Josephine Birch

Portrait of Josephine

In September 2023 Josephine was awarded the Mortitz-Heyman Residency at Borgo Pignano, creating a vast body of works inspiring her new exhibition with Weald Contemporary. In Josephines new collection of drawings, prints and paintings Toscana Heat/Light we are drawn into the heat and light of Tuscany. We caught up with Josephine to find out more about her life and work.

So Josephine - would you start please by introducing yourself and tell us a little bit about yourself and your work.  

 Josephine: I’m an artist and illustrator from Devon with a keen interest in wildlife and storytelling. I teach printmaking and love working with all kinds of people to find a way for them to engage with creative processes. My works usually begin on location and are often finished whilst out and about; these works and walks inspire my studio practise where print making helps expand my ideas and open up narratives and imagination. I work as an illustrator and write and illustrate children's picture books which are always informed by my drawing practise. Drawing is my greatest love.  

Can you tell us about Birch Press and how that came about? 

Josephine: Birch Press houses all my illustration for childrens picture book, novels and chapter books. The work is rooted in all the same sensibilities and values as my drawing, painting and print practise; landscape, the natural world, living and working with animals etc. I really love how books, and picture books in particular, bring artworks into homes, schools, libraries; it is the most direct way for people of any background to access art and in the picturebook form 32 pages of it !  It is often childrens first introduction to great artists. Looking at picture books was my biggest inspiration as a child. 

 I decided to separate my illustration from my painting, drawing and printmaking practise because it made it simpler to promote the different work and organise online portfolios. It’s hard enough as an artist that many industries want to quickly pigeon hole creatives output. There are so many ways in which these kinds of disciplines over-lap and it really just comes down to the intention and application but it frustrates me that Illustrators are sometimes considered lesser artists. A wonderful artist may find the book the best form for their work, or may care that children are the recipients of it. Thats a wonderful thing that shouldn't be overlooked !  

Rising, watercolour 30.5x30.5 Framed

Did you have a favourite work of art or artist when you were growing up and did you always know you were an artist? 

 Josephine: As I mention above my first introduction to artists work was through picture books and I absolutely loved Brian Wildsmith, Shirley Hughes, Mairi Hedderwick and Raymond Briggs. They sparked the first realisations that this could be a job, a way of life. My mum was a dress maker and taught Textiles and my sister is a brilliant painter so I was surrounded by creativity as a child. I also really remember my mum pinning up a copy I’d made at primary school of Monets ‘The Cliffs at Etretat’ and feeling really proud of it. These kinds of little boosts really matter in giving young people the confidence to keep making work, especially in today's state school systems that so poorly support creative thinking. My sister and I were very lucky to have a mum who always emotionally backed our pursuits in the arts. 

When you were hosting the Drawn to Print workshop at Weald Contemporary you had some beautiful and unexpected equipment to work with, do you find yourself continuing to experiment with new ways of mark making or do you have a favoured toolkit you return to time and again? 

Josephine: At Cambridge School of Art we were always taught to keep challenging ourselves with new tools and processes. I think that has stayed with me. For me its all about a balance  between skill and control coupled with innovation and playfulness which allows for some serendipity. This only comes from lots of practise!  I also think the idea sometimes dictates the process – so I let that happen too. 

  I do have a kit for working on location but I swap and change things. I try to take out a limited tool kit most days to take some decisions out of the equation, but it will usually consist of a small watercolour pan set, some tubes of gouche and jars of ink and a full pencil case with charcoals and pencils. 

Portrait of Josephine and Maggie

Can you tell us more about being awarded the Mortitz-Heyman Residency at Borgo Pignano, and creating this incredibly soulful body of works that inspired your solo exhibition with Weald Contemporary? 

Josephine: The Royal Drawing School is a gift that keeps on giving. They so beautifully support their alumni with residency opportunities. It is through these kinds of residencies that I have really learnt how to work in the studio and what to do with these drawings I make on location. The residency at Pignano is quite isolating in ways. You have your own studio apartment on this huge estate and some days I wouldn’t say more than ‘Ciao’ to the farmers all day long. It’s a strange thing that wouldn't be sustainable for too long (at least for me) but it gives you this rare opportunity to not think about anyone or anything other than the work. Everyday is organised solely around that. Each day I would head out early with my sketchbooks and drawing board, with various materials and by the end of each day I’d find a new thing that I wanted to return to for tomorrow, considering when the light might be best, the shadows longest. I have to pace myself as drawing is very exhausting, and I was walking miles in the heat, so I’d tend to allow time to play in my sketchbook as well as time for large focused works. I’d also spend time zooming in and zooming out, focusing on close ups of flora and fauna and then placing these moments into larger works. It requires a certain amount of discipline but once I start it becomes like an obsession; I did not want to leave ! It was so wonderful to have the opportunity to show all of the work together at Weald and reflect on this time. It gave me the opportunity to continue leaning into the experience and make works reflecting my time there, such as the large hanging monoprints. 

You once described the act of drawing to be ‘like a spell’ perhaps beginning a drawing and realising all at once that hours have past by and you are still completely focused on what you are doing. Has this always been the case? and can you tell us about a favourite drawing experience from Borgo Pignano? 

 Josephine: This really began with spending more time drawing on location, which is something we did a lot of on my degree at CSA. I realised that I was sitting still and remaining totally focused (I think we’d call it hyperfocusing nowadays!) Every drawing starts with a period of feeling like I don’t know how to make the right marks, how to organise them and make them communicate what I want them too, but it usually starts to become clear once I’ve dropped into the process more – a bit like meditating or taking a walk, it takes a while to really sink into what you're doing. I think this is why drawing on location is so important for me; coupling the physicality of being outdoors and adding some hurdles puts a boundary between the idea and the work and helps me to turn it into something more than just a straight copy of what’s in front of me. You’re there for extended periods of time, with all the stories in your head, all the emotions of what's going on in your life, and you're responding to the world directly around you. 

 I can remember each drawing I made and where I was when I made it, even the thoughts that were running through my mind. It creates a of kind time capsule of that moment in my mind. The one I really remember was the last drawing I made, ‘View to Borgo Pignano’ when I was exhausted after walking for hours zig zagging my way across the estate. It was boiling hot and I found shade under a little oak tree in the middle of this huge field. All the wildflowers surrounded me, the grasses where singing with grass hoppers and little hard working dung beetles and ants. The clouds were racing across the sky casting shadows over the rolling hills and I began this enormous drawing. I felt I’d bitten off more than I could chew but I was so tired I just relaxed into the moment, focusing on the fact that this was my last afternoon, the last day alone in this amazing place. It became one of my favourite drawings. I think you can see it isn’t as well organised as some of the other large drawings, but I think it has this very full sense of Tuscany, alive and buzzing with so much wildlife and colour and movement.  

Heading Out to Draw, 132x184cm, 126cmx178cm, charcoal, 2023 Unframed

 You have produced some Silent Book which are beautiful, Can you talk more about this? 

Josephine:  I love silent books because they can be read by any person of any language or reading ability. It also gives the reader this sense of creating the story alongside the artist. Our schools push reading levels so hard onto young children despite evidence that this can do more harm than good. We really hamper children in their creativity with all these tests and rules around language, reading and writing. Wordless picture books puts the story telling back into the childs hands and if adults are reading with children it is very quickly obvious who is better at reading pictures! Adults often forget this particular skill !   

  In terms of my practise the wordless/silent book is so akin to all my work- a sense of narrative, of how images work side by side to tell a story. Its always on my mind. If I paint a house with a lit window, the subsequent painting will be of who might be sitting just inside  and then what landscape this house sits in and so on. 

What are you reading at the moment? 

Josephine: I nearly always have non-fiction on the go alongside fiction as I gobble up fiction and am very slow at non-fiction! I’m reading A field guide to getting lost by Rebecca Solnit and I’m rereading Little Women for the millionth time. Very comforting. 

We were discussing your open-source printing press which led us to discover our mutual appreciation of School Prints, can you talk a bit about how you see print evolving and becoming more accessible? 

Josephine: The history and nature of print making is all about ‘the dissemination of information to the masses’. Like picture books, print is a way to make art works available and affordable to a greater amount of people. I teach printmaking at a university and love seeing the thrill of the reveal and the magic of the science of print dawn on new printmakers. Unfortunately, printmaking processes can be expensive to access as we often need specialist equipment so I love exploring and teaching processes that can be done in a sophisticated way by anyone. The tiny Etching press means we can bring printmaking to schools and rural areas. I’m also really interest in how we better support rural arts opportunities. So often funding is based in cities, and when it does come to rural areas its isn’t down the lanes but still centred in local cities. I am much more interested in creating very good opportunities for fewer people rurally than I am in reaching larger audience in urban places that already have these opportunities. Cities have the infrastructure, the funding, the museums and the access routes. How we reach children and communities who have none of this is far more interesting and important to me. Rural communities are so often overlooked and there is a general assumption that living rurally means more wealth; in fact some of the most deprived UK areas are rural! 

Studio playlist time! Please could you list 10 of your favourite studio tracks? It can be what you are listening to at the moment or an ultimate collection, the choice yours… 

Josephine:  I get absolute obsessions and my current is Kate Bollinger and there are constants like Kate Bush and Erykah Badu but the mood has to be exactly right for what I’m working on. My ultimate studio playlist would go something like; 

1. Kate Bollinger – Lady in the Darkest Hour 

1. Goat Rodeo – Attaboy 

1. Talking Heads – This must be the place  

1. Eykah Badu – Appletree 

1. The Fretless – Waiving to Ryan 

1. Johnny Flynn – The Wrote and The writ 

1. Tom Verlaine – Breakin' My Heart 

1. Kate Bush – Bertie 

1. Etta James – I'd rather go blind 

1. Solomon Burke – None of us are free  

 All of the works included in Josephines exhibition will be for sale via out online shop until 9 Feb 2024.

Edward Liddle

We join Kent-based artist Edward Liddle in his studio to ask him some questions. His studio, tucked away in a suburb in an old 1960's warehouse, is filled with hundreds of bits of Chinese rice paper, painted on with textile patterns and then either stored in archival boxes or hung with nails and magnets. Textiles, prints, poetry and ceramic experiments are all dotted about between mugs of tea, and plates of biscuits. Ed is wearing a heavy cotton workman's jacket and some lace-up black plimsolls, and he greets us with a gruff but joking shout of "you can't park there!"

Could you tell us a bit about the inspiration behind this recent series of works that are going into your show, Fade Resistant, and how they came to be?

The works on show are primarily from the past eighteen months or so. They are works on paper, the imagery all taken from my own personal archive. I’m always collecting imagery for my archive, sometimes I take photographs and at other times I take screenshots from things im watching on tv or streaming. The archive contains a wealth of visual material and is a reflection of my fascination/being drawn to decoration and domestic motifs. The works on show at Weald Contemporary are my workings out on paper, painting the imagery from my archive. They’re incredibly personal and sort of form a non rationalised diary, however they are also hyper visual and at a remove from me. They are elusive but contain under the surface a lot of narrative, if you take some clues from the titles or if simply evoking memories for audiences.

There are so many pattens here so this must be difficult, but - what's your favourite textile pattern you've come across and why?

I really like the utilitarian textiles of buses and public transport. Legends like Margaret Gill who when creating their work had the brief of ‘highly patterned and pleasing but must hide the dirt’ – or something like that. It’s a great insight into those design and aesthetic decisions. We live with an enormous amount of designed and created visual material in our everyday lives. Often overlooked, I love the idea that my works might allow audiences to re-see the things they walk past everyday having witnessed them in my works and had a moment of recognition.
 
Are there any odd or surprising patterns painted in the exhibition that you'd like to talk about?

I love the dancing ladies. This is an example of me pinching some visual material from someone else’s archive. In the Museo Novecento in Milan, this was a scrap of paper from the personal archive of artist Alghiero Boetti. Is it a piece of wrapping paper, or maybe some clothing came wrapped in it. It has a life of which I will know very little, or if I do it will be by pure happenstance. I like the idea that someone probably in the 20th century created this motif which was turned into an object, not one of great worth but then in turn Boetti was attracted to the motif, and then the curator who decided to hang the piece in the museum, and then along I come and think ohhh that’s funky. It’s a fascinating and totally unpredictable lineage, one that straddles art, design, commerce and all the support characters that had to be in place for us to each encounter that one motif. PLUS of course it is cheeky and suggestive but also fun and a heavily loaded piece of imagery. I don’t deny it is also perhaps outdated and also sexualises women. All from a scrap of paper. And that is another layer to all the works here, imagery IS loaded and all imagery has a story or a political statement to make, if only we look and reflect and listen to it.
 
You've had a bit of time in art academia - how do you think this has influenced your practice?

I’ve always enjoyed both making creative output as well as researching and writing about it. I’d say my time in academia has encouraged me to try and approach making my work from multiple angles and to not deny the power or possible political nature of the material I’m working with. Social history is rightfully being embedded in contemporary art practices more and more. I like to think my work has something to say, something to add, but I also try not to over intellectualise the work … not until after it’s made anyway!

Top image: Edward Liddle in this Studio.

Bottom image: Install shot of Fade Resistant at Weald Contemporary. Image credit Hollie Jean Crosbie

You also co-founded Knotworks in Tunbridge Wells, how does it work and impact upon your art?

Knot Works is an arts organisation that I co-founded with Holly Jean Crosbie and Sam Wheeler. We provide studios for artists and makers, run workshops and also programme exhibitions and host artist development events. I am always interested in trying to bring like-minded people together, to discuss share and sometimes disagree about what we’re working on. Whatever anyone says, we are always made better by engaging with others about our work.

I am adamant that the more artist studios and artistic provision there is, the better. If we want to maintain making moving, inspiring, high quality creative output we need to support and champion artists and makers. So, yeh, it’s important to me and I believe makes my own work better because I’m part of something bigger than just myself.
 

I'm interested in the way you've said these works can hang in a modular fashion; what's your approach to the idea of exhibiting, and is this intrinsic to the way you make work?

I love a process. And I find structure really useful in making work. With the modular nature of the works, it’s really satisfying to know that I just need to grab some paper and paint and crack on. I’ve found as time has gone on that in order to make work I need to reduce the possible barriers to making. But, on the other side of having made something, when the works are all interchangeable its really quite fun to play around with the modular pieces and see what happens, it’s extremely low risk because I’m not intrinsically changing the work in anyway except placing something next to something else and seeing what happens, what do they ‘say’ to one another.

What are you working on next?

Always painting more imagery from my archive. More large works on wallpaper. I am also continuing to explore new sculptural installations, much like the floor tiles I made for my exhibition Carrément at Centrale in Brussels. The works here reflect just one part of my work! Oh and I’ve been thinking a lot about how performance and writing might activate works such as the paintings and wallpapers. What are the stories that those work tell and can I be more direct with those narratives? Lots to explore!
 
Lastly, You are very much a music person; you even used to be a hospital radio DJ so this may seem impossible, but: what would be your 5 track studio playlist, and why is it Prince?

HA!

Yes always Prince. But, at the moment:

PJ Harvey – I inside the old year dying

Miles Davis – On the Corner

Blur – The ballad of Darren

Alice Coltrane – Journey in Satchidananda

Laura Marling – Song for our Daughter

Packaging Study #5 (Boetti’s dancing ladies) Oil on calligraphy rice paper, 65 x 78cm

Andrew Churchill

 Leading us on an exploration of the night, Andrew Churchill presents a series of paintings capturing intimate views from West Sussex to the broad vistas of the Northern Irish coast.

A range of emotions are captured in these changing sky scenes, from evening to dusk and night, showing the complex relationship and characters of the sun and moon. Rendered in an intricate palette, we are invited to see the night, dark and full of colour. We caught up with Andrew Churchill in the lead up to his exhibition with us.

You began the series of paintings that feature in your exhibition Dark Is The Night in Yapton, was it always your intention to document the skies through this transition from living in West Sussex to living in Northern Ireland?

No, it wasn’t a plan at all. I was visiting Northern Ireland regularly and making drawings of the village we were staying in. The weather was glorious so the skies were bright and blue. Gradually these paintings started to take on a feeling of dusk. Simultaneously I was seeing the development of houses encroach on the skyline around where I lived in Yapton. It was very depressing, but as I walked to and from the studio at night I enjoyed seeing the houses lit by moonlight. I decided it was an opportunity. An artist who lives in the same village said something like “you’ve made something positive out of all the house-building” which I suppose is true. When we moved to Northern Ireland in July this year, our house is on the side of a hill, looking across a huge expanse of sea horizon. There is so much uninterrupted sky! This was the prompt to make new paintings of the open sky. Whilst the subject is important, of far greater importance is the making of a successful painting. The ‘limited’ subject matter of skies, is a good structure to explore painting with.

What is your studio space like in Ballywalter and how do you see your practice and relationship with the local art scene evolving?

It’s very early days for me in Ballywalter but the artists I have met so far have been incredibly welcoming. I have a painting in a group show in Belfast at the moment. It’s a really strong show and I am very proud to be part of it. There is a very little by way of a commercial gallery scene in Northern Ireland. This means artists are doing it for themselves in studio gallery spaces, or showing in Dublin or London. I have a little plan to try and address that, with a gallery space where I live in Ballywalter.

My studio is in the machine-end of an old milking parlour. It’s a lovely space though I am doing battle with starlings and pigeons who keep shitting on my paintings! My current work is fairly small so the space works well. I have plans to have a larger studio in the milking parlour, but that will have to wait until the Spring next year.
 
What has been your best discovery so far?

I just saw a great show at Ards Art Centre by Daniel Coleman. Very spare and beautiful hang. Wonderful paintings, mostly blues. And a painting in the group show I am in at Arcade Studios by Hannah Clegg is just knockout. It’s called ‘Is My Ear Deep or Deeper’ and I’d buy it if I had the money. 
 
It is interesting that as an artist your work allows you to travel, not necessarily literally, but people keep in touch with you through the work, and so the work travels, the images travel, and therefore you’re not static either.

There is an old adage that all still-life paintings are actually self portraits. I absolutely believe this to be true and feel it extends to all ‘good’ painting. I suppose, having relocated, but connected as we are through the limitations of social media, it would be true to say that people can connect with where I am, what I am doing and to a degree how I’m feeling, through the work. During a Covid lockdown I was conversing with an artist, via Instagram, who is in Brooklyn, New York. He didn’t realise I was based in England. He said what a shame it was that I couldn’t come and visit him in the studio because of Covid. I replied that the biggest barrier was the Atlantic Ocean! But it occurred to me that his NY studio was as cut off from me, at that time, as my friend Piers Ottey’s studio which was 5 minutes up the road. 

I am amused that having relocated to Northern Ireland I am now having an exhibition with you at Weald, just minutes from where I used to live! But more than that, it is a great opportunity to tie the two worlds together for a few weeks of exhibition. Every artist will tell you that it is a lonely profession. It’s impossible not to feel isolated in your studio. Moments of connection with other artists, or their work, are of the utmost importance.

Paths To The Sea

I like to think that your painting rewards a careful viewer, can you speak to the recurring themes and motifs that appear in your work?

The repetition of motifs and themes in my work is largely born from the realisation that there are an infinite number of ways to tackle the same subject. I’m not interested in painting ‘a view’, I’m interested in making a good painting. Painting is such a ridiculous and often infuriating activity, there is always something more to do with it, something to find out. I hope that, collectively, across a group of works on the same idea, a sense of what I am trying to achieve comes across, and that individually, a painting can stand for its intentions. 

I have been incredibly fortunate in the last two years to have been a studio assistant to the painter Michael Simpson. He was one of my painting tutors at Bath in the late 90s. His work and his attitude toward work have been a huge influence. The sheer rigour in which he approaches his painting is phenomenal. Whilst working with him on an exhibition of his drawings, of which there were more than 100, the phrase ‘variety in repetition’ kept coming to mind. Although ostensibly the subject matter was limited to just 4 or 5 subjects (squints, benches etc..) the sheer variety and difference was extraordinary, even between two drawings that on initial viewing were almost identical. 
 
What are you reading at the moment?

I’m reading Eduardo Paolozzi’s Writings and Interviews. I’m fascinated by his Automobile Heads and Standing Figures so I’m scouring the book for references to them whilst enjoying the wider writing on his work. He did what I would do with a time machine, he visited Alberto Giacometti in his Paris studio. He writes “…he was obsessed about his ideas and worked all night, and everything else in life for him was just a grey shadow.”. I’m waiting for my copy of Jon Fosse's A Shining to arrive. He was just awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. Every artist should read his Septology.

The title of your exhibition Dark Was The Night is taken from the Blind Willie Johnson track “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground” which is a song with a powerful vocal and no lyrics. How did this come to be the title of your exhibition?

It was a phrase I kept saying to myself in the studio as I worked. There is a brilliant compilation album of the same name, mostly American musicians, recorded as an Aids and HIV awareness fundraiser. The original Blind Willie Johnson track is extraordinary. To have such a lyrical title but its words are never actually sung in the song is quite brilliant. As is often the way with Blues music, other artists have woven the refrain into their lyrics. I like the finality of the words, the absoluteness of the statement. The lack of mystery implied in the words suited my paintings.

Does music play a big part in influencing your work generally?

It certainly influences the titles I give my work. Often a song lyric will spring out whilst I am working which fits the painting exactly. I use music to influence my making of the work more than anything. If it’s getting too cosy and I need to disrupt the painting, Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew or Slint’s Tweez will be put on the stereo. Its both an atmospheric influence and a reminder not to be safe, to push the limits.
 
Please can you give us a 5-10 track studio playlist?

Oh, this is really hard! 10 tracks! 10 albums would be easier. I spend long hours in the studio so I generally listen to albums all the way through, often all the albums I have by one artist in a day. I recently spent a joyful day with Nirvana! But if I’m pushed, here are the 10 tracks and the albums they come from:

Dark Was The Night - Blind Willie Johnson

Derek & The Dominos - Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad? (from Layla & Other Assorted Love Songs)

Slint - Carol (from Tweez) 

Miles Davis - Pharoah’s Dance (from Bitches Brew)

Bob Dylan - Blind Willie McTell (from The Bootleg Series 1-3 Rare And Unreleased, 1961-1991)

Floating Points, Pharaoh Sanders and London Symphony Orchestra - Promises (has to be the whole album)

Cat Power - American Flag (from Moon Pix)

Daniel Blumberg - Madder (from Minus)

Baby Dee - When You Found Me (from Not Alone - Médecins sans frontières compilation)

(Swapped for ‘Small Song’ on playlist due to availability)

Vic Chesnutt - We Hovered With Short Wings (from At The Cut)

Dirty Three - Doris (from Cinder)

Heather Summers - Story of an Artist (from Covers from a Cabin)

(Swapped for the original Daniel Johnston on playlist due to availability)

Binker & Moses - Because Because (from Feeding The Machine)

Yes, I know there are 13 here!

Thanks Andrew!

Daisy Harcourt

From Mrs Dalloway to Jo Sweeting, Women & Word is a celebration of the lives of female writers and literary characters. Daisy Harcourt explores the unique discourse between artist and writer alongside a fascinating series of portraits featuring contemporary women, each sitter with a personal connection to the written and spoken word. 

We took a bit of time out to find out more….

Weald: What are you reading at the moment?

Daisy: John Craxton : A Life of Gifts by Ian Collins

Weald: Could you tell us a bit about the themes and subjects in your show?

The overarching theme of my show is female connection to literature; looking partly at formative experiences which have contributed to contemporary women’s love of words/writing/reading.
The experience of female writers and female literary characters is another theme in my show-  I’ve tried to interpret and express my own understanding of a selection of writers and fictional characters through drawing portraits of them.

Weald: The portraits have a lot of life and presence, yet their looks are not at all domineering; instead putting the viewer at ease. How did you develop this portraiture style?

Daisy: I have always drawn people in a way that I feel must be something to do with liking the person/sitter a lot - if I didn’t really admire them in some way I don’t think I could create the portraits you see.

Anne Elliot by Daisy Harcourt

Weald: What lead you to using pencil and ink as a medium?

Daisy: Working with pencil is something I’ve always done since I was a child. Latterly I discovered different types of ink, these are interesting and less predictable to use, the fluidity of mark making and texture creating contrast to the drawn line.


Weald : A bit of a taboo question now - what is your favourite portrait from the series and why?

Daisy: From the series?  I couldn’t possibly say!
From the show - ‘Mrs Dalloway’.
She is a favourite of mine for a number of reasons - the scale was new and challenging for me but I am happy with it; parts of the composition have different styles of working and ultimately I am pleased with the way they work together. Lastly I feel ‘Mrs Dalloway’ expresses a little of the character I imagine when I read Woolf’s novel.

Weald: What’s next on the horizon for you in terms of your practice?

Daisy: I am considering more portrait series and am keen to create larger scale works - I’m interested in creating portraits of underrepresented historical figures for public spaces.

Weald : Finally - what would be your 5 song studio soundtrack?

Daisy:

Moon in June - Soft Machine

Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis - Vaughan Williams

Light Flight - Pentangle

The Zephyr Song - Red Hot Chilli Peppers 

Pictures Of You - The Cure

Info · Daisy Harcourt // Women and Word

Jasper Thims

Bognor based Jasper Thims is a highly skilled ceramicist, for this exhibition he presents a collection of uniquely hand built porcelain vessels.

We Caught up with Jasper in the lead up to our Mothshell Ambit exhibition!

Weald- Tell us about your relationship with ceramics and the inherent qualities you most value

Jasper - I think some of the most interesting qualities of clay lie in the experimental. I started quite young but what stuck with me was how clay can be influenced and changed to take on so many other properties, because in essence clay is a special blend of mud. The opportunities are endless, clay can easily exist from a liquid to a solid, you can play with its material qualities in any of those states and manipulate it in any way you see fit; as long as it comes out of the kiln at the end and doesn't explode (and or damage the kiln) you’re fine. From the material to the theoretical you have a rich tapestry of meanings and histories to play with, from ancient Jōmon ceramics to contemporary experimental forms and you don't even need to touch the history of ceramics if you don't want to. Through process and thought I feel I am bringing into being work that ever reaches towards fundamental meanings to me.

Weald - How much importance do you give to the light where you work?

Jasper - Personally I think the interplay between light and form is one of the most important tools I use when making. The meaning of the light isn't really important to me but how it can camouflage and obfuscate texture, shape, pattern or meaning is something I'm always considering when I'm making. Light is a tool, but there is a kind of uncertainty in the making process, in ceramics you know how the glaze might affect the texture or scale of a vessels surface but not necessarily how it will affect the object, similarly to how the form will shrink in firing, until it comes out of the kiln there's a kind of uncertainty I have to deal with.

Weald - What is your relationship to objects?

I think I'm a bit opinionated when it comes to objects we value, I’m not adverse to throwing away a lot of things and I rarely regret it, but I think there is a balance between significant objects and everything else. I don't like clutter and I'd hate to be utilitarian about the value of objects, I’ve learnt that objects should be authentic in some way to who you think you are. You don't need lots of things but the things you have should hold significance, they do not necessarily need to be positive, it could even be visceral negative in some way.

Weald - Do you create reference materials for yourself, photos, drawings etc or collect objects?

Jasper - When I'm out and about I'm often struck by spaces that are undergoing some form of liminality, something that exists in those spaces that are undergoing a kind of change, I end up taking photographs and collecting them for research. Rubble, rubbish, overgrowth, overuse or misuse, there is something in those photos that touch on the greater meaning I know I'm talking about.

I then take these images and translate them into drawings, the essential shapes, patterns, textures into monochrome drawings. From there I use them in the forms, though they are never used directly, they help draft an initial starting point and explore potential patterns and marks.

Alongside this I mainly collect tools to mark make on my forms, not for any solid meaning but when it comes to finding objects you look at things differently and consider how they'd mark when put into clay. I don't find inherent meaning in the tools I collect but by the very nature of the tools I am combining marks from disparate contexts and when combined onto the form they blur their meaning or origin. I think that it gives meaning to the tools paradoxically.

Weald - Do you have an idea of what you’d like to explore next?

Jasper - Recently I’m excited at the prospect of experimentation into additions of glaze material in clay bodies and then using said clayzeTM in the building of the forms to allow the material to embody a hands off kind of change. I want to allow the materials to have a kind of controlled yet uncontrolled chaos that only will be known to exist after the firings. Alongside this I am also looking into extrusions, making my own clay body and more kinds of mark making.

Weald - Do you prefer silence when you are working or do you listen to something?

Jasper - I love music but when I'm making work it can be very hit or miss, sometimes a bit intense. I can get a bit caught up in what it's saying and it distracts from what I'm trying to say. In the studio I often jump between Spotify and BBC Radio 6.

5 song studio soundtrack:

• Saudade - Ana Frango Eléctrico

• Dazies - Yuele

• Playboy/Positions - Shygirl

• Cyberia Lyr2 -Sewerslvt

• Hyper-ballad - Bjork (Orchestral)

Info · Mothshell Ambit - Jasper Thims

Daniella Norton

Daniella’s work is an exploration of the space between the different realities that we operate in and our perception of these situations. She uses abstraction and figuration to keep us off balance and our comfort zones challenged, the amorphous worlds and dream-like figures in the work are infused with a magical and somewhat fantastical, multi-dimensional quality. In the current Tree Root Goddess series Daniella sets out to reclaim depiction of female form, to give it a deeper more fully laden context of women’s lives and meaning and connotation that are largely unacknowledged in historical depictions of the female form.

We Caught up with Daniella in the lead up to our Mothshell Ambit exhibition!

Weald -    What is your process like, and what media do you use to influence your work if at all?

Daniella - I suppose my process is driven by my interests rather than being driven by materials initially, it swaps over later. I begin with an encounter, be that with an art object or an activity like walking. The encounter is a spark to connecting with interests. I am drawn to objects that link to the narrating of personal experiences. For instance, when I went to the Brancusi Studio in Paris I was struck by the sculptures, their depiction of sleep as I’m interested in the time we spend drifting in different levels of consciousness. The tree root goddess series perhaps not so obviously, is linked to this. I am interested in how these creatures exist in different physical form, and how this then suggests to me that there are many layers of consciousness and connectivity that might exist also. In creating these mythical tree root goddesses it has allowed me to journey beyond the rational to explore the representation of femininity. 

 Painting is a language, and I am always mindful of the medium itself, because of its long history it allows one to quote and reference and play like you might with the written word. It also has a three-dimensional aspect, the paintings are also objects and I enjoy treating the paint, even when thinly applied as an almost sculptural material. For this reason, I am less concerned with creating a verbatim image of something than the feeling that the paint is doing something. 

Weald -   How did you get to this process?

Daniella - I arrived at this process through a dissatisfaction with my previous attempts at making paintings. Except for the ones from the first year on my BA before painting became familiar. I realised that what excites me about painting is a feeling of going beyond what you know. My paintings often have an awkwardness about them, and I think this is because I am always trying to find a way of painting that is yet unknown to me. 

Weald -   What do you think of as the most important themes in your work?

Daniella - The most important themes in my work are probably connectivity (between nature and humans, animal and human, humans, and humans or hupeople), a relationship between physicality and the philosophical and feminism. 

Weald -  How has your practice evolved in recent years?

Daniella - My practice has benefitted from a few factors recently. I participated in the Turps Painting School Correspondence Course in 21/22, which was a valuable opportunity to receive feedback from mentors on my practice. Aside from that I am lucky to be part of an arts community in Brighton and it is the conversations and banter that really help shape my work and create an environment that is conducive to my practice. In addition to that there has been the Artist Support Pledge initiated by Matthew Burrows MBE, which has provided a supportive community that is based online and allows artists to connect globally. Art is a communicative activity in my view and it is as a result of these communities that my work has grown and developed. 

 Weald - Can you tell us how the Goddess series come about?

 Daniella - I was invited to participate in an exhibition ’the Goddesses’ at Terrace Gallery earlier in 2023 by artist curators Lucy Jagger and Angela Johnson. The premise of the exhibition was to foreground female and non-binary artists and support each other by including emergent and more established artists exhibiting together. This led me to connect with what Goddesses might mean to me personally. It was a walk through the woods near my house with these thoughts in the back of my mind that allowed me to encounter trees blown over in past storms and connect with them as creatures that had experienced life altering events and survived, growing new branches, and thriving in a new form. This was how the tree root goddess series began. I’m now looking at how the forms of the tree root goddesses might connect with Botticelli’s Venus and how Venus might respond to our current world. 

Weald - Lastly, please would you give us a 5 song studio soundtrack or podcast recommendation?

Daniella - My top podcast is To the studios by @davidauborn who is also an awesome painter. 

My current studio favourites for music are Joan as a Policewoman and Lucille Bogan.

Lucille Bogan was a fascinating woman, well worth reading up on as well as listening to her music.  

Info · Mothshell Ambit - Daniella Norton

Joseph Dilnot

Joseph Dilnot paints intuitively to explore layered subject matter creating a personal mythology and symbolism, in which imagined worlds, momentary insights and reflections on personal experiences are condensed into lyrical and enigmatic paintings. Growing up and living between the English Channel and the South Downs National Park, Dilnot draws great inspiration from the natural world. Spending long periods observing the micro life of insects and exploring the gentle and contemplative landscape of the South Downs, he draws on these observations and memories to depict uncanny, equivocal landscapes, often inhabited by wandering, solitary figures.

We Caught up with Joseph in the lead up to our Mothshell Ambit exhibition!

Weald  -   Earlier this year you were invited to take part in Creature Feature, a virtual group exhibition by mepaintsme; an exclusively online gallery. Can you tell us about the experience of exhibiting online?

Joseph - It was great, they have a very unique eye and I was honoured to be invited after being a fan for a long time. Exhibiting online was a brilliant experience with them, it allowed my pictures to reach a wide audience and was very positive. 

Weald -  Is there a specific environment or material that feels integral to your work at the moment?

Joseph - The most integral environment will always be where I live/work. I live in Eastbourne and my studio is at the bottom of a garden. Always being surrounded by nature, be it the South Downs or the pond by my studio I am always immersed in nature which is an important part of my subject matter. I have peace and time to really think about what I’m doing. It has its downsides living and working somewhere quiet but I’m not sure I could make my work in a city. 

Weald - Your work has real tenderness, can you tell us about your influences?

Joseph - Thank you! That’s a difficult one to answer. I was greatly impacted by going to see the 500 year anniversary exhibition of Hieronymus Bosch when I was 18/19, it was incredible. People were having to queue up to see the paintings! I also visited the Prado in Madrid last year and the background landscapes in Goya and Velazquez paintings sparked something within me, I still imagine myself walking in those distant landscapes. 

Weald - Are there overarching themes that return to your painting?

Joseph - I tend to return to solitary figures in unpeopled spaces. I’m interested in what that experience is, from moments of wonder and lightness to anxiety and self searching. 

Weald - What are you working on now?

Joseph - I have just got back from Cornwall where I spent time marching about in the countryside battling rain and wind! I’m going to try and channel some of those elemental landscapes and weather in my pictures. 

Paper Hat by Joseph Dilnot

Weald - Joe, can you give us a  5 song studio soundtrack :

Joeseph -

In no particular order…

-Beggar- Richard Dawson 

-The Lighthouse V (feat. Larla Ó Lionáird)- Colin Stetson

-Om Mani Padme Hum- Constance Demby

-Glass Chattering- Yoshio Ojima 

-Shadow in the Frame -Daniel Rossen

Info · Mothshell Ambit -Joseph Dilnot

Jennifer Davis

Jennifer Davis’s paintings explore the narrative between self and material, serving as a form of open-ended conversation. Jennifer explains “I consider myself to have a very personal approach to colour and gesture, working intuitively and using my instincts. Painting and drawing give me the platform to express this. Drawing and journaling throughout the years has informed the development of a personal language which translates directly into painting.”

We Caught up with Jennifer in the lead up to our Mothshell Ambit exhibition!

Weald - Can you tell us about the subject matter of the work included in Mothshell Ambit?

Jennifer - I want to tell stories in my work and capture imagined scenes. I’ve always felt the need to create images that hold notions of narrative and humour. In this way, a great deal of the subject matter is the process of painting itself, and how it allows for feelings and ideas to materialise through this transformation.

In the past year I became more interested in the idea of retelling and revisiting ideas from history and translating it through my own lens. I was looking at the idea of public executions and the parallels to modern day cancel culture, especially surrounding women’s experiences. Wanting to make a sort of satirical critique of this I began to include imagery in my work that simplified this idea.

Weald -Does symbolism play a part in your painting?

Jennifer - Yes, through a repetitive process characters emerge from a personal language that represent something, often giving it dual meanings. I like to keep these ambiguous and open for the viewer to interpret. Using text alongside becomes part of the process, helping to expand the narratives and alludes to the symbolic meanings.

 “A bell jar, holding possibilities of something precious, sacred, ready to be observed. But the contents were bare, the shelter cracked and deemed ‘irreparable’. A sense that something of beauty once occupied this space of illusionary protection”

Useless Bell-Jar

Weald - You were finishing your degree at Brighton University during the Covid pandemic, how did this affect how you produced work

Jennifer - During my final year of my BA I was working on a collection of work that had come from a series of drawings. They were interestingly already playing with themes of isolation and introspection. It was weird because it felt like these paintings had suddenly manifested into reality. In March we were told to pack up our things and take it all home. I attempted to set up a studio in my bedroom with tarpaulin. It was an absolute mess and I was using oil paints too so I was basically filling my room with fumes and felt myself going a bit crazy. I think it had an affect on the last few pieces of work made at this time as it was in a much more manic and uneasy state of mind. When finishing the degree I continued to draw on a daily basis in a journalistic manner. New motifs and language began to develop during this time, much of it being based around the collapse of self.

Weald - Could you tell us more about how you came to use mixed media & collage in your work?

Jennifer - finishing university, covid was still present, so I had to make do with making work from home (as I deferred a year of my MA due to a lack of studio.) This time it seemed impossible to work on a larger scale as I had moved house and there seemed no way around being able to work in oil paint. I reverted to using gouache on paper, it still gave me the freedom to mix colour and have some sense of fluidity. However unlike oil there was not much way I could work into the paint and build it up (which is common in my process). I found a lot of flaws in this as they seemed too rigid, so impulsively I began to cut them all up. I had piles of these pieces, scattered everywhere. It made sense to do something with them so I started to piece them together and they began to form new compositions and narratives. It was a playful process, and allowed me to experiment with the relation of space. I see these pieces as works in themselves, but they also informed future larger scale pieces.

 Weald - What are you working on at the moment?

Jennifer -I finished my MA last summer, and since then have found myself without a studio. I have returned to working at a smaller scale, using the same idea of mixed media and collage. I have been working on developing new language and motif within my work which will hopefully soon be able to take life on a much larger scale on canvas. Since finishing the Masters, I have continued to write and this is an area I would like to expand upon, interweaving aspects of social and individual commentary; the confessional and the fiction. Humour is at the forefront of my practice, so being able to express this in both the image and in words is something I want to continue to work on.

Weald - Please give us a 5 song studio soundtrack or podcast recommendation:

        Jennifer - always listen to music when in the studio and making work. Most of what I listen to is quite upbeat, and often dance tracks. It works best for me to throw myself into things with high energy and to have little distraction around me. Although every now and then I do need a softer song, often for when I’m reflecting.

•      Another Place - Dusky, Lucy Tun

•     Kammy (like i do) - Fred Again...

•    On the Run - Kelela

•     6 Underground - Sneaker Pimps

•    Staring at the Henry Moore - Aldous Harding

Info · Mothshell Ambit - Jennifer Davis