Bonhoga, Bye Bye

Urban Baskets is only on for another few days in Shetland and yet it seems only the other day that we were unpacking it up there. If you were thinking of visiting it this is a gentle reminder to do so before the 2nd May when it will be packed up again to head back to Dorset and then on to the National Vlechtmuseum in the Netherlands, where it gets a three month showing.

Sadly, for me, and despite our best efforts to find more venues, it will sit in its boxes for two months prior to going on show again. By all accounts the people who have seen it so far have got a great deal of pleasure from it, so it seems a shame that more people in Britain have not been given the chance to see it. It will return briefly to the UK in 2012. I will, however, be teaching at Walford Mill in Dorset over the weekend of 23/24 July (the details are in the side panel of this blog under Teaching).

Meanwhile I have started on a new body of work that I will be exhibiting at the Palais des Eveques at Issigeac in the Dordogne for the month of July. This exhibition will be a constituent part of the Fete de la Vannerie that will be held there on the17th July. I have called this exhibition ‘Tri and Leaf’, a play of words, not only on the title of a Tolkien book but also with French and English,' Tri' is the French word for the sorting and selecting of things for recycling. The work employs a mixture of recycled and natural materials, so it seems appropriate!

Some months back I received an invitation from Jette Mellgren and Jan Johanson www.pilflet.dk to participate in an outdoor event in Odense, Denmark this May alongside other artists and makers from all over Europe. Much as I enjoy traveling, and it is always fun being with other makers, I also need to make new work. So, reluctantly, I turned it down. Ultimately, the work I do in the studio is the catalyst for everything else as it opens up new opportunities to exhibit, teach or participate in events. Making new work is therefore vital and needs time and space dedicated to it. Constantly hopping from one event or place to another or working to other people’s briefs makes it very difficult to do anything truly new or original with the limited time left. Usually, of necessity, you have to return to previously worked out ideas. Sometimes this is appropriate but I also need the challenge of setting my own briefs and developing new ideas.

The next two months are therefore dedicated to making new work, whether the garden a.k.a ‘The National Park’ will agree to this arrangement is another matter altogether!

CEO 'The National Park'