I was in Merville Garden Village recently and was struck by how beautiful it looked with  the cherry blossoms in full bloom.

Merville has an interesting history too, the original Georgian house was built in 1795 and has been the home of many prominent families throughout the years. It was eventually  restored to it’s present condition in 2006. The estate that  surrounds it was built by Thomas McGrath who had been inspired to build a number of Garden Villages and chose architect Thomas Hayton Mawson to do the building designs and planning. The estate was completed in 1949 and was designated a conservation area in 1995. Read more about it here.

The village also has a connection to artist Sir Stanley Spencer  1891-1959 who spent some time there visiting his brother in the early 1950s. Spencer painted a view of the estate from one of the flats although the estate looks rather more austere than it looks now.

He also painted a portrait of his sister-in-law Daphne while he was there. This is a beautiful portrait and is often on show at the Ulster Museum. Spencer is well known as an allegorical artist but his portraits are beautiful. Spencer doesn’t seem to be a particularly fashionable artist at the moment, but for me his portraits are just wonderful and worth studying if you are interested at all in doing some portraiture yourself.  Look at the beautiful hands and arm  in this portrait of Daphne and the wonderful tones and sculpting on the face, neck and chest. And those beads around her neck, when standing in front of the actual painting you feel that you could actually lift them off. Love it!

Printing Soundwaves

Have a look at this video taken at the Vibrate Exhibition in Downpatrick showing innovative printmaker Dr Josephine McCormick explaining how she gets the patterns for her cymatic prints which can be seen on the wall behind her. Josephine’s website is really interesting and shows a very different approach to printmaking.

Creative Change Exhibition

I have a couple of paintings in Creative Change NI ‘s first group show ‘Vibrate’ in the Saint Patrick Centre Downpatrick. This is a really great exhibition showing a wide range of work in both subject matter and medium. It is really well worth a visit.  It continues until the 28th April 2012 when there will also be an opportunity to see some experimental video. Creative Change NI is a  ”site to connect Art Galleries and other agents of change in Northern Ireland to help each other find what’s on when and who’s doing what.” Below is ‘ Googled’ one of the paintings I have exhibited, in a photograph taken  at home before the exhibition, with my little muse. This painting is a  variation on ‘Goggled’ which was in the RUA exhibition last year and below that ‘ The Space Between’  a much smaller and more dreamy type of image.  See more photos of everyones work here.

Merville Exhibition

I feel really lucky to have managed to get three pieces of work into the ASU (Arts Society of Ulster)  Annual Exhibition this year. The Exhibition is in Merville House in Merville Garden Village and runs until Sunday 15th April. There is such a wide variety work to see. Is really worth a visit. Below are two of my three pieces Ready to Go which is a portrait of my little grandson and Leah my cousin’s gorgeous daughter.

It’s me!

It's me!

Sunhat

This acrylic painting is based on photographs taken while my little muse was playing in the garden on her swing. I just loved the shadow patterns made by the sunhat on her face. It was a challenge, but I think I got there in the end. I got this painting selected for the Arts Society of Ulster Annual Exhibition 2011.

 

Anticipation

Ethan my little grandson totally enthralled with a TV programme, so I seized the opportunity to do a few quick sketches and take a few photos while he remained still. Later at home I worked on this little portrait in acrylics. Another lucky one, I got this accepted in the Royal Ulster Academy Exhibition 2011 along with Goggled (previous post).  It sold also………… happy days!  This photo was taken through the glass of the frame and unfortunately you can see the reflections on the glass. Never remember to do the photos before I go the framers ………………. always in a rush to meet hand in dates.