November 2024 - February 2025
The first of our triannual exhibitions held in the main gallery space (shop) this exhibition explores how female artists interact with their environment. Textile artist Lynda Shell has created one of a kind bags and quilts using silkscreen printed offcuts guided by an admiration for the rural African American women of Gee’s Band, Alabama. Contemporary impressionist painter Jane Morrow explores the notion of hiraeth in her landscape paintings; capturing fleeting but spiritually connecting moments, often painting environments that are at risk from climate change and development. Ceramicist Hilary Coole has created a collection inspired by our destruction of the planet. The female form represents mother earth and she is surrounded by abstract landscapes.
‘NO WASTE’ COLLECTION - Lynda Shell
“The ‘No Waste’ collection has been created using all the silkscreen printed off-cuts kept for many years from my handmade bag collections. I have never been able to throw away even the smallest of scraps believing that they would be useful one day.
In a world where sustainability and caring for the environment is at the forefront of our minds the idea of making something new and exciting out of what may otherwise be thrown away has been my driving challenge.
The inspiration for my final designs has come from my love of making quilts. I have a long-standing admiration of the quilts produced by woman from a small rural African American community of Gee’s Bend, Alabama, who become well known for their remarkable abstract quilts made from work clothes remnants and scraps.
With their distinctive bold aesthetic in mind the ‘No Waste’ collection has been crafted using a considered combination of colours, patterns & plains. Like the woman of Gee’s Bend I adopted an improvisational approach to placement, disregarding conventional geometrics and allowing the material to influence the creative process. Each product created is therefore completely unique and special.”
Jane Morrow
This latest collection of Jane’s work, explores the notions of Gaia and Mother Nature and how she responds to them as an artist. All the paintings on display are of views that inspire her on daily walks and journeys around North Wales from Anglesey to Snowdonia and her beloved home town of Denbigh.
“I am fortunate to live and work in such a beautiful part of the world. I am often inspired by fleeting, natural moments and details such as a passing cloud or a beam of light illuminating the hillside or trunk of a tree. The sea, sky, trees, hills, dwellings and animals, that I observe and paint, endeavour to give a sense of place and connection to the Earth and in particular Wales and remind us of how precious these landscapes are within the natural world and how fundamental they are to our human experience as caretakers and inhabitants of it.
I hope to express this passion and emotion through my work by creating evocative and atmospheric pieces that give the viewer the chance to pause, take a breath and to remember that we are all connected somehow.”
Along with nature, the love of art history, poetry and literature consistently inform her work. Especially that of Constable, Turner and the French Impressionists as well as writers such as Dylan Thomas and the Brontë sisters. Jane has exhibited both in solo and mixed exhibitions. Her work is collected both in the uk and internationally.
