Helene Schjerfbeck - Royal Academy of Art (August 2019)

I hadn't heard of Helene Schjerfbeck before this exhibition and it was a delightful surprise to discover her work.

Self portraits spanning decades: 

Other portraits:

 

Arundel Castle - September 2019

Arundel Castle, West Sussex

The castle creates a striking view from the train as it passes Arundel and at last I finally got round to visiting.  It wasn't a disappointment!  The castle is massive and a lot of fun to explore, especially clambering around inside the keep.

The Castle Keep

This display case was lined with crushed velvet:

Lots of patterns in the leaded glass windows:

The massive baronial hall

This would make a nice reading snug, although probably freezing cold for most of the year.

A portrait of Charles I by Van Dyck (who else?) with a beautiful sleigh(?) in front.

Mary Fitzalan, wife of the 4th Duke of Norfolk.  Always interesting to look at clothing in Tudor portraits.

The dining room

One of the bedroom toilets.  Presumably still in use, judging by the provision of toilet paper!

3 years of no posts - I have a lot to catch up on!

Posts about the last 3 years will be out of order.  And I really need to decide which font to use...  This is Trebuchet, normal size.

Julie Arkell papier-mache workshop at West Dean - January 2015

Hot off the press for once.  Just back from a 5 day course at West Dean with Julie Arkell.

The characters in their mummified state.  For speed we were using a 'dry' method of constructing the underlying structures by scrunching newspaper and binding it with masking tape, rather than using paste which would take too long to dry.

With a layer of newspaper pasted over the masking tape.

Being glued to pieces of mountboard for the soles of their feet.

Wearing some of their clothes.

Other odds and ends: tree, toadstools, stitched picture, and doll torso with papier-mache limbs.

Everything, although not finished of course.

Julie also had us making bird nests with papier-mache twigs, real twigs, and scraps of fabric, thread etc.  She completed one which is due for her nature table at her exhibition in Swansea.  We suggested that one of her partially completed nests would be best worn as a crown (above).

My nest was well camouflaged against the flint walls.


A good group of classmates who created some very inventive creatures:
 

Not a lot of daylight for walking in the grounds at this time of year.  The ground was quite bare compared with the summer but the snowdrops and hellebores were out and the river was in full flow.