White Shift - an installation

Kathryn Campbell Dodd and Louise Bird - White Shift - more images

On Tuesday, I spent the day at Aberystwyth Arts Centre at the launch of Culture Colony. A day of events had been organised by the man behind the venture, Pete Telfer. With a new website, Culture Colony is set to become a great place to bookmark for Welsh art - an active space where artists can show their work, blog and communicate with each other. It is also a place to view cultural content about the arts in Wales. It is responding to the dirth of cultural programming on TV, and with his television background, Pete brings a fantastic ethos to the project. He aims to keep the editing to a minimum, allowing the artists and practitioners involved to tell their own truth.

From the left: Kim Fielding, Ann Jordan, Nazma Ali, Mari Beynon Owen, Michael Cousin

I showed a collaborative piece of work with fellow Carmarthen artist, Louise Bird in the Round Studio space. Serendipitously, we we sharing the space with composer and sound artist Ed Wright from North Wales. We met for the first time in the morning and within an hour the work was installed and we had negotiated a really nice working relationship. Ed's sound pieces worked really well with our installation which also included a video projection of Louise's crochet and added all sorts of layers to the experience.

Michelle Collins - Documentation is My Downfall - photo: Michelle Collins

Other artists' involved included Kim Fielding from tactileBOSCH studios and gallery in Cardiff who installed two photographic flat light box works in the entrance to the Round Studio - I was delighted that our work was reached via Kim's. Carmarthenshire artist Michelle Collins was also showing her work in one of the amazing silver artist units on the site, Documentation is My Downfall comprised of a series of archive boxes filled with Michelle's reference materials. The visitor is asked to browse through the boxes and curate scraps, articles and images onto a pin board alongside other people's choices. There was also tea and cake to be shared - excellent!

Thanks to Culture Colony for a great day - please visit the site and join in!

Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru 2010 - Blaenau Gwent and Heads of the Valleys

This year, the National Eisteddfod of Wales is being held at a site in Ebbw Vale in the south Wales valleys. My friend Louise Bird was chosen to show work this year and I went to help her install it yesterday - it was a long day, the piece is called Iota and consists of 160 metres of deep sea fishing line crocheted along its length with little rosettes that Louise calls 'Iota'. Y Lle Celf - The Arts and Crafts Pavilion this year is a spectacular build. Normally it is held in a standard white marquee, but for 2010 a huge concrete basement from the old steelworks that were located at the site as been converted and covered with a huge pavilion roof. It is really spectacular.

Artists, Louise Bird and Carwyn Evans behind Iota

It took us 9 hours to hang the work - up and down ladders and ramps, it spans the space from the roof to the floor. Next door to us Good Cop Bad Cop came in to hang a wonderful set of works - the latex skin from a series of chairs and a table - I don't know what it is called yet...

Good Cop Bad Cop

I was also excited to see some of Andre Stitt's new paintings, which I have only seen online and in print thus far. Originally from Northern Ireland, Stitt is an internationally renowned performance artist who has been based in Wales now for many years. In the last few years he has been developing a practice as a painter.

Andre Stitt

I'll be going to the opening tomorrow night - so watch this space for an update...

More pics here.

Fibre Art Wales

Louise Bird - Black Hole of Carmarthen - seen here

I am delighted that I have just been selected to join Fibre Art Wales, a group of professional artists working in Wales "...with the aim of raising the profile of Welsh contemporary fibre art, to educate and stimulate the public regarding new developments and challenges in the current visual fibre art climate".

It is an energetic group with an strong exhibiting presence, and I hope to be able to show in the next exhibition coming up at the National Botanic Gardens in Carmarthenshire.

Here is work from a few of my new colleagues!

Ruth Harries - The Path - seen here

Michelle Griffiths - Endogenus series (Neurons) - seen here

Alison Mercer - Babygrow No: 8 - seen here

Laura Thomas - Haze - seen here

Ruth McLees - Pixel Girl 1 - seen here

The Pembrokeshire Open Art Exhibition

The Pembrokeshire Open 2010

I went with my friend Louise Bird to the opening of The Pembrokeshire Open Art Exhibition last Saturday. It is a new annual open competition for emerging and established artists showing at the Joanna Field Gallery at the Torch Theatre, Milford Haven.

Louise was chosen for the show with Iota, a 260 metre crocheted fishing line piece which was installed on the upper floor, a good spot which utilised the natural light and views across the harbour.

Louise Bird - Iota - reflected in the windows of the Torch Theatre - seen here

My own choice of winner would have been Amanda Benson, a London based artist who was showing two small pieces of sculpture commenting on luxury property.

Amanda Benson - Holiday Home St. Pere de Ribes - seen here

"Running simultaneously with and counter to the vogue for property make-overs Amanda Benson presents Dreamhomes that, although they have their origins in California or Nantucket, are constructed from the primitive materials to be found to hand in a Hackney artist's studio. The gap between Jackie O or Elvis' mansion and the plasticine and cardboard re-interpretations express both a grand and poignant wish-fulfillment and the basic human need for shelter common to both. The everyday materials make up delicate and beautiful structures that pique our imagination, let us re-build the lives of the rich and/or famous in our own image and with whatever means are at our disposal." seen here

The Invisible Blanket - Louise Bird

Louise Bird - The Invisible Blanket - seen here

Louise Bird explores ideas about science and scientific philosophy through her artistic practice. She draws parallels between the actions of crochet and the continual creation of matter. She articulates science and mathematics through the processes of making and "...investigates the relationship between the invisibly small and the unimaginably huge."

Experimenting with unusual materials such as fishing line, Louise's pieces grow painstakingly slowly, sometimes taking up to a year to finish. She uses film and photography to animate and experiment further with her work. Here's a fantastic film made during an installation project in collaboration with Jacob Whittaker, Loopholes shown in The Tannery, Machynlleth in 2009.

The Invisible Blanket is currently coming into being....

Rhôd at Melin Newydd

Melin Newydd/New Mill

I am really excited to have been asked to contribute to the second staging of Rhôd curated by photographer Roger Lougher and artist Louise Bird. In May 2009 the first Rhôd was shown over a week at Melin Newydd in Drefach Felindre, west Wales. A fantastic line up of artists (Louise Bird, Liz Waterhouse, Sarah Tierney, Dave Shepherd, Andrew Cooper, Kim Fielding, Carwyn Evans and Rhys Dafis) showed work in and around the mill building.

Here is a really beatutiful film shot and edited by Peter Telfer for Culture Colony, documenting the event.

Watch this space and visit the blog for news of Rhôd 2010...

The Last Gallery, Llangadog

The Last Gallery - Llangadog, west Wales

I visited The Last Gallery in Llangadog yesterday with friend and fellow artist, Jacob Whittaker. We are showing a joint project in March 2010 in the gallery (...watch this space for news!)

The gallery was originally a cobblers' shop (hence the name) and retains its delightful original features - a really beautiful little space. Artist, Julie Ann Sheridan and her husband, upholsterer Mick Sheridan own and run the space. Open at specified times in the year, some artworks are offered for sale, but the emphasis is on the experience of viewing art rather than looking to buy it. Since opening in 2007 there has been a consistently interesting programme of shows including Marcus Coates' film Dawn Chorus and Wales based artist Louise Bird's Hyperbolic Spiral Crochet.

Currently Julie is showing a series of her own miniature landscape paintings of the village of Llangadog.

Julie Ann Sheridan - Village View

Event Horizon

Louise Bird - Event Horizon (installation - Rhondda Heritage Park) seen here

Louise Bird's Event Horizon project continues. Having recently been accepted as a member of Fibre Art Wales, she is exhibiting with the group at Rhondda Heritage Park in the Welsh valleys. Made up of hundreds of black crocheted pods, the piece explores the science/art themes that inform Louise's practice. This installation includes a DVD of the pods being created. In Crafted - Contemporary Craft and Fine Art at Oriel Myrddin Gallery earlier this year, Event Horizon appeared without the film.

Louise Bird - Event Horizon (installed in Oriel Myrddin Gallery) seen here

Loopholes

Visited Machynlleth in mid Wales today to see a collaborative installation by crochet artist, Louise Bird and sound and film artist Jake Whittaker - Loopholes. It was installed into the Old Tannery, a semi derelict building next door to The Tabernacle (MOMA Wales) which is hosting temporary art pieces until building work begins to convert the space into an extension for the gallery.

The project was the result of an Arts Council of Wales development project to explore the connections and correlations between the artist's work. Louise's crochet incorporates ideas about science with traditional crochet techniques. She currently uses deep sea fishing line to make intensive, repetitive objects. Jake uses "...found objects, music, video, photography, performance, and interactive networks/processes to explore themes of memory, nostalgia, aesthetics and perception". Both artists use repetition as a theme.

The Old tannery is gloriously run down, a gently decaying space full of crumbly lime dust. It has three defined spaces. On entry you hear a monotonous, stuck record - a turntable on the floor with its arm tied playing looped vinyl from the local charity shop - Telyn Cymru/The Harp of Wales. Louise's "Iota" crocheted piece - 60 metres of fishing line punctuated by little rosettes of crochet connects to the turntable and then leads off to draw us into the rest of the exhibition.




Next, a darkened narrow space, a convex mirror with a spooky, green, swirling image of a crochet piece projected onto it. Mesmeric and slightly mandala like. Little disembodied hands pepper the image, sliding in and out of the frame, crocheting-crocheting-crocheting, constantly making. It's a lovely piece, and the droning from looping sound either side of the space accentuates the hypnotic quality.



In the last space Louise's huge Fabric of the Universe piece - a circular piece of fishing line crochet - is on the floor. Four old fashioned decks with tied tone arms are playing drones. Fascinating choices of vinyl - from BBC sound archive of bird song to Esme Lewis Productions disc of 'Dawnsiau'r Twmpath 2' by 'Band y Meillion'- all sourced in local charity shops. The old fashioned equipment roots the experience into a context of place and history. Projected on the wall is a close-up image of the transparent crochet on the floor. It blends serendipitously with the stone and lime wall behind to make a rippling, ephemeral texture.



The transparent but slightly scintillating nature of the fishing line expresses something profound about the process of making. The continual activity of the crochet...the constant creation of the universe - big/little - all the same activity. It has resonances of all those myths where women spin up reality, Arachne, the Norns et al.



I left buoyed by the sensitivity and gentle balance between the artists work, the subtle inhabitation the space, the skillfully understated aesthetic. Exquisite.



Find out more: Louise, Jake