Mysteries of the deep Orkney

Still working on this piece I've decided to add some colour at the top to remind me of the beautiful pink and yellow flowered meadows. 

Way of the Gull progress is slow

                                       

I'm still playing around with these pieces, not happy with the printed gulls, I'm going to try my hand at machine embroidery.

Making ready for Brighouse Victorian Market

 I'll be at the market with my friends from Lateral.  Four of us will be sharing a stall.  Lots of lovely things on offer.

Lateral is a group of artists that work and show together.  Originally founded by Huddersfield Uni Textile Crafts graduates now expanded to include more like minded artists.

Exhibitions to visit

Poppies at the YSP are a huge attraction, too much wallowing in the past instead of facing up to the plight of current victims of war for my taste.

The new exhibition of Bill Viola's work in the Underground Gallery and the Chapel is both stunning and thought provoking.

The next exhibition on my list to visit is Art Textiles at the Whitworth in Manchester.

Way of the Gull

Trying my hand at machine embroidery, I'm hoping to create some backgrounds for the woven bundles, brooding black gulls overshadowing the pretty flowers.

Inspiration in County Antrim

Way of the Gull

Thinking about adding some lino print gulls to the background with the embroidery.

Way of the Gull

A bit of sewing perhaps.

Back to work on the Way of the Gull

                    

           
                        

All four pieces are assembled, now the only problem is how to finish them off. Are they finished?

Landmarks, Berry Banks and Hagg Wood, in the exhibition at Holmfirth Art Week

Wandering through the bluebells along Berry Banks,

 later in the year there'll be blackberries and bilberries for the picking.

      

Dappled sunlight by the river, bright new leaves campion, 

rowan tree in flower, last year's beech mast crunching underfoot.

Landmarks and Edgelands

My current projects Landmarks and Edgelands are exploring the landscape from different perspectives.  Landmarks, working from maps and local knowledge, is looking at place names that relate to the land and its features, Reynards, Hagg, Berry and Ramsden currently in my sketchbook. Edgelands is investigating abandoned sites along the River Holme that were once 'hives' of industry now abandoned for nature to recapture, havens for wildlife unlike much of the adjoining farm land.
The Edgelands project will hopefully be exhibited with Lateral in their Transitions exhibition in 2016.

Highline celebrating 50 years of the Pennine Way

the South Square exhibition closes at the end of the week

Where I Wander Berry Banks

research for a piece called Berry Banks brambles bilberries sunshine bumble bees bird song, just now dappled shade and blue bells

Where I wander

Back to the old themes, Ramsden Clough, Hagg Wood and Berry Banks.  Places that I habitually visit.

Orkney

progressing slowly, another week perhaps, and it will be off the loom

Orkney

The tapestry is progressing slowly, but I think I have at last got the measure of it.



Dark and disturbing, coming from the depths of the land and the sea.

                           

Ash Trees in flower

The ash trees are in flower, I'm wondering is it time to revisit the unresolved ash die back project. The disease is spreading up the A65 through the Dales.

Orkney

So I decided to start something new.

another failure, I managed to cut through the warp.

Way of the Gull

The question is when to give it up as a bad job, and  take a walk around the garden.

Way of the Gull

still not working, time to have a go at something else

Give Nature a Home RSPB Low Moor

Reynards's Clough

Tom Stephenson's Dream

Installed at the South Square Centre

Tom Stephenson's Dream

Journeys end

Tom Stephenson's Dream - the story for the book

6 august edale Jacob’s ladder kinder bleaklow desolate picture windows and views at torside 15 miles 7 august laddow blackhill wessenden swellands beach curlews cotton grass heather scented air standedge brass band players waiting to shower wellcroft perched 29 miles 8 august it wasn’t dull plastic bottles and apple cores A roads and motorways intrusion mount olive baptist chapel sad cemetery neglect what price plenty millstone edge blackstone edge windmills and masts 45 miles blackshaw head 9 august rain rain rain old stone paths to work worn by many years of feet heather scent in the rain top withens brontes heathcliffe coffee in the bubble at ponden too early 57 miles no bed or dinner 10 august hungry hard going ooze underfoot harebells new views ickornshaw chalets cows sheep curlews calling death rabbits swallows martins calves in cages bellowing east marton cold comfort farm 69 miles 11 august aire in spate sticky water water sodden fields rain washed sky honey scented thistles sleepy places squelch squelch squelch fast flowing scary power fear malham 78 miles on to Horton rain rain RAIN curlew calling wet campers pen-y-ghent onward no cafe closed limestone gritstone bird’s foot trefoil brown milky foam quarry scar bumble bee on thistle crown again 93 miles over the hill to hawes cam high road plod plod plod corvids wheeling drizzle mizzle ballon field patterns and out barns tread lightly on the land bones saturated youth hostel 107 miles 14 august great shunner fell rain wind thwaite respite robin peanuts mining spoil rocky path water logged keld butt house swale in spate too much meat 118 miles 15 august sun breeze grouse goback goback goback dying rabbit honey scented thistles suffering swamp tan hill abandoned gate posts lying dead heaving bog goback goback goback footprints in the peat hannah’s meadows sponging up the river middleton lift 132 miles 16 august tees in spate awesome waterfalls roaring pouring foaming churning 147 miles 17 august tees in spate MIDGES MIDGES MIDGES bites slippy slithery paths midges cauldron spout wow high cup nick streaming with water difficult ford spouting spurting ravens flooded warren dufton 159 miles 18 august little dun golf balls great dun cross fell top of the pennines mist no shelter where’s the shelter where’s the trig cloud clears eden valley below greg’s hut prayer flags coffin route garrygill cup of tea 165 miles past half way 19 august dry boots yurts nice b&b new tactics no michael and pauline too wet take the railway route no swamp alston coffee slaggyford spooky chapel 177 miles 20 august wet boots stay on the railway line no swamp here railway weed balsam birch willow water water  everywhere blackbird wild raspberries people redundant buffers no longer needed haltwhistle half-day closing churchyard cup of tea greenheads 188 miles 21 august rotting chapel yha on the wall to once brewed views north and south spectacular 195 miles 22 august along the wall and through the  swamp the cheviot beckons bellingham signal box dining room 220 miles 23 august blue sky wide open horizons huge cross fell cheviot from whence we came to where we’re going swamp trees bumble bees soft breeze soft ground wet sweet smelling heather byrness 235 miles 24 august on to the cheviot blue sky views even the wading through the swamp can’t spoil this who said the cheviot was the worst bit glorious barrow burn mr and mrs tait cup of tea and welcome 251 miles coquet valley stells 25 august gale force winds clennell street mountain refuge gale force winds the last lap ‘blessed are those that love the hills’ kirk yetholm 264 miles

Tom Stephenson's Dream

Assembling material for the book
.

Give Nature a home

I've now got the correct title.

Give Nature a Home

 

bug hotel on the back of my garden shed,  where next?

Tom Stephenson's Dream

All three tapestries finished, now there's only the book to complete. 

Tom Stephenson's Dream

Working on the big skies over the Cheviot.

Re-framing the Landscape at the Abbot Hall Gallery

A thought provoking exhibition looking at artists who reject the traditional approach to the landscape. Wonderfully presented at the Abbot Hall, a small gallery that offers really interesting exhibitions.
The exhibition included the Boyle Family and 'Memorious Earth,' work by Richard Skelton and Autumn Richardson based in the Duddon Valley linking the natural history of the area with artefacts from the collection in  the Museum of Lakeland Life, loved it.

Homes for Nature

 

Way of the Gull

Could this be Homes for Nature time is running out.

Homes for Nature

This is the theme for the next exhibition, its proving difficult to come up with an interesting idea.  I wonder if The Way of the Gull story will fit the bill?

Tom Stephenson's Deam

Progressing slowly

 I've now unpicked the top section, and started again, its beginning to feel more like the moorland.