We carried out a couple more interviews with some of the artists entering the open arts...
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Valerie Hunt
Valerie has entered the Open Arts
Exhibition before and has been painting on and off over the years, she is
inspired by faces and loves to paint portraits either from real life or from
pictures.
The inspiration for Valerie’s piece
comes from an eccentric gentleman that lives in her area and sits outside his
house most days, she told us that she ‘loves an interesting face’ and he fit her
artistic criteria. Valerie decided to approach the gentleman who introduced
himself as Ken and was surprised when she asked is he could sit for a portrait.
Ken was stunned by the results of
the painting and will be attending the exhibition to see his face amongst the
other portraits.
Valerie’s hopes for the exhibition
are purely for people to enjoy the art and for Ken and his wife to like the
painting.
Valerie was really pleased to hear
that the size restriction for entries had been abolished and thinks the solo
exhibition prize is an excellent idea.
Paul Graham
Paul entered the Open Arts last year
for the first time and is really looking forward to seeing how his new 3D
creations will be received by the public.
Paul found himself in a position
where he was out of work and felt that he wanted to explore his skills and use
them as an outlet for creativity. He began collecting unwanted junk from around
his area and started up-cycling. He has entered two large freestanding sculptures.
He created the Giraffe and Komodo
Dragon out of thermalite bricks, using down piping for shape and structure and then
finished off by covering the pieces with Papier Mâché. The final process was to paint
and decorate the animals.
Paul now works making and designing
lighting structures at Lomeshaye village but continues to make his own pieces at
home and hopes for commissions to build his confidence as an artist and continue
to explore his skills. Above all he hopes that his pieces are a conversation
starter and people enjoy them.
He believes changing the entry size
to open should stay like this for the future as art shouldn’t be restricted. He
thinks the solo exhibition prize is great exposure and what all artist
need!
So now we had all the work, all 180 pieces and the next job is to lay out the exhibition and hang it....
First we gather our supplies....
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and then we ponder where everything will fit, and how it will all look together, and try our hardest to make sure every artwork gets a good space that shows it off to it's best advantage....
and then we end up with a temporary gallery that looks a bit like this below....
It's not quite all done, don't worry - we have almost 24 hours before the preview! So here are some close ups of some of the work....
Textiles and 3D is a very strong category this year....
Portraiture has some very impressive works....
I'm especially pleased with the layout and looks of our Pendle in Paint category this year....
As always, we show some very talented, young artist's work....
and we have an open category, which can be (and often is) as weird and wonderful as you like!
Plus some landscapes, which again, looks like a very strong category this year....
Plus two photography categories; edited and unedited...
and I couldn't resist showing another farmer and sheepdog, well we do live in a rural area after all!
I hope that has made you excited to come and see the exhibition for real? We have the preview for exhibitors tomorrow night and then the exhibition is open Friday, Saturday, Sunday from 10am until 4pm.
Tomorrow also sees the first of the market stalls setting up - items that are handmade, or vintage - and we have over 65 stallholders descending on Nelson to sell jewellery, crafts, art, clothing, collectables and edibles. The stalls are also open Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 10am until 4pm.
It's a great weekend, full of colour and inspiration, we hope you can join us.
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