Solo exhibition next month!
I am excited to announce my solo exhibition at the Eagle Gallery, Bedford, in March, entitled “JOANNA STONE: PORTRAITS”
“I’m fired by the challenges of working from life. This informs all my art.”
This exhibition features works in oils, pastels, ink and watercolours that have all been made with the person there, in front of the artist. Some are portraits that show direct connection with the sitter and include significant objects that are meaningful to them, giving vital clues to their personality. Others are characters re-imagined from fairy tales, folklore and Shakespeare. Also included are nude figure studies from life.
Work is for sale, but you are also very welcome to come along just to have a look! I also undertake commissions.
The exhibition runs from 2nd – 9th March at the Eagle Gallery, Mon-Sat, 10 –5.30pm.
Private View : 1st March, invitation only. Please get in touch if you would like to come along.
“Meet the Artist”: Sat 2nd March 10.00 – 5.30pm. I shall be there all day to talk about my work and show some of my sketchbooks etc.
Eagle Gallery, 101, Castle Road, Bedford, MK 40 3QP.
Tel: 01234 346995
“Making a portrait from life reveals much more to me than a photograph. A photograph freezes the fraction of a second and flattens perspective. When looking at eachother we are constantly moving and our eyes take in many thousands of tiny shifts of view, allowing our brains to process lots of visual information to help shape our perception of the person we’re observing.” ©Joanna Stone.
Studio Days…
Friday 23rd October 2015 : “It’s Not All About Drawing…”
Why is it so hard to start?
Determinedly turning my back on pressing emails, and even more pressing washing up – I make it into my art studio, hidden away in the garden – by mid-morning. It feels cold and damp in here. In my coat, while the heater gets to work, I pull out some sheets of used watercolour paper. (If they’re already used on one side, I won’t feel too precious about what I produce on the other side!)
Musical accompaniment must be classical (-no lyrics or voices to intrude upon my conciousness!). Pagannini – violin & cello – energizing.
“back iii”,
Joanna Stone 2015,
Watercolour.
“back iii” Joanna Stone, 2015. Watercolour.
I seem to have created a “back” series…
I decide to take photographs of recent drawings as a record and to use online. This turns into a process of consideration.
CONTEMPLATION TIME: IMPORTANT TO GAZE AND CONSIDER.
Making notes in my A6 sketchbook (almost a diary, but with drawings & not quite a journal) and cross-referencing other sketchbooks (I have several on the go at any one time).
The music has stopped.
A flock of Goldcrests come through the garden all around the studio, sounding high, sweet, few notes. Moving swiftly, taking invisible insects from the trees.
Another “thread” tugs at my thoughts…
TREES
This studio, this house and garden, this village – we’re surrounded by acres of of ancient woodland and heath.
One A3 sketch book is becoming all about this landscape. I feel alternately hemmed in or liberated by trees…
Psychogeography
(Merlin Coverley, but also Dorothy Wordsworth, Richard Long and many more) – walking and recording – not just how it looks but how it feels, smells, sounds. Human interaction with the landscape. My connection.
Hunger suddenly drives me back into the house for a sandwich and hot tea, still contemplating ideas, undoing and reshaping in my mind’s eye.
Afterwards I go for a walk in the woods. Ancient woodland, mostly Sessile Oaks in this part, although I can’t find any over perhaps two hundred years (?)…Maybe they were cut down to use for building…? Our house has oak beams.
Drawing and taking photographs as I go. Occasional dog-walkers regarding me with suspicion or amusement.
My favourite tiny sketchbook, 2015.
Joanna Stone
My favourite tiny sketchbook, handmade for me by my daughter.
Sessile Oak,
Joanna Stone 2015,
brushpen.
Sessile oaks in bakers Wood, pencil 2015.
Joanna Stone
A couple of walking hours later, and back to the studio to allow the day’s wanderings and wonderings to settle into some kind of vision.
Now
I have a way
to begin
Joanna Stone 