Walking into my new studio where it is quite cold, but quiet and peaceful,  feels lovely. I know I will not be disturbed by anything, and I can get down to work. Here are some photos of new work in progress:

 

 

Last week I taught a one-day workshop in St. Ives in the small studio at St Ives School of Painting, over-looking the sea…

We made drawings and monotypes from a bodily place, arrived at through working with the breath, the non-dominant hand, and responding to music. Here are some of the images produced….

         

            

        

It was a great class, intense and exciting work was produced.

My next drawing workshop is at Cornwall College on April 3rd.

Excited about moving to Studio 6 at Trewarveneth in April..

I’ve been working in oils on paper, loving working with glorious colours again!

I’m reading a book by Alan Bleakley,

Fruits of the Moon Tree: Medicine Wheel and Transpersonal Psychology, and found this great quote: “Blake knew that it is what we have made invisible to ourselves that is important, that the unexplored side of our human natures was in the close ‘primitive’ senses, touch, smell, taste, .. These were the ways to true naked thin-skinned feeling…” (p.vi)

 

And I am continuing to make works in oil – on paper, panel, and canvas. I’ve been making works in which I think I as a figure am more central, less equivocal, less shadowy, less in the background; and I am incorporating some of my subtle or visionary experiences into the work – or, rather, they are emerging as I work. A woman with green hair in a pink field of colour became a woman with breasts issuing forth the sea, upon which floated two boats, on water travelling uphill towards a spirit tree. There are now two spirit trees, one figure with her hair coming alive and somehow containing the physical or lower world. The sea and the boats have gone, but they may return elsewhere, in another work.

 

I am grateful to Eliza for writing this piece; she is going to choose one of my works as a cover for one of her E.P.s.

 

York, New School House Gallery

New School House Gallery directors Paula Jackson and Robert Teed are a discerning pair, known for exhibiting outstanding UK artists who work in all manner of mediums. Their latest offering, a selection from Cornwall based painter Kate Walters’ work is no exception and continues to uphold their unparalleled standards in North Yorkshire.

The first thing to strike you about Ms Walters work is that of a certain naivety. Don’t be fooled; the longer you look it becomes apparent that the painted images of long limbed animals, sparse dark landscapes, and the forms of pre-Christian-like-people-as-deities are deliberate, considered but instinctual and contain a mythology which speaks to a primeval part of yourself you didn’t know to be present. Part cave painting, part vision, there’s something incredibly unique and unsettling about the minimal palette. The use of pinks and purples mixed in with ghostly charcoal taps into your subconscious making for a compelling view.

Immediately you see that Walters’ native area of Penzance, steeped in folklore and ancient culture, inhabits her work truly. The lost Cornish culture is a fine mix akin to other Celtic strains yet the Iron Age legacy defines an aspect of its identity more so than in its prevalently known cousins. In using this culture as a filter the artist has captured what it is to discover expressing ones inner world with an external medium – which could sit comfortably on a canvas or a secluded cliff face, such is its authenticity.

Whether to your taste or not you cannot deny Kate Walters sincerity, depth of experience or context; the future can very much be seen through the eye of the past.

Eliza Gregory


Musician/Poet/Artist
www.headsearchingforbody.tumblr.com

The Tyrolean Folk Museum is situated in the centre of Innsbruck, in the old town, very near the Dom, or Cathedral. Created in 1888 and recently re-furbished, it is a fantastic and fascinating place to spend a few hours.

 I visited in February on my free day in Innsbruck whilst presenting at the university. Spread over several floors, with a light installation reminiscent of something I saw recently at the Venice Biennale, it’s an amazing collection of different aspects of hand-made vernacular culture, much of it extraordinary, full of heart, earth, animal, working-by-fires-feelings, and very touching. On the ground floor alongside the excellent café there is a beautiful collection of nativity miniatures.There are actually quite large tableaux, in some cases 3 m wide, and they are varied, intricate, beautiful and lit in such a way that they seem to come to life. You can see the continuity of this tradition in certain shop window displays in the town as well.

 

On the first floor there is a wide range of decorated farm implements, ranging from stunningly beautiful hand-embroidered animal bell necklaces or collars, to sculptures of Christ carried by a donkey, religious paintings, huge flowery head-dresses, costumes for festivals, cooking tools and ceramics. Every item is hand-made, and either refers lovingly to a strong connection to Nature, tradition, faith, or all three.

                                        

 The second floor focuses on the life events of the-only-just pre-modern local people, where death and life were daily closely interwoven. Child-birth in remote mountainous regions was sometimes a risky matter, and there are many little magical paintings depicting the prayers and agonies of the people. Children were often lost during birth, and there are paintings and dolls depicting these little souls. The after-life was also a pre-occupation, and there are many references to local beliefs, lovingly depicted as if to ward off that which is feared, yet also attempting to appease.

                              

                                    

 There were also life-size reconstructions of actual rooms: furnished entirely in wood, with leaded light windows and enormous decorated ceramic stoves, perhaps one decorative/religious item per room, and hard wooden furniture, these rooms were spartan but beautiful and lovingly re-created.

 There were hundreds of examples of hand-embroidered ribbons, tiny boxes made of bone or horn, finely decorated with beautiful animal forms; hand-woven rugs and textiles, and hand-carved wooden tools for all manner of culinary and domestic tasks.

              

                     

I came away with a strong sense of a time and place that felt both near and remote in the context of our modern lives, but that there is also an enduring pulse in the desire to create beauty in the everyday as well as celebrating significant events in the passage of lives where living could sometimes be very hard.

I was hoping there would be a great big catalogue, given the exhibition was so rich, but there was nothing! I was glad I had taken so many photos.

March issue link:   http://issuu.com/aesthetip/docs/aesthetip-march-2014

The beginning of March has been busy and full of new things. I had a long journey to York but it was good to have some time out to reflect. I stayed in a lovely airbnb, in a little girl’s room, with wolf and stars posters, and a large cuddly wolf should I need company in bed. I was also visited, persistently, by large ladybirds.

Robert and Paula had already installed the show when I arrived so we just had finishing touches to make, and I gave three interviews – a long one to Charles Hutchinson of the York Press, a shorter one to BBC Radio York and then one to camera for Robert, in order for him to make a film which can run in the gallery alongside the works.

Link to first article in the York Press: http:www.yorkpress.co.uk/leisure/exhibitions/11061693. Kate Walters New School house Gallery until April 26

The Private View went very well and I met some very interesting people. The artist Jake Attree had some great things to say about my work which I found very encouraging and heartening.

 

 

Before the Opening I spent some hours in the Minster for peace and stillness. I loved the stained glass windows:

 

and I enjoyed the shop window displays in York, which reminded me of those you can see in small Italian towns, where they also take great pride in their work.

Spending hours browsing the bookshops was a real treat, and I found some beauties – by Marina Warner.

 

http://issuu.com/aesthetip/docs/aesthetip-march-2014

 

I am really thrilled with their article on me after their studio visit. Thanks so much Emma and Steve!

 

New work:

It  has been a very busy month. I’ve had an intense intensive teaching week at Newlyn School of Art, which went really well. I was teaching a workshop on drawing meanings, methods and materials. The next one there will be in August. Here are some photos of the work made…

 

and some life drawings….

I have also been working on new pieces for my show in Edinburgh, and getting excited about my journey to York to install my work there.

 

Mother Artist

Rebecca Baillie has invitied me to submit work, and thoughts, responses to questions, for her show on perceptions of motherhood due to be shown in london at the APT Gallery later this year.

Here are some of my thoughts on the Artist as Mother, Mother as Artist:

 1. To me the term and concept ‘maternal’ implies the womb,bringing to birth, nurturing, being watched over, warmth, warm colours, red, but also white; being able to speak the language of trust, intuition, empathy.

2. Notions of ‘the maternal’ are made visible in my work in various ways: through the warm earthy colours I use; through the forms, the arcs of embrace and protection…

3. ‘Mother artists’ to me are those who are able to display certain characteristics; maybe true mother artists don’t achieve fame or recognition, there is a humility which goes with it, the absence of ego, wisdom, strongly centred and grounded within themselves. A mother artist would pay attention to nurturing her own creativity and she may also pay attention to nurturing the creativity in others – the mother artist teacher.

4. ‘Children’ might not be human offspring, but animals, works of art, thoughts and actions shared, the nurturing of nature. A mother artist would hold a space, the being, void, to allow the becoming…she is the generative space, her energy the generative energy…

Becoming a mother has deepened my sense of being alive and my son is one of the most joyful aspects of my life.

5. Yes I do see myself as a ‘mother artist’. All my works are birthed in a bodily way, always felt first inside my body in a deep and inchoate way.

 

 

I returned two days ago from the Minding Animals International Conference, held at the University of Innsbruck (Feb 6 – 8th). I met many very interesting and well-informed people. I enjoyed learning about the dingo, but I was sad and shocked to hear of all the animals who die pressed against the so-called rabbit proof fence, in their efforts to reach water in Southern Australia. Learning about veterinary science in ancient Mesopotamia was also fascinating, and lovely to see the ancient carved tablets which bequeath us this information.

Innsbruck itself is reached by a slightly hairy plane ride in between enormous mountain peaks. The airport is tiny compared to Gatwick. The city seemed quiet, with little traffic, few tourists, and generally an atmosphere of calm.

I gave two talks/workshops focusing on the animals human relationship and in particular what animals have taught me. I spoke about my mare and what she taught me about motherhood. I spoke at some length about my show at Newlyn Art Gallery, and about what we can learn from entering into a conversation with Nature. I asked the people in the audience to reflect on events in their lives where animals had been significant, and to consider what they had learned. I spoke about my work really at its heart being about close attention, affection, and nurturing.

 

 

 

 

 

After I had given my talks I visited the mountain foothills and had a wonderful time exploring the snow-clad forests. It was beautiful, I loved it.

More soon on my visit to the Tiroler Folk Museum, which was amazing!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have been working hard in the lovely spacious Newlyn studio, making many monotypes on fragile but beautiful Japanese Gampi paper. It is time to move my focus to oil painting again though, which is more difficult for me. I have two lovely large new canvases ready to go!

Today was a raven day. I saw one early this morning; another sitting on a post at wild and glowing Bodrifty, and two others flying overhead, playing and chatting in their lovely deep raven voices.

A dream awoke me this morning, of a lover coming to lie down beside me, heavy, dark, quiet.