEN’S glass jewellery
and sculpture is inspired by her deep connection with wild plants, herbs, the
moon and the planets. In her intuitive work, glass is layered with
precious metals, paint and images, then fired to produce colourful abstract
compositions.
Helen loves
experimenting with alchemic reactions in her glass kiln and layering different
mediums within small pieces. “My pieces are little worlds, reflecting the inner
and outer world,” she says.
As well as working in her York studio, Helen provides fun and friendly fused-glass workshops in the community. Follow her at facebook.com/HelenWhiteheadGlassArtist.
Printmaker Sally Clarke
Sally Clarke, printmaking
SALLY specialises in collagraph
printmaking, using the human figure and composition to express atmospheric
imagery.
Sally studied for a Fine
Arts degree at Gloucestershire College of Arts as a mature student. She worked in
various media before discovering printmaking more than 20 years ago, finding herself
attracted particularly to its limitless opportunities for experimentation.
Sally is a founder
member of York Printmakers, has exhibited in many Yorkshire venues and is a
regular exhibitor in York Open Studios. Contact her via sallyclarkeprintmaker@yahoo.co.uk.
Adrienne French: interpreting colour and texture in her landscape paintings
Adrienne French, painting
IN her evocative
paintings, collographs and monoprints, Adrienne interprets colour and texture
of both local and foreign landscapes.
She pursued her love of art by completing an art and design degree at Leeds University in 2000 while continuing her work as a nurse. Until 2015, she was artist in residence at a hospice, alongside continuing to develop her own artwork, a process that is ongoing.
She has shown her work
in northern galleries and takes part regularly in many annual arts events in Yorkshire.
All roads lead to Adrienne at adifrench@gmail.com.
Caroline Lord: recycling pottery, wood and metal in mosaics and sculptures
Caroline Lord, mixed media
CAROLINE combines found
items of pottery, wood and metal, recycling them into mosaics and quirky
ceramic sculptures.
She studied stained glass
and tapestry weaving in the 1960s at Edinburgh College of Art, where she was
awarded a scholarship for a further year’s study, specialising in tapestry weaving.
One of Caroline Lord’s quirky sculptures
Ten years ago, after
completing a mosaics workshop led by Emma Biggs, Caroline changed artistic
direction, starting to work with re-cycled ceramics.
She has exhibited in
York Open Studios, at the Zillah Bell Gallery, Thirsk, with the York Art
Workers Association and in the Great North Art Show. Contact her at
carolinelord42@hotmail.com.
Peter Park: textile designer turned painter
Peter Park, painting
PETER would have been making
his York Open Studios debut with his expressive and gestural abstract paintings
of the Yorkshire landscape and coast in acrylic paint on canvas.
After a foundation course at York School of Art, he studied printed textile design in Manchester (BA) and Birmingham (MA), then worked as a textile designer and lecturer in design in Manchester.
One of Peter Park’s abstract paintings of a Yorkshire landscape
Returning to York in 2013, he began painting, predominantly landscapes that he has exhibited at fellow York Open Studios exhibitor Kay Dower’s Corner Gallery and with Little Van Gogh in London. Seek him out via peter.park500@virginmedia.com.
Tomorrow: Dee Thwaite; Anna Vialle; Rosie Bramley; Tabitha Grove and Peter Heaton.
Washed up: a giant squad on Scarborough’s North Bay beach on January 14 1933, pictured in a magic lantern slide. Picture: Scarborough Museums Trust
HISTORIC magic lantern slides from the Scarborough
Collections are an online hit in these dark days.
As part of Scarborough Museums Trust’s response to the Coronavirus shutdown, collections manager Jim Middleton is posting regular images from the stock of slides and glass-plate negatives on Twitter, using the hashtag #lockdownlanternslides.
The North Bay Pier, after the storm damage in 1905
The response has been “remarkable”, he says: “We’re getting comments and
queries from other museums, historians and the public nationwide. This includes
an interaction the other day with the Natural History Museum in London, who
contacted us during a series of posts themed around cephalopods, the family of
marine animals that includes octopus and squid.”
Middleton had posted an image of a 5.3m-long giant squid that had been
washed up on the North Bay beach on January 14 1933, pictured surrounded by
curious Scarborough locals.
Pier-less: The North Bay Pier destroyed by the 1905 storm
“We’d always known that they had the beak of the squid, but they got in
touch to say they had the whole animal preserved in their archive,” says
Middleton. “We’ll be hoping to get a better look at it when we can.”
Among other themes being explored are historic local buildings, some of them
no longer in existence, such as the North Bay pleasure pier, destroyed in a
storm in 1905, and vintage seaside scenes of children rock pooling and bathing-beauty
contests.
The North Bay Pier, pictured from the other side, in one of the magic lantern slides
Magic lanterns were early image projectors that applied a light source
to magnify and project images on glass and they were used for both education
and entertainment, particularly during the 19th and early 20th centuries.
The Scarborough Collections – the name given to all the museum objects
owned by the Borough of Scarborough – contains more than 7,000 slides and glass
plates, in the care of Scarborough Museums Trust.
Storm damage: the collapsed North Bay Pier in Scarborough in 1905
The images posted daily by Middleton can be seen by following @SMT_Collections on Twitter. To view existing posts, search #lockdownlanternslides.
The Rotunda Museum, Scarborough Art Gallery and Woodend, all run by Scarborugh
Museums Trust, are closed until further notice.
COUNTRY duo The Shires are moving their 25-date 2020 tour to the autumn,
in response to the Coronavirus pandemic shutdown.
Ben Earle and Crissie Rhodes have switched their York Barbican show from May 20 to November 1, when they will be joined by Texan country singer and songwriter Eric Paslay.
Tickets remain valid for the revised date – The Shires’ only Yorkshire
gig on the itinerary – but those seeking a refund should contact their point of
purchase.
The first Brits to win Best International Act in the American Country
Music Association awards, Earle and Rhodes released their fourth album, Good
Years, in this anything but good year on March 13, reaching number three in the
charts.
As with their past albums, 2015’s Brave, 2016’s My Universe and 2018’s
Accidentally On Purpose, the recording sessions took place in Nashville,
Tennessee.
The album artwork for The Shires’ new album
“We are so excited to be releasing Good Years,” say Earle and Rhodes. “Honesty and storytelling have always been such an important part of our song-writing. We’ve poured some of the incredible experiences and life we’ve lived into these songs.
“We can’t wait to play these live across the country. The songs mean so much to us personally, but there really is nothing like looking out at our fans in the crowd and seeing how much of an impact they can have in someone else’s life. It’s truly a very special thing”.
The Shires last played York Barbican in May 2018 and performed a headline set at Pocklington’s Platform Festival at The Old Station last summer.
Only a smattering of seats remains on sale for their Barbican return on 0203 356 5441 or at yorkbarbican.co.uk.
York Explore Library and Archive, the York hub of Explore York in Museum Street, York
THIS is the time to explore Explore York online, providing the Libraries
from Home service during the Coronavirus lockdown.
“If you are confused or overwhelmed by the huge amount of information on offer, Explore can help,” says executive assistant Gillian Holmes, encouraging visits to the website, exploreyork.org.uk, “where it is simple to find what you need”.
This encouragement comes after all Explore York library buildings, reading cafes and the City Archives were closed to the public from 12 noonon March 21, in response to Government strictures.
“We are making it easy for people to find information and advice, as
well as inspiration, as we all deal with the Coronavirus crisis.”
The Explore website has assorted useful links to help people cope during
the coming weeks. “Some sites have always been part of our online offer and
some are brand new,” says Gillian.
“We are also working with City of York Council and our many partners in
York, so that our communities can join together and we continue to support
their initiatives, just as we will when our buildings open again.
“Organisations across
the country are developing their online services in this challenging time. We
are using our expertise to gather together the best offers and add them to the
lists of sites we recommend.”
Explore
York will be developing online activities of its own, such as a Virtual Book Group. “We
will be updating the website regularly as these new things come on stream and
sharing on social media using #LibrariesFromHome,” says Gillian.
The York Explore building: Quiet in the library but still seeking to be busy online
The chance to visit the new York Images site to explore the history of
the city through photographs, illustrations, maps and archival documents at exploreyork.org.uk/digital/york-images/
