Gallery owner Terry Brett holding an artwork by Alan Stokes, part of the Deck The Halls 30th anniversary Christmas exhibition at Pyramid Gallery, York
CHRISTMAS may be a time of joy and festivities, but for Terry Brett, curator and owner of Pyramid Gallery in, Stonegate, York, the season is a “strange time”.
“We prepare for it throughout the year from March,” he writes in his latest blog. “By the time we eventually get to the first week of December I am totally washed out by the whole thing.”
Terry goes on to outline the challenges of mounting Pyramid’s 30th anniversary Christmas exhibition, Deck The Halls, featuring minimalist lithographs by Alan Stones, from Cumbria; metal boxes by Marcus Steel, from the North York Moors; hares and foxes by Blandine Anderson, from Bude; ceramics by Craig Underhill, from St Ives, and paintings by Frans Wesselman, from Worcester.
On show too is glass sculpture by David Reekie, from Dickleburgh, Norfolk; ceramics by Ben Arnup, from York; prints by Mychael Barratt, from London, and portrait art by John Wheeler, from Middlesbrough.
Those challenges vary from a lorry hitting the National Trust-owned building on Monday, to the impact of the York Christmas Market, to the vagaries of the artists who exhibit at Pyramid.
Ceramicist Ben Arnup in his York studio
The lorry first. “I came in at 9.30am to see a large gouge in the render under the overhanging bay and Sarah sweeping the pavement,” writes Terry. “The lorry had mounted the pavement in an attempt to get past a van that was parked opposite our building.
“For me, it was a complete waste of half a day, with more time wasted on Tuesday and probably for the next two months.
“The landlord is the National Trust and they are responsible for the structure, but I need to talk to them about it and provide photographs and videos etc, so that they can assess the damage and make a claim from the truck company’s insurance. They have sent two people to inspect. They are very good, but it all takes time!”
Next, York Christmas Market. “I would like to say that the Christmas Market benefits York, but I have nothing but negative thoughts about it,” writes Terry. “Saturdays are ruined. Except for Saturday 7 December, when York was blasted by Storm Darragh. Thank you Storm Darragh for closing down York Christmas Market.
“The closure for one day was announced on the media and in Pyramid Gallery we had our best trading day since the day we sold a large Paul Smith bronze fox in February 2024. For me this just proves my worst fears about having a Christmas Market in York.”
Windswept Oak, lithograph, by Alan Stokes
Terry continues: “It used to be a nice event – a single weekend when everyone dressed up for the Victorian Christmas Fair. Now it is just a calamity with people coming in droves and queuing for sausages or mulled wine, then realising that they need a toilet, so they now have to queue for a cafe (because there are not enough public toilets in York).
“My customers prefer not to come into the city centre on a Saturday afternoon. It’s a disaster. Except when there is a storm – Storm Darragh I Love You! P.S. Sundays are much more pleasant in the city centre and Pyramid will be open between 11am and 5pm this Sunday.”
Thirdly, the artists and makers. “We know certain things will sell well, but we always want to offer something fresh,” writes Terry. “It’s very difficult to know what will work, so we tend to ask too many makers for too many things – and if everything arrives, it is a logistical nightmare!
“The artists may or may not be able to get the work to us in time – for various reasons (e.g. equipment failures, health issues, family issues, production issues due to trying something new), so again we tend to ask for work from more makers than we really need.”
Certain things could be sold over and over again, if Terry were able to acquire them. “Here is an example: Gin Durham,” he writes. “She lives in High Wycombe and in a studio in her house she produces the most delightful ceramic hares and foxes with highlights to the ears in gold lustre.
Paintings by Frans Wesselman and ceramics by Craig Underhill
“This year she had some health issues and needed to take things easy. She wanted to get work to us, but the task of packing it all up for posting was just too much. When she does send it, there is sometimes a casualty or two and this is a massive ‘downer’ for any artist.
“So, even though we have been talking to her since spring, the work was not going to be arriving. So I said, ‘what if I drive down to High Wycombe? Can I collect?’ And that is how I spent a day last week.”
Terry arose at 6am and arrived back home at 8.30pm, having driven 540 miles. “The hares and foxes have nearly all sold within a week,” he writes. “But this is needing a huge amount of my time…
“Even though I managed to also see the brilliant sculptor Jeremy James in Derbyshire (he let me take away 26 pieces which are now part of the Christmas show) and also Alison Vincent, who makes those astonishing waves and icebergs in glass, when she is not diving with sharks or swimming with Orcas! I absolutely love visiting artists and collecting work, but it takes it out of me and prevents me updating the website.”
Terry, nevertheless, ends on a high note: “The gallery is looking its very best. The work that artists have given us is astonishing and I thank everyone who has said this to me over the last four weeks. Thank you!.”
Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York, is open every weekday, 10am to 5pm; Saturday, 10am to 5pm; Sunday, 11am to 5pm; Christmas Eve, 10am to 3.30pm or 4pm; closed Christmas Day and Boxing Day; December 27, 11am to 4pm; closed New Year’s Day.
The poster for Deck The Halls at Pyramid Gallery, York
Gracing the stage: Grace Lancaster in the role of Carole King in York Stage’s York premiere of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. Picture: Charlie Kirkpatrick
FROM Carole King’s beautiful songs to Velma Celli’s pop queens, an artistic family to a poet’s biscuits, Charles Hutchinson adds to the September sunshine as cause for heading out and about.
Musical of the week: York Stage in Beautiful, The Carole King Musical, Grand Opera House, York, Friday to September 23
YORK, are you ready to feel the Earth move, asks director Nik Briggs, ahead of the York premiere of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. “This show has taken the world by storm, and for good reason, with its inspiring story of Carole King, a woman who rose to fame in the music industry during a time when female songwriters were few and far between”.
Singer, actress and pianist Grace Lancaster takes the lead role in this celebration of perseverance, passion and the power of music to unite. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Damon Gough: Marking 25 years of Badly Drawn Boy
Treasured songwriter of the week: Badly Drawn Boy, The Crescent, York, Monday, 7.30pm
DAMON Gough is undertaking his Something To Tour About: 25 Years Of Badly Drawn Boy tour, playing a sold-out standing show in York with Liam Frost in support.
Chorlton singer, songwriter, guitarist and piano player Gough, who released Banana Skin Shoes as his first studio album in ten years in May 2020, first made his mark with the Mercury Prize-winning The Hour Of Bewilderbeast in 2000. Eight albums on, he has plenty to tour about.
Rosie Jones: Unadulterated joy in Triple Threat at Leeds City Varieties and York Theatre Royal
Comedy gig of the week: Rosie Jones: Triple Threat, Leeds City Varieties Music Hall, Wednesday, 8pm; York Theatre Royal, Thursday, 8pm
COMEDIAN Rosie Jones’s show is guaranteed to be full of unapologetic cheekiness, nonsensical fun and unadulterated joy from the triple threat herself.
Theatre@41 honorary patron Rosie has hosted Channel 4’s travel series Rosie Jones’ Trip Hazard and Mission: Accessible and made numerous appearances on The Last Leg, 8 Out Of 10 Cats, Hypothetical, Mock The Week, The Ranganation and Joe Lycett’s Got Your Back. Box office: Leeds, 0113 243 0808 or leedsheritagetheatres.com; York, 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Jessica Steel: Powerhouse vocals at A Night To Remember
Fundraiser of the week: Big Ian Presents A Night To Remember, York Barbican, Thursday, 7.30pm
HUGE frontman Big Ian Donaghy hosts his annual charity fundraiser as George Hall leads a 20-piece All Star House Band with a 12-strong brass section in a night of cover versions of Kate Bush, Bill Withers, Take That, Fleetwood Mac, Tina Turner, Queen, Wham!, Elvis and more.
Taking part will be Jessica Steel, Heather Findlay, Beth McCarthy, Graham Hodge, The Y Street Band, Boss Caine, Gary Stewart, Simon Snaize, Annie Donaghy, Kieran O’Malley, Las Vegas Ken, the Huge Brass Boys, Hands & Voices, musicians from York Music Forum and Jessa Liversidge’s fully inclusive group Singing For All. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
John Hegley: Biscuits all round at Stillington Mill
Poet of the week: John Hegley: Biscuit Of Destiny, At The Mill, Stillington, near York, Friday, 7.30pm
POET John Hegley, star of radio, television and school assemblies, heads north with a clutch of new verses, a few older favourites and a cardboard camel with a moving jaw.
The biscuits in the show derive Romantic poet John Keats’s phrase: “a scarcity of buiscuit”. Not the sort of phrase nor spelling you expect from a Romantic poet, notes Hegley, who delves into the more eccentric side of Keats, alongside everyday goings-on in the Hegley homes of now and yesteryear. Expect drawings of elephants, myths, discos, daleks, optional community singing and the search for a sense of self-worth. Box office: tickettailor.com/events/atthemill/939591.
Velma Celli: Reigning over York Theatre Royal on Friday in a celebration of British pop royalty, God Save The Queens. Picture: Sophie Eleanor Photography
Brit icons of the week: Velma Celli’s God Save The Queens, York Theatre Royal, Friday, 7.30pm
YORK cabaret superstar Velma Celli, the vocal drag diva alter ego of musical theatre actor Ian Stroughair, introduces her new celebration of British pop royalty.
Accompanied by Scott Phillips’s band, Velma’s night of rapturous music, risqué comedy and fabulous entertainment features the songs of Adele, Amy Winehouse, Annie Lennox, Florence Welch, Leona Lewis, The Spice Girls, Kate Bush, Shirley Bassey, Cilla Black and Bonnie Tyler, plus a tribute to Sinead O’Connor.
Katya Apekisheva: Russian-born pianist playing at York Chamber Music Festival, sometimes solo, sometimes in the company of string players
Festival of the week: York Chamber Music Festival, September 15 to 17
FESTIVAL artistic director and cellist Tim Lowe is joined by John Mills and Jonathan Stone, violins, Hélene Clément and Simone van der Giessen, violas, Jonathan Aasgaard, cello, Billy Cole, double bass, and British-based Russian pianist Katya Apekisheva for three days of concerts.
Highlights include Mendelssohn’s String Quartet Op. 13, Dvořák’s String Sextet, Elgar’s late Piano Quintet, Strauss’s Metamorphosen, Brahms’s Cello Sonata No. 1 and Schubert’s last Piano Sonata in B flat major. For the full programme and venues, head to: ycmf.co.uk/2023-programme. Box office: 01904 658338 or ycmf.co.uk.
Ewa Salecka: Conducting Prima Vocal Ensemble in Songs From The Heart
Choral concert of the month: Prima Vocal Ensemble, Songs From The Heart, National Centre for Early Music, Walmgate, York, September 30, 7.30pm
ARTISTIC director and producer Ewa Salecka leads York choir Prima Vocal Ensemble in an intimate evening of contemporary classical and popular choral music with Greg Birch at the piano.
Works by Randall Thompson, René Clausen, Stephen Paulus and Elizabeth Alexander will be followed by a second half of moving and energetic arrangements of George Gershwin, Duke Ellington and Freddie Mercury songs. Ahead of their 2024 New York City reunion, Prima perform a Christopher Tin number too. Box office: primavocalensemble.com.
Copyright of The Press, York
Hannah Arnup and Ben Arnup with bowls by Mick Arnup and a bronze dog by Sally Arnup at the Arnup Centenary exhibition, opening today at Pyramid Gallery
In Focus: Exhibition launch of the week
Hannah Arnup, Ben Arnup, Tobias Arnup and Vanessa Pooley, Arnup Centenary, Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York, 11am today to October 30
THE Arnups, two generations of artists with roots in York, work in pottery, painting, wildlife sculpture, figurative sculpture and ceramic sculpture. The late Mick and Sally Arnup set up home and studio in Holtby in the 1960s, and three of their family, Ben, Hannah and Tobias, have followed careers in the arts.
This exhibition by the three second generation artists and Tobias’s wife, Vanessa Pooley, coincides with the centenary of their father’s birth in 1923. In recognition of their parents’ influence on their own artistic journeys, a few pieces by Mick and Sally will complement the new works.
Gallery visitors can expect to see new work by ceramist Ben Arnup, who specialises in slab-made flattened boxes and vessels that play with the viewer’s sense of form and space, alongside Hananh Arnup’s wheel-thrown bowls and plates with sgraffito decoration and Vanessa Pooley’s gently curvy female forms in ceramic and bronze. On the walls, the still life paintings by Tobias Arnup will sit alongside ceramic wall pieces by Ben and Hannah.
Ben’s intriguing Trompe L’Oeil forms are well known to collectors of ceramics and visitors to Pyramid Gallery. Formerly a landscape designer, he creates shapes that explore drawn perspective using coloured clay slab-constructed stoneware, “having fun with the way we see form”.
After studying sculpture at Kingston Art School and specialising in ceramics at Goldsmith College, London, Hannah has lived and worked for much of her adult life in Ireland where she owns and runs Ballymorris Pottery. Latterly, she has set up a new studio in the family home in Holtby near York, re- purposed as a community of artists’ studios.
Vanessa works with bronze and ceramic to create sculpture of mostly female forms with an individual and distinctive style that takes inspiration from the work of Henri Laurens and his studio assistant Balthazar Lobo, as well as Marino Marinni and the sculptures of Picasso and Matisse. Her work is to be found in collections around the world.
Tobias studied at Camberwell School of Art and went on to teach at Blackheath School of Art before a change in career to be an art therapist.
“I was helping run a course at Blackheath School of Art and I found I was more interested in the people that sat in my office at lunchtime complaining about their fellow students or about their parents or about not getting their art right or wondering what they were going to do, or who were just not really coping with life very well,” he says.
After his training, Tobias started an art therapy department at Holloway Prison, which was in existence until the women’s prison closed in 2016.
During his 35-year career, he also worked in secure units in mental health hospitals, finding that art could engage traumatised people when other methods of therapy had not.
In his art, Tobias has evolved an individual style that begins with a black outline of still life objects and flowers, drawn in ink with a goose quill. He then adds colour in gouache, filling the spaces between or on top of the black lines.
Depending on what he feels is necessary, he might add more black ink lines, or redo the original lines, then more colour and maybe finish with more black lines. This layering of lines and colour is done slowly and carefully in a process that he describes as meditative. The result is intriguing, distinctive and joyful, with pastel colours contrasting with the black outlines, that have a bold and purposeful feel mixed with occasional random unevenness.
Gallery owner Terry Brett has worked with Ben and Hannah for many years, as well as with Mick and Sally, and looks forward to his inaugural showing of paintings by Tobias and bronze and ceramic sculpture by Vanessa.
“‘For me, this is one of the most satisfying moments in my time as an exhibition curator,” he says. “Not only for the quality of the work and diversity of styles, but also because I am pleased to be representing Vanessa and Tobias for the first time.
“To be hosting the family with an exhibition that is paying respect to Mick and Sally in a collective show is a very special moment for both myself and the gallery.”
Tobias Arnup with his gouache and ink paintings
Tobias Arnup on his artistic practice
THE play between line and colour has always been central to Tobias’s work as a painter. “Undoubtedly my main influence of this has been that of my father, Mick,” he says. “However, I still remember the impact of being taught by the wonderful art master at Pocklington School, Nigel Billington, who encouraged a proper attention to composition and to drawing, particularly with ink.
“It was hardly a surprise when I chose Camberwell School of Art, in London, as the place to study for my Fine Art degree and where I was lucky enough to teach drawing myself for a while.”
Only relatively recently has Tobias experimented more with different media. “For many years my favourite was egg tempera, which I learnt about at Camberwell and used to mix up myself,” he says.
“Depending on how much it was diluted, tempera has both the ‘gloopy’ quality of gouache and the richness of a watercolour glaze. It was working on paper, though, that has allowed me to work more flexibly.
“Using water-soluble pencil, Indian ink, watercolour and gouache – although not necessarily in that order – I seem to be forever swinging between creating chaos and trying to excerpt some sort of order on the composition.”
He continues: “These days the chaos of my ink marks is being brought under some sort of control by the flat, mat gouache. When things get a bit too tidy, out comes the ink bottle again.
“There cannot have been many options for school teachers at the time. Mr Billington’s huge set-ups suited me perfectly, however. They were there ready for me – a constant resource, I realise now, that is currently replicated in my own studio.
“Although they stray into more abstract concerns, I regard all these works as still-lives. When I am a bit stuck, it’s the ink and the goose-feather quills that I turn to, although I have used up my store of Chinese geese quills that I collected up from the garden when I was young.”
Pyramid Gallery opening hours are: Monday to Saturday 10am to 5pm.The displays can be viewed at pyramidgallery.com too.
Goose by the Ouse: Dame Berwick Kaler, centre, with Martin Barrass, left, AJ Powell, Suzy Cooper and David Leonard, gathering again at the Grand Opera House, York, for The Adventures Of Old Mother Goose. Picture: David Harrison
KALER on the loose, Christmas music, art and crafts and a stellar trio on the horizon have Charles Hutchinson hopping between diaries
Berwick’s back: The Adventures Of Old Granny Goose, Grand Opera House, York, December 10 to January 8
THE script is complete, as of 6am on Thursday morning, for writer, director and perennial York dame Berwick Kaler’s second year at his adopted panto home, presented in tandem with the Grand Opera House’s new partners in pantomime, UK Productions.
At 76, expect a greater emphasis on the verbal jousting from Dame Berwick, but still with slapstick aplenty in the familiar company of sidekick Martin Barrass, villain David Leonard, principal gal Suzy Cooper, luverly Brummie AJ Powell and ever-game dancer Jake Lindsay in his tenth Kaler panto, me babbies, me bairns. Box office: 0844 871 7615 or atgtickets.com/York.
Angel With Gift, linocut print by Anita Klein, part of The Christmas Collection at Pyramid Gallery, York
Exhibition launch of the week: The Christmas Collection at Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York, today until January 12, open daily
YORK ceramicist Ben Arnup opens The Christmas Collection, the last exhibition of Pyramid Gallery’s 40th anniversary celebrations, at midday today. He will be exhibiting 12 new trompe l’oeil ceramic sculptures too.
Gallery curator Terry Brett has invited London printmaker Anita Kelin to fill the walls with 15 large linocut original prints and two paintings in her 28th year of showing her depictions of family life at Pyramid. Exhibiting too will be printmaker Mychael Barratt, sculptors Christine Pike and Jennie McCall, ceramicist Katie Braida and glassmakers Rachel Elliott, Alison Vincent, Keith Cummings and David Reekie, plus 50 jewellery makers.
Sara Davies: Crafty ideas for Christmas at York Barbican
Return to York of the week: Craft Your Christmas with Sara Davies, York Barbican, tonight, 7.30pm
DRAGONS’ Den entrepreneur Sara Davies, who founded her Crafter’s Companion company in 2005 while studying at the University of York, offers practical demonstrations, creative ideas and a healthy slice of down-to-earth know-how.
Taking you from gifts to garlands, cards to crackers, via a peek into the Den and a sprinkling of Strictly Come Dancing sparkle, Sara will help you to create your own unique handmade Christmas. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
The Ebor Singers: Christmas music from America and Britain at St Lawrence Parish Church
Christmas concert of the week: The Ebor Singers, A Christmas Celebration By Candlelight, St Lawrence Parish Church, Lawrence Street, York, tonight, 7.30pm
PAUL Gameson directs The Ebor Singers in an evening of beautiful choral arrangements for Christmastide that also marks the launch of the York choir’s CD recording of Christmas music by contemporary American composers, Wishes And Candles.
Pieces from the disc, featuring works by Morten Lauridsen, Eric Whitacre, Dan Forrest, Abbie Bettinis and Matthew Culloton, will be complemented by festive compositions by John Rutter and Bob Chilcott. Expect audience participation in carol singing too. Tickets: eventbrite.co.uk and on the door.
Russell Watson and Aled Jones
Festive musical duo of the week: Aled Jones and Russell Watson, Christmas With Aled & Russell York Barbican, Tuesday, 8pm
ALED Jones and Russell Watson are reuniting for Christmas 2022, combining a new album and tour. Performing together again after a three-year hiatus, the classical singers will be promoting their November 4 release of Christmas With Aled And Russell.
The album features new recordings of traditional carols such as O Holy Night, O Little Town Of Bethlehem and In The Bleak Midwinter, alongside festive favourites White Christmas, It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas, Little Drummer Boy and Mistletoe And Wine, complemented by a duet rendition of Walking In The Air. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk
York Mystery Plays Supporters Trust cast members in rehearsal for A Nativity for York. Picture: John Saunders
Nativity play of the week: York Mystery Plays Supporters Trust in A Nativity for York, Spurriergate Centre, Spurriergate, York, Thursday, Friday, 7.30pm; Saturday, Sunday, 3pm, 5pm and 7.30pm
A NATIVITY for York returns to the Spurriergate Centre following a two-year enforced break, staged by York Mystery Plays Supporters Trust (YMPST). After directing the Last Judgement plays on the city streets in 2018 and 2022, Alan Heaven has created a fresh, vibrant and magical retelling of the Nativity, combining “music, dance, sorrows and joys and some audience participation”.
Heaven’s company of actors, dancers and musicians is drawn from a wide range of community volunteers, in keeping with the YMPST productions of A Nativity for York in 2019 and A Resurrection for York in 2021. Tickets: 01904 623568, at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk or in person from the Theatre Royal box office.
Solomon’s Knot: Christmas Cantatas at Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall, University of York, in York Early Music Christmas Festival 2022’s concluding concert
Festival of the week: York Early Music Christmas Festival, mainly at NCEM, Walmgate, December 8 to 16; online box set, December 19 to January 31
MUSIC, minstrels, merriment, mulled wine and mince pies combine in York Early Music Christmas Festival 2022, to be complemented by an online box set of festival highlights post-festival.
Taking part will be La Palatine (Fiesta Galante); Ensemble Augelletti (Pick A Card!); Solomon’s Knot (Johann Kuhnau’s Christmas Cantatas); Spiritato and The Marion Consort (Inspiring Bach); Ensemble Moliere (Good Soup); Bojan Čičić (Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas); The Orlando Consort (Adieu) and Yorkshire Bach Choir & Yorkshire Baroque Soloists (Handel’s Brockes Passion). Box office: 01904 658338 or ncem.co.uk.
Guitarist Tom Bennett and baritone Sam Hird, outside their training ground, the Royal College of Music. On Friday, they perform a Christmas recital in York
Homecoming of the week: Sam Hird and Tom Bennett, A Winter Night’s Recital, All Saints’ Church, North Street, York, Friday, 7pm to 9pm
YORK baritone Sam Hird and his fellow Royal College of Music graduate, guitarist Tom Bennett, perfrom classical songs from around the world, by Schubert, Faure and Britten, complemented by festive favourites such as Adeste Fideles, O Holy Night and A Cradle In Bethlehem to stir the Christmas spirit.
The 15th century All Saints’ Church will be the “perfect backdrop” to this candlelit concert, Hird’s professional solo debut. A glass of mulled wine and a mince pie is included in the ticket price of £10 plus booking fee, available from samhirdmusic.co.uk and on the door.
Big jumpers, big songs: Alistair Griffin presents The Big Christmas Concert, St Michael le Belfrey Church, York, December 9, 10 and 17, 8pm; doors, 7.30pm
Alistair Griffin: Christmas hits
BILLED as “the biggest Christmas concert in York”, singer-songwriter Alistair Griffin’s winter warmer returns with classic Christmas tunes, carols and bags of festive cheer, heralded by a brass band.
The Big Christmas Concert takes a festive musical journey from acoustic versions of traditional carols to Wizzard, Slade and The Pogues, as audiences sing along and sip mulled wine while enjoying the fairytale of old York. Christmas jumpers and Christmas attire are encouraged; a prize will be given for the best costume. Box office: www.alistairgriffin.com.
One way or another, you’re gonna get ya ticket for Blondie at Scarborough Open Air Theatre next summer
Booking ahead: Blondie, Scarborough Open Air Theatre, June 22 2023
LOWER East Side New York trailblazers Blondie are off to the East Coast next summer to play Britain’s largest outdoor concert arena.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame icons will be led as ever by pioneering frontwoman/songwriter Debbie Harry, 77, guitarist/conceptual mastermind Chris Stein and powerhouse drummer Clem Burke, joined by former Sex Pistols bassist Glen Matlock, guitarist Tommy Kessler and keyboardist Matt Katz-Bohen.
Blondie join Sting, Pulp, rock supergroup Hollywood Vampires, N-Dubz, Olly Murs and Mamma Mia! among Scarborough OAT’s 2023 headliners, with plenty more to be added. Box office: scarboroughopenairtheatre.com.
The Waterboys: 40th anniversary celebrations in 2023, taking in York Barbican
Booking ahead too: The Waterboys, York Barbican, October 12 2023, 7.30pm
GREAT, Scott will be back for yet another evening with The Waterboys at York Barbican, this time to mark the Scottish-founded folk, rock, soul and blues band’s 40th anniversary.
Mike Scott, 63, has made a habit of playing the Barbican, laying on the “Big Music” in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2018 and October 2021, since when The Waterboys have released 15th studio album All Souls Hill in May. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Grayson Perry: A Show All About You…and surely about him too at Harrogate Convention Centre?
A brush with an artist: Grayson Perry: A Show All About You, Harrogate Convention Centre, October 1 2023, 7.30pm
ARTIST, iconoclast and TV presenter Grayson Perry follows up A Show For Normal People with A Show All About You, wherein he asks, “What makes you, you?”. Is there a part deep inside that no-one understands? Have you found your tribe or are you a unique human being? Or is it more complicated than that?
Perry, “white, male, heterosexual, able bodied, English, southerner, baby boomer and member of the establishment”, takes a mischievous look at the nature of identity, promising to make you laugh, shudder, and reassess who you really are. Box office: 01423 502116 or harrogatetheatre.co.uk.
Also recommended but sold out: The Cure, The Lost World Tour 2022, Leeds First Direct Arena, Tuesday, doors, 6pm
ROBERT Smith’s ever-changing band play Leeds for the first time since September 21 1985 at the whatever-happened-to-the Queens Hall. Expect a long, long set of all the heavenly, hippy pop hits, the gloomier goth stalwarts and more than a glimpse of the long-promised 14th studio album, Songs Of A Lost World, pencilled in for 2023.
The Christmas collection: York ceramicist Ben Arnup, left, and Pyramid Gallery owner Terry Brett with an Anita Klein linocut print behind them
YORK ceramicist Ben Arnup will open Pyramid Gallery’s concluding 40th anniversary exhibition, The Christmas Collection, in Stonegate, York, on Saturday at 12 noon.
Ben will be exhibiting 12 new pieces, having supplied gallery curator and owner Terry Brett with his distinctive trompe l’oeil’ ceramic sculptures for 28 years.
At the heart of The Christmas Collection will be new work by another Pyramid regular, London artist and printmaker Anita Klein. “I’ve invited Anita to fill the walls of this show with 15 large linocut original prints and two paintings,” says Terry.
“The gallery has enjoyed a long, unbroken relationship with Anita as a supplier of her extensive catalogue of prints that form a diary of her family life.
Angel With Gift, linocut print, by Anita Klein
“Over the 28 years in which she has shown more than 800 different pictures at Pyramid Gallery, we’ve watched her career progress to the point where she has become one of the most collectable printmakers in the UK. It seems very fitting that she is the main focus of this year’s final anniversary exhibition.”
As well as showing new linocut prints, Anita will be selling copies of her book Out Of The Ordinary – 40 years Of Print Making, published by Eames Fine Art in October.
For more than 40 years, this artist of the everyday and the personal has produced thousands of paintings, prints and drawings depicting her immediate family – husband, daughters, grandchildren and herself – going about the very ordinary activities of daily life.
From watching television, cooking, reading, driving to school, soaking in the bath and getting dressed, to cleaning the house, choosing a pet, going on holiday, or just cuddling up and sharing tender moments with loved ones, Anita captures these seemingly unremarkable domestic scenes with humour, sensitivity and beauty, creating an intimate visual journal with which everyone can identify.
The book cover for Anita Klein’s Out Of The Ordinary, published in October and on sale at Pyramid Gallery
The book contains 550 of Anita’s best-loved prints, presented as a charming chronological record of the family’s day-to-day life through the decades, seen from the artist-mother’s perspective, as they grow and change in their respective roles within the household.
Out Of The Ordinary also charts her development as a printmaker, from the simple monochrome drypoints of the 1980s, a consequence of the practical and financial demands of being a young stay-at-home mum, through to the more colourful and elaborate prints of recent years.
A personal appreciation of Anita Klein’s work by poet Hollie McNish opens the volume, while texts by publishers Rebecca and Vincent Eames, who have collaborated with the artist for more than two decades, and critic Mel Gooding give an introduction to her practice.
Anita herself provides recollections and further detail with short commentaries on the images and the occasions that they depict, complemented by poetry contributions from Dame Carol Ann Duffy, Hollie McNish and Wendy Cope.
Pangolin, sculpture, by Jennie McCall, from The Christmas Collection at Pyramid Gallery
Taking part in the exhibition too will be sculptors Jennie McCall and Christine Pike; printmaker Mychael Barratt; slipware potter Dylan Bowen; ceramicists Katie Braida, Ilona Sulikova and Drew Caines (from Leeds); glass installation artist and sculptor Monette Larsen and glassmakers Rachel Elliott, Alison Vincent, Keith Cummings, Bruce Marks and David Reekie.
To complement with festive sparkle, the Christmas Collection jewellery displays will feature studio work by more than 50 British makers, including Jane Macintosh.
Saturday’s launch will run from 12 noon to 3pm; the exhibition will continue until January 12, open 10am to 5pm, Monday to Saturday; 11am to 4pm on Sundays.
The poster for The Christmas Collection exhibitiion at Pyramid Gallery
YORK ceramist Ben Arnup opens the Christmas Collection exhibition at Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York, tomorrow at 11am.
On show until January 20 will be new work comprising 24 small and medium pots that feature trompe l’oeil effects with his flattened box forms and a new departure in his style wih vase and beaker forms.
“Collectors of his work will be surprised to hear that an eminent ceramic artist who has built his career on the basis of trying to trick the eye has this year progressed into the realm of vessels that are not compressed to an almost flat form,” says Pyramid Gallery curator and owner Terry Brett.
“But they will also be pleased that nothing in Arnup’s world is regular and that each vessel here in this show succeeds in being slightly eccentric.
“Ben has always experimented with surface decoration, using micro-thin layers of coloured clay to create a marble effect or applying textured coloured slips to differentiate different sides to a cube. The new work incorporates both of these techniques to pleasing effect.”
Pyramid Gallery owner Terry Brett holding ceramics by Ben Arnup. Behind him are paintings by Mick Leach
Arnup’s interest in ceramics started at home. Blessed with a sculptor and a potter as parents, he grew up learning ceramics skills and technology.
Originally trained as a landscape architect, he worked in the industry until 1984 when he returned to making pots, heavily influenced by the design process. Previously working in Ross Moor and with his father near Holtby, he now lives and works in York.
From the beginning of his career as a potter, his pieces were always shallow, with trompe l’oeil illusions. For the first 15 years, his work was high-fired stoneware in an oil reduction kiln; now this fellow of the Craft Potters Association fires to an oxidised stoneware in an electric kiln to achieve cleaner, brighter colours.
“In order to create a colourful fluid field for the trompe l’oeil image I laminate a porcelain veneer onto a stronger clay body,” he says. “The drawn illusion is complemented by the colourful rhythm in the base clay.
Barn, box-form ceramic, by Ben Arnup
“The pots are an exploration of the way we see. The onlooker will be well aware of the frail illusion and the contradiction between what is suggested and what is tangible. I like to play a game: setting the prosaic nature of clay against the unlikely structures of the drawings.”
Arnup will be at Pyramid Gallery between 11 am and 2.30pm tomorrow to greet collectors and explain his making methods and inspirations for the work. Wine and refreshments will be served.
On the walls are paintings by York artist Mick Leach and work by Scottish artists Ian MacIntyre (paintings) and Hilke MacIntyre (ceramic reliefs and linocut prints), while an array of many different types of 3D art is provided by sculptor Jennie McCall, glass maker Catherine Shilling and potters Dylan Bowen and Katie Pruden.
As always, the window and cabinets on the ground floor are filled with hand-made jewellery by more than 50 British jewellery designer/makers.
Gallery opening hours are 10am to 5pm, Monday to Saturday, and 11am to 4.30pm on Sundays. Much of the work can be seen and bought via the gallery website at pyramidgallery.com.
YORK Open
Studios 2020, the chance to meet 144 artists at 100 locations over two April
weekends, has been cancelled in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.
However,
with doors sadly shut for the April 17 to 19 and April 25 to 26 event,
CharlesHutchPress wants to champion the creativity of York’s artists and
makers, who would have been showcasing their ceramics, collage, digital,
illustration, jewellery, mixed media, painting, print, photography, sculpture
and textiles skills.
Each day,
in brochure order, five artists who now miss out on the exposure of Open
Studios will be given a pen portrait on these pages, because so much art and
craft will have been created for the event and still needs a new home.
Addresses will not be included at this time.
Meanwhile,
York Open Studios artists are finding their own way to respond to the shutdown
by filling their windows with their work instead. Look for #openwindowsyork2020 to locate them.
“If you see one in your area while taking your daily exercise, take a picture
and let us know,” they say.
Ovoid On Ball, by Ben Arnup
Ben Arnup, ceramics
BEN defines his ceramics
as art pottery, wherein an early obsession with perspective has developed into
a play between drawn description and form.
“I like to play a game: setting the prosaic nature
of clay against the unlikely structures of the drawings,” says Ben of his oxidised
stoneware with inlays and colourful
porcelain veneers, fired in an electric kiln.
The son of the late
Mick and Sally Arnup, painter and potter and sculptor respectively, he grew up
learning ceramic skills and technology.
Ben Arnup: “I like to play a game,” he says
Having trained as a
landscape architect at Manchester Polytechnic, he worked for Landscape Design Associates in Peterborough,
before he returned to making pots influenced by the design process in 1984.
Now a fellow of the Craft Potters Association, he works out of a basement
workshop in his York home, exhibiting his ceramics in Britain, Europe and North
America. Learn more at benarnup.co.uk.
Linked pendant, by Jo Bagshaw
Jo Bagshaw, jewellery
THE central theme of Jo’s
work is to create beautiful, wearable collections of silver jewellery that
follow simple lines and shapes.
“I’m
inspired by everyday objects, vintage items and novelties,” she says. “I
sometimes include these elements directly in my work, encasing and embellishing
them with precious metals to give a fresh perspective to a familiar object.
Jo Bagshaw: Inspired by everyday objects, vintage items and novelties
“I often
weave a narrative into my jewellery, incorporating messages or well-known
sayings to an item that convey meaning to the wearer.
After
completing a degree in metalwork and jewellery in 2004, Jo launched her
jewellery business in 2006. Since then, she has combined this with teaching
jewellery-making skills at The Mount School, York. More details at
jobagshaw.co.uk.
Clay in hand: Feet in Clay ceramicist and multi-media artist Francesca King
Francesca King, ceramics/multi-media
FRANCESCA founded her ceramics practice in 2016 to explore surface, texture and formation of agate clay. She has exhibited nationally, alongside undertaking ceramic portrait commissions and teaching.
Now in the second year
of her MA in fine art, she was awarded first prize in an international art
competition, leading to a week’s residency at Urbino University, Italy.
Francesca, who is also a
clay therapist, is taking clay into a more interactive aspect of sculpture with
her Feet in Clay installation: an interactive
sculptural exhibit that “promotes the positive aspects of clay in motion,
stimulating the corporeal experience for participants”.
Francesca KIng at work
The Feet in Clay experience would have
been offered during Francesca’s exhibition for York Open Studios 2020, for which
she was one of the annual event’s multimedia bursary recipients.
This bursary enables artists to create
experiences such as digital works, installations, films or performances as part
of York Open Studios.
For the full picture, take a look at francescakingceramics.com.
Photographer Simon Palmour: Likes to remove the glass barrier between viewer and image
Simon Palmour, photography
SIMON has been a
photographer for 35 years, having his work published and exhibited at many
locations, not least the Royal Geographical Society.
Abstract images are
extracted from landscapes and reproduced on several media, such as aluminium,
acrylic and board to “remove the glass barrier between viewer and image”.
Last year, his photographic essay on The Yorkshire High Wolds was published. This year, he was timing the publication of his new project on the Yorkshire Elmet flatlands to coincide with York Open Studios 2020.
The Tree On The Beach, by Simon Palmour
A theme of his photography is ambiguity, whether of scale, subject, point of view or colour (much, although not all, of his work being monochrome). “The aim is to invite contemplation, to reward repeated consideration and to cause a little confusion,” he says.
Simon also carries out
portrait work, commissions and workshops, as well as teaching groups and offering
personal tuition.
After the cancellation of this year’s York Open Studios, he is holding a Virtual Show instead throughout April. Visit palmourphotographics.blogspot.com/p/virtual-exhibition.html daily.
“Each day, I’ll add a different piece to the show, with the story behind the shot and the cost of a print,” he says. Those images can be bought at palmour@gmail.com.
Julerry, by Elena Panina
Elena Panina, textiles
ELENA is a Russian-born
textile artist who works with wool, silk and decorative fibres.
Using wet felting
techniques, she makes wearable art pieces: necklaces, shawls and throws,
bracelets, headwear, belts, hand bags, toys and wall hangings.
Elena was born and brought up in St Petersburg, moving to Britain 15 years ago. She attended arts college in St Petersburg and her past artwork centred on ink drawings, until she discovered wet and needle felting three years ago.
Elena Panina: Drawn to the magical qualities of felting
Studying felting from
Russian felt makers, she was drawn immediately to its magical properties as she
learnt how to produce cloth out of fibres.
As well as an artist,
she is a teacher. She can be contacted via yelenavpanina@sky.com.
TOMORROW: Jill Tattersall; Here Be Monsters; Joanna Wakefield; Mark Hearld and Lauren Terry.
