Category: Blog

‘When Soft was the Sun’ Autumn Exhibition 2022

As the evenings start to draw in, our thoughts turn to home and a good fire in the hearth. To set the scene we mark the beauty of the changes of the season, and introduce our special Autumn Exhibition combined with h.Art entitled ‘When Soft was the Sun’ which opens on Saturday September 3 at Old Chapel Gallery, Pembridge, promoting the work of talented British artists and makers from around the county and beyond.  

Our line up this year will feature artists Lynda Jones, Karen Pearce, Sue Hayden, Rachel Wright and Jemima Jameson. 

Heading the line up is artist Lynda Jones. Formerly from Sunderland, she settled in Monmouth in the early 1980’s, where she has lived ever since. She studied Art Foundation at Newport College of Art & Design, followed by a degree in Visual Art at The University of Wales, Aberystwyth.

Her canvases and drawings are mostly depictions of landscapes in the Monmouth area – the final image often bears little relation to the original subject but all have a common starting point – the memory of a place she knows well.

Karen Pearce paints mainly in acrylics on canvas. Her latest works reflect her interest in rocks and water, her experimentation with different media and her love of the coastline in West Wales amongst certain other locations. Aspects of painting water excites her, such as the affinity it has with paint layering and glazing techniques and the way it can have a unifying effect on a composition as it reflects the sky.

By popular demand Jemima Jameson returns with a beautifully executed collection of painted boxes and cabinets. Hares, foxes, kingfishers are just some of nature’s beautiful creatures that Jemima captures in acrylic paints as she creates these heirloom pieces.

Artist Sue Hayden is excited by the relationship between texture, shape, light and space in landscapes and employs acrylics and pastels on paper that has been layered up beforehand with paint and paper creating a collage effect. This adds energy, randomness and interest to the subject. Glorious Pembrokeshire forms her main preoccupation.

Rachel Wright is inspired by many subjects, including landscapes, seascapes, wildlife, harbour towns, boats, lighthouses and windmills. These themes are then translated into machine embroidered fabric collages, using vibrant threads, worked onto carefully cut pieces of fabric. This enables Rachel to draw and paint through fabric and stitch, providing a rich source of colour, texture and pattern which forms her ‘palette’ and the threads are used like a fine paintbrush to fill in the details. Rachel’s trademark is her use of striking, rich colour, which captivates and draws the viewer in. Her aim is simply to delight the eye.

Karin Celestine, fibre artist, writer and illustrator from Monmouthshire, has created a delightful collection of needle felted creatures from hares to badgers and mice, each one with its own charm, character and mischief. She can happily turn her hand to making all creatures great and small, mythical and real.

Rachel Bailey’s jewellery explores her love of wild creatures, our native animals and birds and magical realms. The semi precious stones she uses are an integral part of her inspiration as they suggest landscapes in which the creatures inhabit. Each piece is individually made and therefore unique, in sterling silver and Hallmarked in Sheffield.

A special Festival Exhibition at Old Chapel Gallery, Pembridge, to run during the Hay Festival of Literature and the Arts 2022, opens on Saturday May 21 continuing to the end of June and features the work of talented British artists and makers from far and near. 

Heading the line up is artist Lynda Jones formerly from Sunderland. She settled in Monmouth in the early 1980’s, where she has lived ever since. She studied Art Foundation at Newport College of Art & Design, followed by a degree in Visual Art at The University of Wales, Aberystwyth.

Her canvases are mostly depictions of landscapes in the Monmouth area – the final image often bears little relation to the original subject but all have a common starting point – the memory of a place she knows well.

Former graphic designer Joanna Griffiths studied at the London College of Printing and had a successful and long career in commercial art. She now paints full time from her studio in Powys. Her pastel artworks capture the hills, moors and farmland of the Welsh Marches. Depicting all seasons Joanna often only walks a short distance to study the subjects she loves.

Northumberland-based artist, Mary Ann Rogers, paints vibrant watercolour paintings full of energy, from an in-depth knowledge of her subject matter. Her studio is surrounded by the wild hills of Northumberland, whose inhabitants, along with her own menagerie of birds, feature in her work. 

Potter Josie Walters makes tableware and cooking pots in earthenware clay, which are decorated with slips and coloured glazes. Most of the pots are thrown on a traditional momentum wheel, even though many of the finished shapes are oval or rectangular.  

Ceramicist Simon Rich had such a strong interest in pottery at an early age that he started to teach the craft to his fellow pupils at school.

Upon leaving school, he looked for an outlet for his creative talents and joined the studio of the famous Alan Caiger-Smith at the Aldermaston Pottery. He remained there for five years before establishing himself in West Wales. He now creates beautiful ceramics with a Crystalline glaze.

Ali is a contemporary jewellery designer/maker, based in Herefordshire. In 2004 she decided to study at Hereford College of Art as a mature student; fulfilling a long awaited passion to work with metal. She started with metal sculpture, slowly scaling things down over the years and now creating jewellery, which still retains a sculptural quality to it.

Rachel Bailey’s jewellery explores her love of wild creatures, our native animals and birds and magical realms. The semi precious stones she uses are an integral part of her inspiration as they suggest landscapes in which the creatures inhabit. Each piece is individually made and therefore unique, in sterling silver and Hallmarked in Sheffield.

Running concurrently is an ever-changing collection of unique garden sculptures to enhance your outdoor space in a variety of media such as stoneware, forged iron, iron resin, stone resin, stainless steel, glass and more including the work of several sculptors new to the gallery.

Despite the mild winter season we will look forward to longer days, balmy evenings and with Summer around the corner our thoughts are turning to our gardens. With this in mind Old Chapel Gallery, Pembridge opens its annual garden sculpture exhibition ‘Shadows on the Grass’, showing the work of talented British designer/makers in a variety of media. 

Opening on Saturday April 30 2022 the exhibition will run throughout the year. 

We have worked with sculptor Helen Sinclair since we opened the gallery in 1989 and she is still a firm favourite. Helen makes semi-figurative sculpture, cast into either resin or bronze from originals which she makes in plaster, clay, wax, cardboard, wood.

The materials she works with are as stimulating to her as the subject matter.

Helen lives by the sea and collects driftwood, broken furniture, discarded plastic debris and other beach-found ‘stuff’, all of which regularly introduce a new and unexpected vocabulary to explore.

New to the gallery is sculptor Caro Burberry who creates bronze resin sculptures suitable for the garden and interior. 

Her work is about intimate relationship with nature and landscape; It explores a sense of joined destiny and belonging between humans and the rest of the natural world.

A lifelong artist with a strong background in printmaking and drawing, she received a classical training at The Frink School of Figurative Sculpture, where her mentors included Alan Thornhill and Peter Randall-Page RA.

Also showing is sculptor Andrew Roache, retired veterinary surgeon, who has a keen eye to animal anatomy. Most of his work is intended for outdoor display so is life-size or larger. He favours iron resin because it lends itself well to animal subjects and each cast matures in an interesting and individual way.

Several artist blacksmiths will be showing a collection of their latest work in forged iron and stainless steel, including Neil Lossock, John Twiddy, Jenny Pickford and Sally Gaston where the visitor will discover cardoons, poppies, ferns, wild flowers as well as practical garden pieces, including a bird bath and plant supports. Some will be galvanised to protect them from the weather and others will feature hand blown glass.

Each piece of garden sculpture is designed to give hours of pleasure to enhance time spent in the garden. All available online at oldchapelgallery.co.uk

The gallery is open from Wednesday to Saturday 11 – 4.30pm and Sunday 12 – 4pm Other times by appointment. Closed on Tuesdays. For more information or to join the mailing list go to www.oldchapelgallery.co.uk or ring 01544 388842

Glorious Awakening’ h.Art and Autumn Exhibition at Old Chapel Gallery, Pembridge opens on Saturday  September 4 promoting the work of talented British artists and makers from around the county and beyond.

Heading the line up will be a tempting collection of stained glass from ever popular artist Tamsin Abbott whose work is influenced by our ancient land and how we are connected to it: the hills, the woods, the plants, birds and animals that live alongside us and the world of myths and fairytales that we have spun around it.

New to the gallery is jeweller Ali Tregaskes who combines her love of photography with her metal work using her images of nature, architecture and coast to create the etchings. Techniques she employs include silver etching, oxidising, saw piercing, soldering and granulation. Ali creates jewellery that appeals to both men and women.

Another new comer to the gallery is printmaker Sarah Jameson, a Shropshire based artist working in a variety of media, including photography, traditional and digital drawing, collage and mono-printing. She is inspired by her local landscape  – the hills, steep-sided valleys and woods, as well as its proximity to her home country of Wales.

Textile artist Barbara Shaw hand-stitches many scraps of fabric in layers to produce exquisite, unique textile collage pictures. During the week of h.Art, Barbara will be demonstrating how she puts together her amazing textile collage pictures.

Karin Celestine is an artist and author, who creates needle felted animals of charm and character, including the stars of her own delightful stop-motion animations and her series of children’s books.

Her joy in the natural world is reflected in her sculptural copper pieces which complement her felt-work.

Ceramic artist Helen Martino is fascinated by body language and how it communicates. In her ceramic sculptures the exaggerated and stylised movements of the silent movies have seemed a natural way to portray communication and narrative as the sculptures depict moments in the everyday life of people. Helen works on a series of pieces within a single narrative, each successive sculpture expressing the story in a different way through a change in scale, movement, composition or colour.

Mary Stephens loves working with clay, mainly producing fine thrown stoneware and porcelain on the potter’s wheel. Her work is often part glazed which allows the tactile quality of the fired piece to be explored as well as giving a subtle design. Mary grew up in Leominster and trained as a potter at Pembridge Terracotta after completing a Fine Art Sculpture degree in 1997.

Also showing will be a collection of art work by Jemima Jameson who works mainly in acrylics. She enjoys painting onto wooden panels, bowls and furniture which suits her style.

To compliment this exhibition there will be jewellery from several Herefordshire designers including  Rachel Bailey, Leoma Drew, Hilary Mee, Chrissie Nash, Lesley Strickland, Gail Klevan and more.

This exhibition will run till the end of October 2021