End of Year

Only four more days of the Sublime Landscapes exhibition to run. Mixed feelings; it's a wonderful show, and a joy to spend time surrounded by such enriching work and so will be a shame to take it down next week, but I'm also looking forward to some family time with the gallery closed for Christmas.

With Debbie painting, running the gallery and looking after Finn, and with me working, the moments we can spend together are few, but precious. The next few weeks will be spent reflecting on an busy year, 2009, and looking forward to 2010.

And an important part of this is news that warmed our hearts - a holiday cottage on the Northumberalnd coastline that we have stayed in several times before has been refurbished and after several years off the market, is now back open for business. We usually stay in January or February to enjoy the empty but usually sunlit beach. Debbie takes paint and brush, and many of her larger seascapes have been painted on the cottage's kitchen table looking out over the epic panorama... Fingers crossed our booking has been accepted for Jan...

We visited a new gallery in York on Sunday - The New School House near the Black Swan pub. It's great to see new galleries in the area (for some reason York seems to have few considering what a beautiful city it is and how many visitors it attracts each year). The New School House is carrying some of the finest ceramics we have seen in the area - and we wish them all the success for the future...

In Deep

This is our first year living here at the Lund, and now, moving from Autumn through to the beginning of winter, we are learning some more new things...

Like the fact that, when it rains a lot after the leaves have just fallen from the trees, then the pond outlet gets blocked, it floods. Then the water starts to back up the inlets to the pond - which includes our sewage biodigester. So I spent much of last night, in the dark with a big stick trying to unblock the pond outflow. But it was worth the effort - when I finally found it and cleared it it was like a huge gurgling bath emptying for a couple of hours... fantastic noise!

And with the leaves falling, the colours change in the garden. The bark on the beach trees has finally turned bright white, showing up the contrast with the red dogwood...


But mainly, at the moment, it is just the gray and brown of rain and mud!

The Northern Art Show

This week I have taken a few days off work with the aim of hanging the next show in good time, rather than working right up until the last minute as is far too easy to do. And this time it paid off. Our reward was the chance to take a family day out together - something we don't manage to do very often.

So, Debbie, Finn and I headed off to the Northern Art Show in Harrogate. Last year we took a stand for Lund Gallery. It was our first venture into the world of art fairs, and I think we did look a little 'fresh faced'. We took a lot of effort to set up with shelving, cabinets, ceramics and paintings all arranged like a mini Lund Gallery. But it looked like the 'norm' was to turn up with some paintings and just hang them on the partition walls, without too much extra fuss. Anyhow - the main thing was that we had a great time, and even managed to cover the costs (which not everyone managed to do...)

I am glad that the art show was back in Harrogate, and I hope it becomes a regular feature. The more successful art based events in Yorkshire, the better. If it runs again next year we will aim to be there - but this year with having a child, moving house and extending the gallery it was just too much to contemplate.

So now Debbie is framing up her work to hang in the show. As soon as it is up, I'll be up the ladders adjusting the lighting and replacing some bulbs.

And now I'll be heading out to feed the boiler... With the colder weather coming in it is eating more wood chip. It does take an effort to feed, but the smell of the smoke drifting around the barns behind the cottage is wonderful. And the thin pale line rising from the chimney is somehow comforting to see in the pale light just before dawn - 'The boiler is still running - phew'.

Sublime Landscapes

Work from Jonathan Shearer and Michelle Knight turned up at the gallery a couple of days ago - very exciting! For this show we have taken the decision to put as much information and as many images as possible up on our website - so please do take a look...

Debbie's Blog so far...

It’s wonderful to be starting to get a bit of time back in the studio after 9 months, although I am fully aware that Motherhood means an end to long luxurious periods spent pondering things before brush hits paper.


The attached picture of my studio is remarkably illustrative of my studio time up until recently – namely small hours snatched here and there, often at night or in that slightly woolly sleep deprived state that all new parents are familiar with. A couple of commissions have given me healthy deadlines to encourage my return sooner rather than later – the artists’ ability to procrastinate is another entirely different topic which deserves its own session..!

Recently a couple of lovely occurrences at the gallery served to remind me of what a wonderfully small world the creative one is.

Last week a couple of gallery regulars and past customers popped into the gallery with some friends who were breaking their journey south to Wales from Scotland having delivered some work to an exhibition. After some time I enquired as to the name of the lady with whom I had been chewing the fat to which she answered ,”oh you probably won’t have heard of me…”

Turns out this artist was Mary Loyd Jones. I think she was quite shocked to learn that my student sketchbooks contained post cards of Mary’s work which I had first seen hanging in an exhibition at Leeds City Art Gallery 15 or so years ago. Furthermore I also discovered that Mary is currently working on a project with painter Roger Cecil, another painter whose work I strongly identify with and admire.

The other occurrence was during the recent preview to Kate Wickam’s show. Kate had bravely made the journey up from East Sussex to be present at the preview. An hour or so into proceedings and a relatively elderly couple introduced themselves to Kate. Turns out that Kate had been a bridesmaid at this couples wedding when she was about 6 years old, over 40 years ago. The couple who are on our mailing list from an exhibition last year received the invite and deduced that this must be the same Kate Wickam who they knew had gone on to study ceramics. A lot of catching up ensued and resulted in the purchase of two lovely pieces of Kate’s work – a lovely end to the day…

Next week its hopefully off to Leeds with Finn to see the Hughie O’Donaghue show before it disappears.

Green at last

Rain at last. Six weeks ago I finally managed to sow grass seed on the mud bath that had surrounded our house. Then we had one of the driest autumns in years and I thought I would lose the whole lot. So a good downpour has been welcome, and the grass seems to have doubled in volume in a day....

And also helped the cabbage finally perk up after being transplanted:

Though they have a long way to go compared to those in an allotment just down the road. While taking our son on a walk last Sunday, I passed this amazing show of colour over a fantastic allotment. Allotments often display a wonderful skill in making do with whatever is at hand, a quality I admire...

Shorter Days

Today was the first day that I mounted lights on my bike to cycle to work since the beginning of summer. The days seem to be getting shorter so quickly (which indeed they do - as the rate of change of day length is quickest around the equinox). But the reward of setting of before dawn is to see the sun rising, and today was a cracker of a sunrise.

The weather forecast suggests that the first frosts can be expected soon. I have just planted out my cabbages and spring greens and sown some broad beans, so am hoping that they manage to get a hold before the weather turns to colder. If I am lucky, the frost will come just in time to wipe out the catapillars that I know are just startng to feed on the cabbage.

I have always been keen on growing my own veg. It'snot a financial thing, or even really a taste thing (though they do taste better - most of the time), I think it's mainly a 'feelgood' thing. Watching something grow from seed, nurturing its development, seeing it ripen and mature, then eating it: There is something complete and 'wholesome' about the whole cycle. This year has been a courgette bonanza, and Debbie and I have been experimenting with ways to cope with the deluge. Much courgette cake has been eaten, and the freezer if full of courgette curry (interesting - but probably not to be repeated...)

And after several years of missing the opportunity, this year I managed to catch the elderberries in time. After many hours of labour on Sunday I have six small jars of elderberry relish. Just need to try and leave them long enough to mature. (The first time I tried this recipe in 2003 I knocked over a 4 pint jug full of elderberries. I was surrounded by thousands of little black berries and could not move from the spot without crushing them underfoot - Debbie had to come and rescue me with a dustpan and brush...)

Our Fourth Birthday...

Lund Gallery has recently celebrated its fourth birthday, and Debbie and I are starting to settle into our new life here at the Lund. In February, following several years of planning and building, we finally moved out to the gallery and now live in a small cottage on site with our nine month old son Finn. The time seemed right to keep a record of our Life at the Lund...

One of the most exciting recent events has been our first creative course to be run at the gallery. Dominic Hopkinson, a sculptor with over 20 years experience working in stone, hosted two weekends of 'Sculpture in Stone' in a cattle shed at the Lund.

Since opening the Gallery we have been keen to host creative events in the space here at the gallery, and so it was wonderful to see this finally kick off and listen to the tapping of metal into stone for hour after hour... I'm sure we'll try and lure Dominic back for some events next year.

Lund Gallery is currently featuring ceramics by Kate Wickham at Gallery. Kate came up from London to be present at the opening, which gave many people a chance to have a chat about her work and career... which was much appreciated.

The other big news is that, with the weather starting to cool off, I have re-lit the boiler. It's a 40kW woodchip and log boiler imported from Denmark, and it caused months of teething problems when we first sparked it up in January. So far this week, it seems to be burning well. Actually, the colder the weather the better the boiler runs; it has most problems when it is trying to 'tick-over'... tending to burn back up into the fuel hopper which causes the whole system to flood itself. Fingers crossed for the next few weeks!