2010 Round Up

As the year rapidly draws to a close, it's time to reflect on what's happened over the past months. For us it's been a great year: we launched our blog, visited lots of galleries, exhibitions and other art events, talked to dozens of amazing artists, began to build up a collection of pictures, ceramics and other art and generally had an arty kind of year.

It's difficult to decide what the highlights of the year have been, but after much discussion, here our some of our favourite things from 2010.

Favourite Picture

Rosita, our own Mona Lisa. We discovered her in a charity shop and almost passed her by. She now keeps an eye on the comings and goings from the corner of our living room. This is an intriguing portrait that has given us lots to discuss and we are sure it will continue to do so.

Favourite Ceramic

Mortimer, the toucan has a unique style, dramatic colouring and a personality all his own. He has a comfortable little perch on top of the electric meter cupboard; an ideal vantage point to watch the world go by through the front window.

Favourite Place

Richmond Station in North Yorkshire. This rennovated railway station is not only a versatile and active venue for displaying and selling art but also a very popular focal point for local residents and tourists alike.

Favourite Artist

Where do we start? We've met so many and admired so much of their work. As we've chatted with them we've discovered a wealth of artistic talent and enthusiasm. So we have to say that they're all our favourites. We thank them for their interest in what we are doing and look forward to seeing them and many others we have yet to meet next year.

Vicky And Vince,
Love Your Art.

Art In Malta

We're just back from a lovely trip to Malta. The island is strategically located in the Mediterranean Sea, just south of Sicily. Having been occupied or administered by Phoenicians, Romans and British amongst others, it is steeped in history. But despite this varied history, we weren't expecting to see much in the way of art.

However, we had barely got off the plane before we encountered our first piece of Maltese art. As we entered the airport terminal building we passed a modern sculpture called Flight (pictured). This was the beginning of an art journey through the ages.

Our first trip out was to the capital, Valletta, where crowds were celebrating Republic Day. We had been led to believe that everywhere would be closed but we found all the shops open. These included quite a few art shops selling contemporary paintings, ceramics, glass and jewellery.

Whilst in Valletta we also visited the Casa Rocca Picola, a splendid 16th century palace now owned and occupied by the 9th Marquis and Marchioness De Piro. As everyone else was watching the Military displays in Republic Square, we were given a personal tour by the guide and were able to spend more time looking at the things we found particularly interesting. Every room was filled with pictures, including family portraits dating back to the 1500's, local landscapes and other interesting subjects.

Later in the week we returned to Valletta to visit The National Museum of Fine Arts. On display are a large number of pictures by artists who were either native to the island or who had visited there. The dates range from the 1400s to the present day and many of the earlier pictures are in a Caravaggistic style. Sadly, we missed seeing some of Caravaggio's own paintings which are in the St John's Co-Cathedral; we arrived 15 minutes after it had closed. If you're not familiar with Caravaggio, you can read more here.

Moving back to Roman times, we visited the domus museum at Rabat, near Mdina. A small display of artifacts did not really prepare us for the splendid mosaic floors that had been unearthed here. Sections of mosaic were also on display around the rooms. Some of these were made with tessera only few millimetres in size. The exquisite detail must have taken a team of artisans months to create.

Going back even further in time, the Hypogeum in Paola is a series of prehistoric underground burial chambers dating back between 4000 and 6000 years. This amazing feat of architecture carved out of the limestone to form interconnected chambers is the last place you would expect to find art. But in some of the more recent (if you can call 4000 years recent) chambers, hexagonal and spiral patterns painted in red ochre could just be made out on the walls and ceilings.

What we had planned to be a simple, relaxing holiday with visits to a few historic places, turned out to be a fascinating exploration of the history of art in Malta.


Vicky and Vince,
Love Your Art

Letter To Santa

Dear Santa,

We are looking forward to Christmas very much and have been very good boys and girls all year. We have built a worthy collection of art and supported several charity shops at the same time. We haven't written nasty things about controversial artists or their beds and we haven't knocked over any expensive Chinese vases.

Please stop at our house on Christmas Eve. We will leave you two mince pies and a glass of sherry as well as a saucer of milk for Rudolph.

Here is our list:

Tickets to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, inclusive of flights from Heathrow Airport. We want to have a thorough look round the gallery so we will also need two weeks accommodation at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel. Plus a bit of spending money for the shops.

An art lesson from Banksy. This will let us decorate the outside of our house in a stunning fashion and increase the value of our home by about ten million times!

The Tate Art Collector card game. This will keep the family occupied when they visit and with our superior knowledge of art we will always win!

Finally a picture of sunflowers to brighten up the Winter days. The one by Van Gogh looks quite nice and we will make every effort to find a space on our wall for it.

Finally, finally, a year's supply of Pringles crisps so we have something to nibble on as we admire our own little art collection.


Vicky and Vince,
Love Your Art

Colours Of The Landscape

We were hoping to visit Ann Whitfield's exhibition at the Witham Gallery in Barnard Castle this weekend and were disappointed that other commitments made this impossible for us. We've come across Ann's work a couple of times recently and had made a mental note to take a closer look and hopefully chat to Ann to find out more about her unique style of painting.

As luck would have it, Ann had read our blog and invited us to visit her a couple of weeks ago for a chat and to see a broad range of her work. So we wrapped up well against the early snows and trekked along to Barnard Castle.

Ann began to focus on painting landscapes around eight years ago when she and her husband, Terry, moved from Dorset. She is inspired by the scenery in and around the Dales but rather than make a realistic depiction, she prefers to give a slightly abstract feel to her pictures.

Working with acrylic paint using a palette knife, she sometimes incorporates other materials in the pictures including tissue paper, gold leaf and metallic foil (apparently Green and Black's is the best - both the foil and chocolate!). The tissue paper gives an interesting texture to the paint and the foil and gold leaf adds an extra dimension when it catches the light.

On the face of it, her choice of colours (not that it's really a conscious choice) are unusual. But the lively purples, oranges and pinks are used by Ann to express her emotional response to the subject matter. She recalls a visitor saying that her pictures were "full of joy". We have to agree, they are quite uplifting and very different from conventional landscapes.

Apart from the colours, Ann told us that she likes to portray the hills and valleys accurately so that people are able to recognise the places. She and Terry often go walking to find interesting and unusual views for Ann to sketch and subsequently paint. She finds that fellow walkers like to see and buy her paintings and love to relate stories from the locations they are familiar with. We'd also like to visit some of the locations in Ann's pictures to see them for ourselves. But perhaps we'll wait for the snow to melt first.

The exhibition is running from 10th to 15th December 2010, from 10am to 5pm each day. Ann is sharing the exhibition gallery with Anne Mason, another popular artist from nearby Eggleston.

Ann also has a selection of her pictures permanently on display at her home and is pleased to welcome visitors. You can arrange a visit by email (info@annwhitfieldart.co.uk) or take a look at Ann's web site.

Vicky and Vince,

Love Your Art

The Art Of Geometry

When you think of art, you don't normally associate it with mathematics. But an artist we met recently combines her skills in both art and geometry to create distinctive carved ceramic works. We met Halima Cassell at the preview of her "Dreams Made Manifest" exhibition at Darlington Arts Centre and again a few days later when she gave a talk about her work.

Easily recognisable, her unique style comes from her observation of patterns and their transformation into three-dimensional forms. She takes inspiration from the patterns she sees in Islamic architecture and Asian and African designs.

A versatile sculptor, Halima occasionally works in bronze, stone and wood but her favourite material is clay. Using a variety of clays from around the world she first makes the basic form then calculates, measures and marks a geometric pattern into it and finally carves out the three dimensional pattern. The resulting pieces have individual colours and textures and are described by Halima as "faceted forms"; they reflect light and produce shadows creating a sense of movement as you walk around them.

As we browsed around her exhibition, we were delighted to see that almost all of her pieces had names (we've lost count of how many times we've visited exhibitions where everything was labeled "Untitled"). Halima told us she usually comes up with the names herself but on the odd time she gets stuck, she simply invites a group of friends around, opens a bottle of wine and by the end of the evening, somebody has usually come up with a great name for the anonymous piece.


Halima is a remarkably talented artist. Her imaginative ideas and observational skills combined with her dedication to quality and precision make her work popular around the world. Yet she remains down to earth, friendly and accessible to her fans (which now includes us); she can explain her work equally well in both a technical way and in a simple, jargon-free way that even we can understand. We look forward to our next encounter.


Halima's web site is at www.halimacassell.co.uk.



Love Your Art

Vicky and Vince

The Missing Link

We've talked about seeing art. We've talked about buying art. The missing link is doing art. So with cheque book in hand I called into Darlington Arts Centre and enrolled on an Introduction to Drawing and Painting course.

I have to say that I am not a skilled artist. I've done a bit of doodling in the past but nothing worth keeping. I can also manage to splash a bit of paint on the kitchen walls when they need it.

It was a chilly Wednesday morning in September when I joined the group of a dozen other students to learn what drawing and painting is all about and have a bit of fun at the same time. After the obligatory safety talk and introductions, we got started mixing paint to work out how to make virtually any colour from a basic half dozen tubes of paint.

By week two we were painting a watercolour landscape, a task that was pretty simple thanks to the carefully thought out approach of the tutor, Paul Dillon. Paul has over thirty years experience of drawing and painting and easily pointed out what each of us was doing well and how we could improve on the trickier aspects of painting.

One of Paul's main interests is landscape painting and this influences the classes to some extent. However, he's keen that everybody discovers their own preferences and techniques and he spent time with many of the students suggesting how they could develop their individual styles in the future.

Like me, the other students enjoyed the course too. They agreed that it had been a useful, broad introduction to painting and drawing. Those who had not done any art before had learned a lot; those who already dabbled a bit had refined their techniques and picked up a lot of hints and tips to take them further.

Although my artistic ambition is to create sculpture and mixed media art, this course has given me many of the essentials that I can use when working on my own art.

The course content covers drawing, watercolour and acrylic, observation and composition. It deals with the basic theory and provides lots of opportunities for practical work. So if you want to put things into perspective or find out how to use puddle management to avoid cauliflowers, why not have a go yourself.

The course was part of a programme of leisure classes run by Darlington Borough Council. More are planned for the New Year term. Contact the Arts Centre for details.

Love Your Art,
Vince

Suffer Not In Silence

If you'd gone along to Darlington Arts Centre last Thursday evening, you may have struggled to get in the building; there were hundreds of people milling around. Some had come to visit the centre's own theatre, some to learn how to paint or make jewellery, some to see Halima Cassell's ceramics exhibition preview, some simply to have a drink and a chat with friends in the Lounge and some to attend the Darlington For Culture meeting.

This is a thriving centre of culture, entertainment and social activities. Sadly it may close next year due to Government spending cutbacks. We joined the latter group of visitors to hear about an initiative that may avoid the closure of the building and retain the range of popular arts activities in the town.

Last month Darlington Borough Council announced their worst-case scenario for cutting £22m from their total budget. This included withdrawing their generous (compared to other, much larger, councils) funding for both the Civic Theatre and the Arts Centre, leading to their likely closure. Darlington For Culture was quickly set up with the intention of maintaining the services provided through alternative support from other funding bodies, the centre users and the community at large.

The meeting, chaired by Paul Harman who has extensive experience especially in the performing arts, covered three main points; the discussions that had taken place with the Council so far; a proposal to set up a Community Interest Company to take over the operation of the building and an idea for a "cultural parliament" where issues and the needs of the community could be discussed openly and acted upon. The meeting was attended by members from the clubs and groups based at the centre, representatives from the council, staff and users of the centre and also concerned members of the public.

The general feeling from the audience was that losing a facility like the arts centre would be a significant loss to Darlington as a whole, not just the regular users. It was pointed out that the arts centre served a regional community and perhaps additional support could be obtained from further afield. Several people urged co-operation with the council and other bodies rather than trying to go it alone.

A number of related ideas, some more realistic than others, were put forward. But we're not sure that the suggestion to ask the council to do a U-turn and leave the funding in place would be very successful, considering the pressure they will be under to make substantial savings across their budget.

As you might expect, there was some political posturing by a few people in the room. However their mischievous interruptions were greatly outnumbered by the concerns and support from the majority of the day-to-day users of the centre.

At the end of the meeting a vote was taken on whether individuals would pledge £10 each to buy a share in the company. The vast majority raised their hands, moving the process another step forward.

Whether or not Darlington For Culture will become part of a solution is still uncertain. There may not be sufficient support or time to make the necessary arrangements. What is certain is that without a determined push to find a solution, it is likely that Darlington Arts Centre will close next year.

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Art For All

Darlington Society Of Arts is holding its annual exhibition at the Arts Centre in Darlington. We couldn't miss seeing a large number of paintings, ceramics and mixed media by local artists so off we went.

We were impressed by the quality of the works, the range of styles and techniques used as well as the variety of subjects. We would love to talk about them all but we only have space to mention a few items that caught our attention.

Bella Staithes by Cassandra Anderson is a watercolour of Staithes harbour in unusual shades of purple, pink, brown and turquoise. To us, it seems to be alive with movement and activity, we can almost hear the seagulls and splashing waves. It has an atmosphere that many similar pictures fail to achieve.

Cassandra likes to paint all kinds of subjects. She told us that she paints very quickly and has built up a diverse collection of work. She is now studying Art History through the Open University.

Jack and Rosie Mackenzie are brother and sister and both obviously talented artists. At the show they are exhibiting mutual portraits in acrylic. Both pictures use completely different styles yet both are full of character and emotion.

Rosie's portrait of Jack won the Junior Award. It captures the light and shade on Jack's face perfectly. Jack's portrait of Rosie was highly commended. His technique of bold brush strokes works well to portray his sister in an intimate pose of laughter. It's a pleasure to see some younger artists applying their skills to portraits, a genre that seems to have lost its popularity these days.

The exhibition runs until 19th November 2010 at Darlington Arts Centre.

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

It's Alive!

Illustrations for books form a specialist art genre of their own and are growing in popularity among collectors. The opportunity to own an original illustration is enticing for several reasons: it represents favourite books or characters especially from childhood; it brings a story to life; it's a work of art in its own right; and it's for investment reasons. The Alive! exhibition at the Myles Meehan Gallery, Darlington showcases important illustrators some of whose images are instantly recognisable as well as including many unseen illustrations that were unpublished.

The role of the book illustrator is to interpret the story and depict it in a visually appealing way. In children's books these pictures are often whimsical depictions of people and anthropomorphised animals sometimes in comical situations. For example, I laughed out loud at Emma Chichester Clark's Croc - a cute, harmless bright green crocodile wearing a pink scarf - opening gifts on Christmas Day in "Presents"; or sitting on chair in an outdoor cafe enjoying a nice cold drink with her friend Melrose in "Cafe Scene".

Both adults and children will be familiar with the work on Quentin Blake; of his works featured here, I particularly liked "Reader with Parrot" rendered in his well-known pen and ink style with watercolour. The simple, quickly drawn lines portray the humour and absurdity of a purple parrot perched on top of the head of an elderly man sitting reading in a chair. This picture is part of a series Blake has produced featuring birds doing human tasks in "The Life of Birds".

Ronald Searle also switches between illustrating for adults and children and I didn't know he had produced illustrations for Jeffrey Archer's short stories in "Cat O'Nine Tales". The story of "The Commissioner" is illustrated with a portrait of the Bombay Chief of Police as a rotund looking man: dressed in a grubby cream military uniform bursting at the seams; with an elaborate upturned moustache; a gun holster is hooked around his neck, and he is using a large white hanky to mop his head.

Coming to exhibitions such as this is enjoyable as I'm often introduced to artists whose work I want to see more of. One is Oliver Jeffers for his simple but humorous illustrations with complicated titles such as "He Thought He Might Lasso The Star With The Life Belt" and the book eating boy in "He Was Going Through Them At A Fierce Rate".

Another is Paul Cox, whose work I'm going to nominate as my exhibition favourite for his picture in Durrell's "My Family and other Animals" entitled "Don'ts says anythings to anyones". This shows Spiro and Gerald driving, in an open top car, back from town where they'd been to buy some goldfish. It's a large dramatic picture fizzing with personality and energy allowing the characters to live beyond the pages of the book.

The Alive! Contemporary British Illustration exhibition continues at the Myles Meehan Gallery in the Arts Centre, Darlington until 13th November 2010. The works have been selected and supplied by Chris Beetles Gallery, London.

Love Your Art,
Vicky

Cockerton Art Group

We had a weekend of surprises while visiting an exhibition of art at a local church in Darlington.

Our first surprise was how many people were there viewing the art works. When we arrived, around 11am, the atmosphere was buzzing and we had to squeeze past lots of other enthusiastic viewers to see the pictures.

The show, held by Cockerton Art Group in the Methodist church on the village green, had around 120 pictures produced by the group's members. As you would expect with a general exhibition like this the subject matter and the mediums used were wide ranging. The quality of the work was excellent and most of the pictures were for sale, with prices typically between £10 and £50.

We moved slowly up and down the rows of tables with the pictures on them, it was easy to view the pictures and nobody seemed to mind if you picked them up for a closer look.

As is customary with our blogs, we will mention a few that we liked. Vince was impressed by Carol Cloughton's picture of sheep on the moors. By the way, did we mention that we collect sheep art? Vicky liked L Roach's use of perspective to draw you along the South Jetty at the harbour in Amble, Northumberland. We also admired the finely detailed fretwork of two ladies by Peter Edge.

After a brief look round we noticed a sign saying 'cafe' so decided to go for a cuppa. Here was our next surprise, the Sunday School rooms had been converted into a makeshift cafe and it was packed with even more people than the exhibition! We managed to find a space sharing a table with a couple who had been to see the pictures too. We enjoyed a friendly chat with them about the exhibition and the pictures that we liked.

Our final surprise was on the way out as we spotted a couple of scantily clad women! Fortunately they were only paintings, by the aforementioned Peter Edge. We wondered what the Minister might say if he saw them in his church!



Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Teesdale Open Studios

Open studio events are a convenient way to have a day out visiting artists, enjoying their art and exploring the local area. So last weekend, foregoing our Sunday lie-in, we headed off to Barnard Castle where members of Teesdale Artists' Network are throwing their studios open to art lovers.

Our first call was on John and Pam Pickering. Pam was showing some of her delightful felt pictures based on mythical themes and the natural world. She explained how she embroidered the felt panels both by hand and using a special sewing machine. When producing commissioned work, she likes to include images and symbols that have some connection and meaning to the client.

John showed us a wide range of his paintings, many depicting scenery and landmarks in and around Barnard Castle. His style is strongly influenced by his background in graphic design and screen printing. We particularly admired his paintings of Venice. John likes to visit Venice to find scenes to paint and has found these pictures are very popular with art viewers and buyers.

Next we headed for the Spice Island Restaurant. Not for lunch but to see pictures by Rennie Hamilton (see picture above). Her abstract landscapes and rock formations are influenced by climate change. Rennie told us that she is more an artist than an environmentalist but painting these pictures is her way of helping to raise awareness of ecological issues. We liked the bold style and colours of her paintings.

Our final visit was to Suzanne Tweddle's studio where she produces exquisite glass beads using lampworking techniques. Suzanne actually made a bead while we were there. It was fascinating to watch the demonstration as she melted a rod of coloured glass onto a stainless steel mandrel. She then added dots of different coloured glass. As the whole thing finally melted together and the glowing blob of glass began to cool down, a gorgeous colourful, patterned bead emerged. Suzanne uses the beads to create unique items of jewellery, hand made from start to finish.

We are fast becoming fans of open studios. The events are informal, there is no pressure to buy anything when you visit and the artists are pleased to discuss their work and answer questions. In some cases the artists or makers are happy to demonstrate their techniques to visitors. Although the wide choice of studios to visit can make it tricky to decide who to go and see, with a little bit of advanced planning you can have a great day out.

The Teesdale open studios continue all this week in and around Barnard Castle, ending on Sunday 31st October 2010. There are more details on the web site at www.teesdaleopenstudios.co.uk


Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Credit Crunch Art

Times are tough. The future's uncertain. Everyone's short of money and along comes the perfect picture you've been waiting for. Or in our case, three of them.

We don't want to miss this opportunity but buying so much art may not be the best use of funds during the credit crunch. On the other hand, we don't want to wait or we may miss out.

So should our personal cutbacks affect our art collecting or can we justify buying art in a recession? Here are eight good reasons that we use.

1. It's cheaper than a holiday. Of course it depends where you go: giving up a wet weekend in Bognor may not pay for the Mona Lisa but postponing that two weeks at a 5-star hotel in the Seychelles could buy you some very nice artworks.

2. You can cut back on other things. Try living on baked beans for a week, or three...

3. It's an investment - you'll be able to sell it in thirty years to fund your pension, probably.

4. It cheers you up every time you look at it. (Vicky uses that excuse every time she gets a new pair of shoes.)

5. Your friends will think you're really wealthy and not about to lose your job.

6. You can sell the yacht. (Are you listening Vince?)

7. You can buy your next picture from a charity shop. You might even find that lost Van Gogh hidden by the Nazis. Even if you don't it still provides entertainment seeing all the rubbish, sorry, treasures that people have thrown out.

8. Retail therapy works.


So this weekend we'll resurrect the credit cards and go on a spending spree.

Now we're off to have dinner. Guess it will be beans on toast again tonight.


Love your Art
Vicky and Vince,

Going Back In Time

I must be dreaming. I am. I'm dreaming. I can't believe it. I've travelled back in time to when I was six years old and I'm surrounded by dozens of pictures of Thomas, Percy, Henry and the Fat Controller. Back then I was a huge fan of Thomas the Tank Engine. Those little oblong books, full of wonderful stories and brilliant pictures, were what childhood was all about.

But hang on, it's 2010 now, I'm not six years old any more (sadly). How can this be possible? Well, I'm at an exhibition of original illustrations from the Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends comics. There are over a hundred pictures here; many black and white drawings, some in colour, depicting all the popular characters from the stories, old and new.

To add to the excitement, the exhibition is in a converted railway station, in Richmond, North Yorkshire. And what's more, all the pictures are all for sale!

These original pen and ink drawings were created by the late Timothy Marwood for the Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends comics. They include cover illustrations as well as the stories inside the comics.

With so many magical pictures here it is almost impossible to pick a favourite. The quality and detail is fantastic. I must have looked at each picture 3 or 4 times at least. Eventually I recognised the images from a story I remembered reading all those years ago. It told the worrying tale of how Thomas was low on water but found the water tank out of order. The fireman saved the day when he refilled Thomas's tanks from a nearby stream using only a bucket full of holes!

Vicky's favourite was set in the countryside and showed a charming scene with two children receiving an Easter egg from the Fat Controller with Thomas and James in the background. No doubt they were being rewarded for preventing a major disaster on the railway. Sadly, Vicky, quite an avid reader, has never read the Thomas books. Perhaps this visit will inspire her to do so.

I suppose the question on your mind now is whether we bought one of the illustrations. Well, I think you probably know the answer to that already. A charming drawing of Thomas with Annie and Clarabel is now waiting at the signals until we find a space for them on our walls.

The show continues until 31st October 2010.

Read more about the Thomas show.

Visit the official Thomas web site.

Vince (aged 6+),

Love Your Art

Two Different Worlds

Several events over recent weeks have prompted us to think about how the art world goes about showing and selling art. It seems there are two main styles - formal and informal.

In previous posts we have written about Gallerina and their friendly, relaxed approach, the open-plan exhibitions at Richmond Station where you can browse at leisure all day long if you want and the Matombo sculpture displays with their "have a go yourself" feature.

These ways of seeing and buying art are easy, enjoyable and fun.

On the other hand, some of the commercial galleries we have visited have made us feel quite uncomfortable, even nervous, as though we don't belong to their exclusive art-set.

We went into such a gallery a few weeks ago. The walls were plain, cold white. The pictures and ceramics were displayed in neat, rigid rows, with official looking descriptions, equally neatly aligned next to them.

The owner was just as rigid and predictable. He hovered in the background looking almost like one of his works of art (perhaps a self-installation?). We were "allowed" to wander round the displays. But when we stopped at a picture, he pounced and gave us a lengthy lecture about the artist's life and the concepts behind this amazing work of art. Oh, and he owned a collection of works by that artist too.

We rapidly worked our way back to the door and left the gallery dazed by the intense experience. Time for a coffee and large slice of cake to wind down!

Like most people, we are interested in art for the pleasure it gives us. We can admire the skills of the artists and collect the works we find attractive. We want to enjoy the experience. Gallery owners and curators can help us to learn about the art we are interested in, help us to choose which pieces of art to buy and put us at ease. If we are comfortable and relaxed, we might even spend more money than we ought to.


Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

That's The Way To Do It

If we asked you to guess who won the recent customer services survey in Darlington, you might suggest it was one of the big supermarkets, a popular department store or a designer clothes shop.

But this year, the award for the best customer service in own was won by Gallerina, a commercial art gallery on Duke Street.

The survey was organised by Darlington Borough Council and Darlington Town Centre Traders' Association who sent out mystery shoppers over the summer to find out which businesses gave the best service to their customers.

Brother and sister team Richard and Helen Hindle, who run Gallerina, are both delighted to win the award and put it down to their friendly, relaxed approach, creating an atmosphere where you can browse at leisure and not feel intimidated.

Our experience of the gallery confirms that this philosophy works. Whenever we've popped into Gallerina, we've invariably found Richard enthusiastically discussing an interesting artist with a customer or helping someone to choose the best type of frame for a particular painting.

In fact, when I (Vince) called in to discuss writing this blog, Richard was sat on the sofa chatting with customers over a cuppa. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to join them.

Gallerina's approach has helped them to grow over twelve years to become one of the leading sellers of contemporary art in the area. The gallery currently has displays by Tom McGuiness and Peter Blake as well as a varied mixture of works by many talented artists.

Check out the Gallerina web site.

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Starry Starry Night

Our living room finally has a nicely balanced spread of art on its walls after we discovered a neat little picture called Stars.

In one corner of our living room, a door leads to the kitchen. The two walls that meet at that corner both have various pictures on them a little distance away from the door. The high ceiling leaves a space above the door of around 750mm (2' 6") high by 850mm (2' 10") wide. This space was crying out for a picture but as it was so high and an awkward size, we were at a loss what to do with it.

The other day as we entered one of our favourite local charity shops we glanced across and saw Stars. It wasn't very big, it didn't look very exciting and the chunky gold frame looked a bit out of scale with the picture.

On the way out we took a closer look. It was an original oil painting by Anne Jackson Shields. The picture was basically black with lots of tiny specks of colour to represent the stars. Vicky liked the chunky frame that had been very neatly assembled.

We weren't sure if it would work in the space we wanted to fill. A black picture in a brightly coloured living room? It didn't sound like a recipe for success. We stood in the shop for quite some time discussing whether or not to buy it. We even considered keeping the frame but swapping the picture for something more colourful. In the end we did buy it, thinking we could do something with it even if it didn't work in the living room.

Back home, Vince held Stars up above the door; the scale and proportions looked good; the bold frame didn't overpower the space; it didn't fight with the pictures on the other walls.

We nailed in a hook and hung the picture in its new home. After a bit of discussion about how good it looked, we realised that not only did it fill the space well, it also tied the two walls together. On one side, the gold frame matched a group of other pictures with gold frames, on the other, the blackness of the painting connected with the black frames of two large pictures and the black TV set.

After a few weeks with Stars in our living room, we are very pleased with how it works, integrating other displays that were completely separate before. Sometimes it is not always obvious what works until you try it.

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Surprises At Newby Hall

There's a lot to see at Newby Hall. Apart from the house and gardens there is quite a bit of art too. On the day I visited, there was a display of children's book illustrations by Catherine Rayner, pictures to view in the hall itself and the displays by the Matombo sculptors. But my main aim was to look at the contemporary sculptures on the woodland trail.

It was a bit of a relief to be able to get out of the hot, late summer sun and wander along the shady woodland trail. This was a quieter part of the Newby estate; a place to wind down a bit and enjoy the natural surroundings. But it did turn up a few surprises along the way.

Walking through woods can feel strange, the shadows, the darkness between trees, you sometimes feel as though you are being watched. I looked up and found that I was - an eye-shaped stainless steel sculpture was hanging from a long branch, gazing across the path.

The suddenly from the right a wild boar rushed towards me. Well it seemed to but it was just a bronze casting of one, apparently being chased by medieval hunters.

Of course, art can be fun too. In a broad clearing a family were gathered round a group of giant conkers, one of which was tied to a branch as a swing. Four children were scrambling over the conkers on the ground and arguing over whose turn it was to go on the swing. I'm not sure they should have been doing that as they were priced at £550 each!

Strolling past a large bush I came face to face with a huge gorilla! Fortunately it was only another bronze casting, Jambo from Jersey Zoo.

As I neared the end of the trail, I was startled by the screams of children; they had just entered the tunnel on the miniature railway, another attraction at Newby, and I was back in the real world.

Altogether there were over 50 sculptures placed in the woods and around the gardens. Materials included bronze, wood, glass, stone and steel. This was an excellent experience for me as I am very interested in sculpture.

The sculptures on the trail are all for sale and are on view until 26th September 2010.

Read more about Newby Hall.

Love Your Art,
Vince

Ripon - City Of Art

As I entered through the heavy wooden door the sight before me was not what I expected. You would generally think of churches as peaceful, reverend places with a handful of tourists admiring the architecture, stained-glass windows and religious artefacts.

But here, in Ripon Cathedral, were crowds of people, chatting loudly, dodging seats, memorials and other visitors to look at the paintings and photographs that are part of the Great North Art Show.

A wide variety of pictures adorned the walls down both sides of the cathedral with more on display boards at the east end of the building. An endless list of artists were exhibiting an endless variety of pictures including landscapes, abstract, townscapes, animals and local scenes. Here are a few that caught my attention:

I liked the watery reflections by Fiona Kemp.

Wendy Gimson had some interesting shimmering trees.

Sally Gatie had produced some pictures that made clever use of quilt patterns.

And having an engineering background I was particularly drawn to the Valve pictures by Sue Slocombe.

The bright colours in the pictures of buildings by Alan Luty were really attractive and worked especially well on the night scenes.

Yvonne Elvin had an interesting variety of pictures including this one.

The cathedral isn't the only venue for the Great North Art Show. Around the city hotels, cafés, commercial galleries, and other places have art on display. Even the Workhouse Museum has some installations and was due to hold digital photography workshops. The whole city has become an art gallery!

I managed to pop into a couple of galleries on Kirkgate on the way back from the Cathedral. Alan's Gallery has dozens of watercolours and prints for sale, many depicting landmarks in and around Ripon. The small prints for £20 were neat and colourful, an ideal memento of your visit to Ripon, or a lovely gift for a friend.

This is the ninth year of the event and it continues to provide funds to support the choral and musical activities of the Cathedral. There was probably too much to see in the limited time I had available. Perhaps next year I should set aside a couple of days to do justice to this interesting and extensive exhibition.

The show ends on 18th September 2010.

www.greatnorthartshow.org.uk

Vince,
Love Your Art

Encore!

Last week was a busy week for us. On Thursday evening we headed to Arthur Robinson House on The Green in Billingham for the opening evening of the Encore exhibition. Here fine art students from Cleveland College of Art and Design were showcasing and selling art they had produced on their courses.

On arrival we were greeted with a glass of champagne and canapes, always a good way to start any social occasion! We strolled around, admiring the skills of these young artists whose work included paintings, glass, plaster, porcelain, mixed media and prints.

Here are some of the works that particularly caught our attention. (With apologies for our low resolution images that don't do justice to these artworks.)

Even before we entered the building, we noticed a colourful set of prints through the window. "Emotions Within Relationships" by Lauren Duncan explores relationships between people, from beginning to make friends, to a more involved relationship and finally its deterioration and breakdown. The work is split up into segments to reflect these stages. The wide range of colours and varied patterns, including figures, is intended to help viewers connect with the work.

Kirsten Yates presented a series of three large canvas paintings entitled Fairytale. These largely abstract images are intended to relate to the more real aspects of the Alice In Wonderland story (one of Kirsten's favourite books), rather than the more obvious "fairytale" images. The pictures are based on deserted forests. The use of strong shades of blue in this picture made it stand out to us.

We liked the set of digital prints by Hope Stebbing, called "Home Is Where The Heart Is". These showed repeated, hand drawn images of everyday objects. The curvy shapes and bright pink and purple colours on the old-fashioned telephones created an image reminiscent of the 1960s. Vince said, "It reminds me of record covers by the Beatles." Vicky liked the clean, simple lines of the birdcages. "It's unusual to have simple outlines rather than blocks of colour," she noted.

Sadly we don't have enough space to talk about all the art that was on display but the students have clearly put in a lot of effort to produce some substantial works of art. Well done all.

Check out the College's site at www.ccad.ac.uk.

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Matombo - Spirit Of Sculpture

The north-east of England may not be the centre of the art world but it does have global connections. Two sculptors from Zimbabwe have spent the summer in the gardens at Newby Hall near Ripon, demonstrating and talking about sculpture and exhibiting work that they and other sculptors from their country have produced.

As I headed along the path towards the exhibition area, I saw the first clue that the Matombo exhibition was going to be interesting. Here was a group of giraffe standing by the hedges surrounding the exhibition area. Although they were made from welded metal they were very big, perhaps close to actual size. As I turned into the garden, spread out before me were lots of stone and metal sculptures neatly laid out on the grass and on raised beds. There were animals, birds, figures of people and many abstract sculptures in various sizes, textures and colours.

In the centre of the garden were two lumps of rock that a couple of children were chiselling away at. "Having a go yourself" is encouraged and the rocks had clearly been attacked by kids of all ages over the weeks.

Matthew Nakhawale and Dudzai Mushawepwere, the sculptors, were busy answering questions from visitors, polishing the sculptures with beeswax and supervising the kids as they chipped away in the middle of the garden.

I chatted with Dudzai for quite a while. He told me about the types of stone, the techniques used to create the sculptures and the way some of the artists approached their sculpting. I was a little surprised to hear that it can take several months to complete even a small sculpture. Dudzai was very enthusiastic about his own work, explaining that he liked to create sculptures in an abstract style. He hoped that different people would interpret his art in different ways or one person may see different meanings in the shapes at different times.

As I was leaving a young boy had just finished chiselling at one of the rocks in the "have a go" area. "That was fun," he called to his mother. Yes, it was a bit of fun for the kids and fascinating for me. We may not have heard much good news from Zimbabwe recently but this exhibition showed that there is a positive side to life there.

More on Matombo.

Love Your Art,

Vince

Computer Art

We had the opportunity, recently, to see some pictures produced with the assistance of a computer. This brought up the debate about whether computers are a valid way of creating art. Here are some of the points we discussed.

A computer can produce better results because bad bits can be fixed or re-done. Yes, but artists have always painted over bits of their pictures that they didn't like, or torn them up and started again.

An artist's individual skill is still needed to decide on the subject, compostion, style, etc. Computers can't come up with the ideas unless somebody has already built that feature in to the system. That's right but who knows what computers may be capable of in ten or twenty years time.

A computer to paint pictures is like a sledgehammer to crack a walnut. If you want a painting, use paint and a brush. But a computer is simply a tool that can be used to create a picture, it is just a more complex tool. New technologies have regularly been adopted by artists. Oil paint was a new technology at one time.

Using a computer is cheating, you avoid the skilled and time-consuming work that the artist does to create a work of art. It may simplify some of the work but the computer only does what the operator tells it to do.

It comes down to the point that if you want a painting, pick up a brush and paint. OK, for traditional art that may be the best option. Computers may be better suited to new styles of art rather than mimicking current styles of drawing or painting.

A computer can't make an artist, there has to be some artistic ability and skill to use the computer as a tool for creating art. Yes, art is, perhaps, the creation in the mind of the artist, not the resulting physical representation of it.

Whether or not you like art produced using a computer it still needs the creativity and skill of an artist to come up with a subject and control the computer. But the advantages and flexibility of using this method mean it is likely to become more and more prevelant in the near future. Of course, there is always the potential that computers will be programmed with some of the artists skills, it is happening now in a limited way. Will creativity be the only role left for the artists of the future?


Vicky and Vince,
Love Your Art

Give Them An Inch...

...And they'll take a yard, so they say.

But who would begrudge these students a yard of space to brighten up the walls in Darlington town centre.

Art In The Yards is a project to bring student art to the attention of the public and brighten up parts of the town. This year, six students from the Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College have added their work to those from the past two years. The images are based on the theme of heritage to complement the historic location of the yards. The students used their own individual ideas and a variety of techniques to create images that are all attractive but at the same time very different to each other.

Vicky was intrigued by a typographical arrangement by Joe Cocking, reminding people of a historical fact about the town. She said, "That's clever, it's a piece of art and a historical record and an unusual way of decorating the plain brick walls. We'll have to pop into the library and read up on that."

Vince liked the low-relief sculpture of Barclays Bank by Justin Ramsden, made entirely of Lego bricks. "The detail is amazing," said Vince. "There's even handrails on the steps and posters in the windows."

We went round the corner to look at the real building. It was a surprisingly close match, even the people looked the same! We understand that there is no truth in the rumour that Barclays will be renovating the building to match the Lego® version.

The other artists and their works were Charlotte Clewlow: You are Here, Jessica Everitt: State of Mind, James McKeown: Census, and James Snook: Tees Valley Gateway. Well done and good luck to all six of this year's artists.

Darlington Town Centre Management, which is the project co-ordinator and financial sponsor, has published a PDF brochure describing the Art in the Yards from all three years.


Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

A Spot Of Art

We've just got back from the Station in Richmond, North Yorkshire. This wasn't a train journey (the railway in this part of the Dales closed in 1969) but a visit to an exhibition of pictures from over two hundred artists and photographers on display in the restored railway station.

Since opening in 2007 Richmond Station has become one of the region's most popular venues for exhibiting art. Their latest initiative, A Spot on the Wall, is a fantastic opportunity for local artists to put their work in front of thousands of people, who may not otherwise visit an art exhibition or commercial gallery.

As well as local residents, the Station attracts many tourists visiting the region from all around the world. We watched people coming and going all the time, not only to see the art but to visit the shops, the cinema and have coffee or lunch in the open-plan restaurant. This is a thriving centre of the community.

Although we didn't go intending to buy anything (our walls are pretty full at the moment), we were very tempted by many of the pictures and the fact that all the artists are locally based. In fact, we spotted the names of several artists that we recognised from previous events we've visited in the region.

While we were there we chatted to the Curator, Donald Cline, who told us that one lady had bought her first ever picture. This was largely down to the informal surroundings, the easily accessible displays and the wide variety of pictures on show.

Of course, you don't have to buy, the show can be treated simply as a large exhibition of original paintings, stunning photographs and limited editions. It seemed that wherever we went in the building there were pictures; they clung to display panels, paraded along the mezzanine gallery and meandered down the corridor to the shops.

Curator, Donald, is delighted with the response to the show.

"Art lovers have already bought up sixty-five of the pictures on display, raising over £13,000. This is great news for the artists and also helps to support the running of the Station," Donald told us.

We like the idea of this event, giving people the opportunity to see lots of local artists in one place and being able to buy a picture and take it home straight away; you don't have to leave it until the show is over.

The exhibition and sale ends on 3rd September 2010. You can read more information at www.richmondstation.com.

Update: At the end of the show, 110 pictures had been sold, raising £22,000. An estimated 40,000 people had visited the Station while the show was running.

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Taking It Easy

Not much to report this week as we've had a few days holiday. But here are the major headlines from the past week or so...

Kieron Williamson sells paintings worth £150000 in less than an hour. And he's only 8 years old!

Help the world economic crisis by bidding on art from Lehman Brothers Bank being auctioned at Christies in late September.

Vince buys 73 empty picture frames in a framing shop's stock clearance!

Vicky and Vince,
Love Your Art

Flower Power

Not all pictures are created equal. Work by local artists is often better quality and better value than the mass produced stuff.

A year or so ago, we picked up some square framed floral pictures (left hand picture) in a local department store. They were neutral and inoffensive, like much mass produced wall art but we hoped that three of them on a tall, narrow wall above the stairs would create an interesting display. At the time, we didn't consider whether £15 each was either good or bad value.

After a couple of weeks in place, we grew tired of them. They looked dull and boring and did nothing to lift our spirits as we passed them each morning on the way downstairs. They are now buried deep in our "pile of shame" along with most of our other mistakes. Now we are a little older and wiser, we are more careful and look for reasonably priced, better quality art, often from local artists.

For example, we recently discovered some exquisite floral pictures while attending an exhibition and demonstration at the Castle Gallery in Witham Hall, Barnard Castle. Janet Orme, from Darlington, is a Botanical Artist, producing precise, highly detailed paintings of orchids and other plants in watercolour. We chatted with Janet for some time about her work. She had a wide range of originals, prints and note cards for sale and Vicky chose a wonderful cyclamen print (right hand picture) as a gift for a friend.

Looking round the shops in Barnard Castle we were amazed to find an unusual cream and gold frame that went perfectly with the picture and it was a simple task to assemble them once we got home. Together the print and frame cost less than £20. An excellent purchase compared to the other, dull pictures described above.

You can visit Janet's own site at www.janetorme.co.uk.

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Temenos, Middlesbrough

The North East of England continues to be an inspiration for artists and an important location for big works of art. Temenos, by Anish Kapoor and Cecil Balmond, is the latest of such works, following in the footsteps of Gateshead's Angel of the North, Darlington's Brick Train and North Shields' Lightning Clock. It is part of a major arts project to install five huge sculptures across the Tees Valley; others will be in Stockton, Hartlepool, Darlington and in the Redcar and Cleveland area.

So armed with an information leaflet, we headed for the Middlehaven Docks area of Middlesbrough to see what all the fuss was about.

Vicky: It looks quite graceful. The netting looks like it's floating across the sky.
Vince: It looks like a trawling net to me but you won't catch much with it; it's just an open ended tube.
Vicky: It says it's 50m high but it doesn't look that tall. That crane behind it is higher and the Transporter Bridge looks much bigger in the distance.
Vince: They should have put it higher up to stand out from its surroundings. That would have made it more visible from the A66 as well.
Vicky: The leaflet says it cost £2.7 million. It doesn't seem much for that amount of money.
Vince: There's a lot of engineering gone into it. It will attract tourists to the area and could become a focus for the re-development work being planned.
Vicky: I wonder if it will do for Middlesbrough what the Angel has done for Gateshead?
Vince: What's that?
Vicky: Create an icon for the town, an image that's easily recognisable and represents Middlesbrough.

This is still a new work of art and opinions will need time to consolidate. Perhaps Temenos will grow in stature, if not in size, when the other four works that will be produced as part of the project are complete and installed.

See a larger picture of Temenos in Middlesbrough.

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

The Purple Picture

We've had one of those serendipity moments! A happy accident that in our case gave us a piece of interesting art as well as solving a problem and saving us money.

Last month in one of the charity shops we visit regularly, we spotted a watercolour of Hartlepool Harbour entrance: Vince learnt to sail there so was keen on buying it. But its mahogany style frame was a bit too smart for the soft, blue-grey colours of the picture and it had no mount to show it off to best effect. Then Vince realised that the frame was ideal for a print we had bought some months earlier.

What we call "the purple picture" is a small African landscape print of unusual proportions and in shades of purple. When we bought it it was in a very large chunky brown wood frame that was way out of scale for the picture and it had a ubiquitous cream mount that was entirely the wrong colour. Temporarily, we put it into a cheap A4 certificate frame and planned to get a new frame made for it later.

On checking the frame from the Hartlepool picture we found that it was perfectly proportioned for the purple picture, matching the style well too. All it needed was an appropriate mount. So off went Vince to our local framer, and selected a purple pearlescent mount to match the picture. It now hangs on the living room wall and looks like it was bought from a gallery.

So, that one picture has solved the problem of framing the purple picture and saved us having to buy a custom-made frame that would have cost us many times more. All we need now is a decent frame for the Hartlepool Harbour picture.


Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince


ps. The charity shop where we got the Hartlepool picture now sells only books, with no bric-a-brac or interesting stuff - shame! One less source of great value art.

Greetings To You All

Greetings cards come in all shapes, sizes and subjects. And looking in any card shop, you now find more and more often that some of these cards are based on paintings and other art.

Combining these cards with a cheap photo frame can give you a simple and quick way to decorate your walls with art for probably not much more than a fiver each. And if you pick up the frames for a pound or two in your friendly, local charity shop, you get even better value.

So we're always on the lookout for interesting greetings card on our travels. We already have a triple frame in our living room displaying a set of three cards from Sam Toft's Mustard family collection. And a couple of framed sheep scenes we found in a charity shop turned out, on closer investigation, to be the fronts of Christmas cards.

We have also recently discovered a series of cards with humorous pen and ink sketches by Glockwork. Drawn by Graham “Glock” Ashbridge, these cards include motorcycling, steam trains, life in the Yorkshire Dales and, to our delight, sheep (see picture).

So far, we only have one Glockwork card but we suspect it will form the basis of a mini-collection of these charming sketches. The cards are available in shops across the North of England (plus some South of the Humber) or on the Glockwork website.

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Thank You, Thank You, Thank You!

Unbelievable! One of my life ambitions is about to come true thanks to Light Artist, Bruce Monro.

I happended to come across this BBC news item about Bruce's CD Sea . Using hundreds of thousands of old CDs, Bruce and a team of volunteers have turned an ordinary field of grass into an amazing sea of shimmering light. CDs are a great medium for this project, creating an ever-changing effect of light and colour on a huge scale. Plus, it's a great way to recycle old discs.

For the past fifteen years or so, I have been hanging on to old CDs, collecting unwanted music, computer and Internet discs. I imagined I could produce interesting, unusual and colourful sculptures or framed arrangements. But I was never brave enough to actually do anything with them as I wasn't sure if it would really be a valid way of producing art. Now Bruce has led the way, I have artistic validation for my plans.

I don't have enough CDs to create a sea, not even a pond, but now I have the justification to start working on this art. The next step is to dig out all the sketches and notes I have made over the years and start putting these into practice.

Love Your Art,
Vince

Name That Sheep

By the way, did I ever mention that we collect sheep?

One of our sheep has pride of place high up on the bookshelves in our living room. It's a hand-made pottery ram that we have owned for a few months. It has a quite individual personality and we felt it was crying out for a name. We often give names to pieces in our art collection. In fact pottery firms sometimes do this too, for example the whimsical "Ewe And Me" sheep characters produced by Border Fine Arts. So how do you go about choosing a name for a ram?

We began by trying, unsuccessfully, to find out more about the ram. The sticker on the base suggested it might be a studio piece or possibly sold in a shop. We Googled but failed to find any information on the internet. If you've come across Trinity Pottery or Stuart Taylor, please let us know as we'd love to find out more about this sheep.

The spirally horns and long thin nose are its most distinctive features. The wavy wool coat is represented by spaghetti-like strands of clay built up on the main body of the sheep. It is finished roughly and unglazed giving a rustic texture that helps to create its interesting personality. Our lack of information about this ram gave us the opportunity to create our own story about his origins. His long, thick, brown, curly coat and his imposing horns evoke an image of an upland sheep in a cold, harsh, mountainous environment like the Scottish Highlands. We can just imagine him sheltering from a snowy blizzard behind the wall of a ruined castle.

After looking through a list of boys' names in a dictionary we drew up a shortlist of those with a Scottish origin. We toyed with Hamish, Angus, Fraser and others but finally settled on Alistair as his name and we think it suits him very well!

Love Your Art
Vicky

If Toucan You Can Too

We've been back to Croft village hall where Fran Connelly and Petra Lloyd were exhibiting their artwork as part of the North Yorkshire Open Studios event. For a couple of weekends, artists across North Yorkshire are throwing open the doors of their studios or holding exhibitions and demonstrations of their work. These open studio events are a great way to meet up with your favourite artists or get to know about some new ones. We were able to chat with Fran and Petra about their work and see a broader range of the things they do.

We mentioned Petra's toucans in a previous blog and were delighted to see an even wider selection to choose from than last time. Petra was half way through making one of her ceramic toucans. She explained to us about the clay, how she shaped and carved it and how it was fired using a process called Raku. The Raku firing is a technique, developed in the Far East, that extracts oxygen from the glaze, allowing the metals within it to form unique and distinctive colours such as blues, greens, copper and bronze. As we listened to her explanations, Petra thrust the half finished toucan into Vicky's hands, encouraging her to work at some of the carved detail around the eyes. This kind of interaction with the artists makes these events really interesting and fun. We were so impressed with the way the toucans were made and the wonderful end results that we just had to buy one. We look forward to it landing on on top of our display shelves next week.

The way that Petra's toucans and other ceramics were displayed alongside Fran's gorgeous, dramatically-coloured pastel skyscapes (yes, we bought one of those too) created an attractive display. The mix of different styles worked very well together.

Unfortunately we were not able to visit any of the other open studios last weekend but if we are free next weekend, look out for us.

Find out more at http://www.nyos.org.uk.

Vicky and Vince,
Love Your Art

Buy Me!

"That looks unusual", said Vicky, pointing to a rather strange looking picture cowering in a corner, half hidden by a rack of ladies jackets. Vince pushed the jackets aside to the annoyance of a little old lady who was rummaging through them. He rapidly scanned the piece, making disdainful grunts as he digested the brown colouring and the angular lines of the landscape.

"It looks a bit dull," he suggested. Then he noticed the markings along the bottom edge. "Ah, it's a signed, limited edition. Look 4 of 36, Souel - Vines, D M Patterson. It might be worth a bit!" So we bought it because of its unusual style and the fact that it was a limited edition.

That happened on Saturday. On Sunday we cleaned the picture up and and tried to find a suitable location for it. We failed completely! It didn't hang happily on any of our walls. Perhaps it was the harsh, jagged angles of the brush strokes, the monochrome brown colouring or the wholly inappropriate lime-washed grey frame it was in. Our interest in the picture rapidly turned to disappointment. Now, the only reason we had to keep it was if it had some value.

We spent several hours discussing how much it may be worth as a piece of serious art. A thorough search on the Internet revealed nothing about the picture or the artist. Vince claimed that its unique and distinctive style, and the fact that the artist thought that it was worth producing a limited edition, suggests that it did have some value above a basic print. Vicky argued that the frame reduced its value significantly and the dull, jagged lines of the landscape would appeal to only a very few art lovers. Our conclusion was that if we sold it, we would be unlikely to be able to retire to the Caribbean.

We both regret this impulse buy. Were our expectations too high? Are we becoming over-confident and buying without thinking things through first? Whatever went wrong, we are now left with an unloved, unwanted picture. eBay here we come!

Love Your Art,
Vicky and Vince

Serving Our Apprenticeship

Watching episode 4 "A Work of Art" of the BBC's Junior Apprentice programme provided an insight into the difficulties of buying and selling art. The teams were given a shortlist of contemporary artists from which they had to select two to represent and sell their art at a special gallery sale. Easy? No, it was harder than it looked!

The first problem was which two artists to choose for the team to represent. Was the bottom-line, as Kirsty from Team Instinct focused on, money and whether the artist had a range of prices. Or was it, as Zoe from Team Revolution showed, the concepts behind the art backed up with some schmoozing and flattery of the artist. In the end both teams wanted the same artist, Tom Lewis, as he had a range of affordable and expensive prints and originals that would appeal to a range of buyers. The losing team were stuck with the more expensive artists like Sarah Kate Wilson who's pieces were up to £4000. Although both teams drummed up buyers, most of those preferred to pay in the hundreds rather than thousands of pounds.

What could we learn from this? Despite professional artists trying to push the conceptual boundaries, the majority of buyers wanted something attractive and decorative to put on the walls; neon lights spelling out words or phrases didn't cut it for the average buyer. Price is also important. When buying pieces for our walls we've bought originals by unknown artists from charity shops, or bid on eBay for more well known artists and tried to get value for money. In the end art is only worth what someone is prepared to pay for it.

Vicky,
Love Your Art