wallington – Page 2 – The Consulting Artist

Goodbye, Hello, and Thank You.

I spent last night at The Wallington Arms, along with most of the rest of the town if the crowds were anything to go by. It was the annual community awards night – a chance to meet folk, catch up with friends, hear some live music and celebrate some of the good work being done in the community.

Goodbye

I hid this piece of free art in the Christmas tree in the pub last night. It was found and is off to a new home. It’s a sketch I painted in 2012, one of my favourite early pieces. Parting with this work was a great reminder for me that I started the free art project to help me learn to let go.

Hello

I was fortunate to be part of the live music set up last night. Most people in the area who know me, do so through my free art. Last night gave me the opportunity to say hello in a different guise. I’m very nervous when it comes to musical performances and the crowd were really supportive. I played one of my favourites, City Of New Orleans, and Fairytale Of New York. Loads of people sang long with the second song, that was lovely to hear, thank you. Amelia played, and so did Chloe Ray and her band – great fun!

Thank You

The free art project was nominated in two award categories, and I came home with two runner up prizes. It is lovely to be recognised by your peers, particularly when it’s for doing something you love. Thank you very much to everyone who nominated and voted for me, I appreciate it very much. It was great to see fellow artist Jason Goldrick receive a nomination too, and well done to all the nominees and winners for your contribution, and the recognition you received. And finally, thank you to Carole and Keira who encourage me and give me the time and space to allow the free art project to breathe, and to develop. I couldn’t do it without you. xx.

We Are All Artists

Saturday 19th August, Midday. I’m unloading (what feels like) a ton of art materials at The Wallington Arms, to get ready for our first We Are All Artists community art workshop and exhibition. Jon, Rachel and the rest of the staff are on hand, the doors are opened and the set up begins. Carole and Keira come down early to help – that’s much appreciated. Will anyone show up? I’m quietly confident that there are enough curious people in and around town to make this a worthwhile afternoon. We’ll see…

We are due to start at 2pm, and just before then, our first guests arrive. They are quickly followed by more, and more, and more. In a short time – the huge room is full and we are busy playing a drawing game called Finding Lines. The game loosens people up for a brief conversation about community and what that means to our guests. We ponder a while – share a few ideas, then get down to work. Our intention is to create art for our own evening exhibition.

The pub very kindly provided some snacks as people worked, and boy did they work. The room became an outpouring of colour. Acrylics, water colours, Sharpies, pastels, crayons, pencils and more came to life across the room as the art works began to emerge. Jason Goldrick kindly demonstrated a technique involving water colours, salt, clingfilm and a hair dryer (you had to be there). There seemed to be no end to our creative experiments – credit cards were used as brushes, so were fingers and hands. 4pm arrived in the blink of an eye – and our guests departed. We now had just two hours to turn the room from a fully functioning workshop, into an exhibition space. No pressure!

With more help from Carole, Keira, Helen and Aissa, the transformation began. We worked hard, and once the clear up was finished we then had the job of curating the work. I think we did a pretty good job – I hope you will agree.

The exhibition opened at 6pm and our guests had a great evening viewing all the art and having conversations about community. I met Lindsay who recently guessed the location of a Spanish art drop which I was able to hand over, and Stacie came to the exhibition with a piece of free art which I placed in Spain a year ago. She correctly guessed its location at the time – and it was a lovely coincidence to spend time with two people who had both found Spanish free art. The project is full of lovely coincidences like this.

We closed up just after 8pm and I’m heading back to The Wallington Arms in a while to finish taking everything down. I expect the two large murals will stay on the wall for a while, why not pop down soon and take a look at them?

Thank you to everyone who came and made art, and attended the exhibition. Thanks to Carole, Keira, Helen and Aissa for helping with preparations. Thanks to Rachel, Jon and all the staff at The Wallington Arms for being such great hosts, and thanks to Arts Network Sutton for supporting the free art project and providing a grant so this event could take place.

#WeAreAllArtists

Wallington Weather

A huge lightning storm rolled over our town (and much of Southern England) this week. I slept right through it! Subsequently I’ve seen a few photos of dark purple skies crackling to life in the storm. I thought this would make a good subject for this week’s free art drop, so here’s what I made. Watercolour and silver leaf.