Tuesday

The Gatehouse at Burton Agnes

The days are beginning to get similarity to them. I rise early and often there is a rain shower in the morning somewhere between 6am and 9am, although today a very heavy downpour caught me as I made my way to the summerhouse studio.  There I sort myself out and begin some prep work, such photograph and review the previous day's work. Today I started a doodle book - a short concertina like flier from a takeaway outlet. I gessoed it and started to randomly cover it with bits of the colours I was working with at the time. I must admit by the end of the day this doodle book/fliers was a bit of a dog's dinner of colour. I am not sure what I will do next - stamp and doodle,  zentangle on it, use it as a diary or collage onto it? It does not matter for at the moment - it is a base for future work.

One of the reasons the colours are such a mess is that I was trying to mix a raw sienna colour, having left my tube of shop bought raw sienna at home. I was also trying to mix was a neutral grey.  I do not have this colour in my mind's eye for I rarely use it and I only have it in watercolour paint not acrylic. My attempt came out as a rather lovely very pale mauve but with a very chalky appearance, however, that may have been down to the cheap paint I am using! I have my normal white acrylic paint but I must have acquired this cheaper version that got popped into the limited collection of 'Burton Agnes Hall' paints. My thinking being 'you do use an awful lot of white paint so take a spare to use for some of the early layers'. The trouble is that when you are in the thick of it you just reach out for the colour without checking the label. Lesson to be learnt there. 

Any way, a reason for all this stems back to a colourway design I had seen somewhere and a conversation with one of our visitors about collage. Not so much the collage where it is embedded within a painting but more about where the papers have their own voice. So I began painting my own papers using old book papers and working with them in a small way in an upcycled old book. I had removed many of the pages to reduce the bulk and stuck two or three pages together to give them more stability. I had popped it in my bag, fully gessoed, but with no real purpose in mind. In fact, it had been acting as a tea cup coaster. I think my mini collage book will be a more appropriate use for my little hard backed book.

Grey Start, Gloriously Sunny End

A grey drizzley morning greeted us today. I was on the road soon after 9am to drive the 7 miles or so east into Bridlington. I had to shop for supplies so I was on the look out for the Tesco supermarket. I know Bridlington but rarely drive through it myself as I am usually a passenger or on foot but after a road hiccup I parked up. Shopping was quickly done within the hour and I was back at Burton Agnes Hall by 10:30am and down in the studio in time for the Hall opening at 11am.

I was expecting a quiet day given it was Monday and a grey day but I was proved wrong, we had another day with a steady trickle of visitors.  I seemed to had a hard time in getting started today. I had a number of little jobs I wanted to do like laying down some gesso but I seemed to take my time, perhaps reluctant to get onto the painting panels. I have 5 panels, approximately 12"x8". One I am calling finished and one just needed a touch or two more. Panel 3 (started at the same time as the other two) is proving very difficult to come to terms with. The other two were started a day or two later; one so ticking along but the other may be more tricky.  However, by the end of the the day I did have a clearer focus on where to go next.

The sun came out about 2:30pm and within the hour I had found it unbearably hot in the studio with the sun beating down on the front of the summer house. I reached a point where I could pack up the painting materials and escape out into the shade for a while, returning later to do some mundane tasks. At 5pm, closing time I went to seek shelter form the sum in the walled garden. It is always so full of insects -bees, and hover flies and all kinds of other flying things including butterflies and bird. It is quite incredible.

Sunday

I am an early riser, especially in the summer, so I find myself breakfasted and sorted and wandering down to the summerhouse studio about 10.00am. I like the solitude to get things organised and have time to review the previous day's work. I have started making notes as part of that review process and also writing down my decisions of where to go next. I will then often go for a wander round the grounds, not often making sketches but I will take photographs. It seems silly to be in such a beautiful location, a flower painter's paradise, and not take advantage of it but I had set out with the intention of following a programme I have set myself to paint more abstractly and exploring the idea of painting intuitively. So I am treating this Artist in Residence as an opportunity to paint for two week unhampered by the normal demands of everyday home life but with quite a limited focus and the intention of getting the job done (i.e doing what I wanted and intended to do). I hope I can fulfill my aim and not get distracted with 'oooh I could paint this, or maybe that, or I could sit in the walled garden and sketch', as is my usual approach. This way I may have several paintings to take back home instead of itty bitty pieces of nothing. (However, I am also enough of a realist to know that when I get home and review my finished paintings I will look at thenm and think "What the heck is that?" and then paint over them but at least I will have a good paint surface to work on:)

Sunday must have been day trip day for many local people. The hall and grounds were very busy and we had more visitors and lots of very interesting conversations. There is a gallery in the courtyard and cafe area which is available to hire and two women artists are exhibiting their work in there. Both have very good drawing skills and seem specialise in flower 'portraits', people portraits and animal drawings and paintings. All of a very high standard. Unfortunately, they do not seem to be getting as many visitors into their space and those that do seem less willing to engage in conversation. Perhaps it is our intriguing location in the the attractive summerhouse which draws people to pop in and have a look.
Calling this one finished for now but now wondering if it needs something more at the right hand side.

Saturday

A day of rain was forecast for the east side of the country although ours came at the beginning of the day and towards teatime. In the meantime it was grey, chilly and damp, all this had the effect of keeping visitor numbers low at Burton Agnes Hall. However, we did have some twenty or so visitors pop their heads into the summer house, in spite of us keeping the door closed to try and keep warm. We had some very interesting conversations with most of them. Few of them actually did paint but some did have other creative hobbies and a number of them were regular collectors of art. Of course, they came from many parts of Yorkshire and further afield; often calling into Burton Agnes enroute to somewhere or coming from somewhere else.

I have often found that socialising can be quite an exciting and stimulating experience but also quite tiring. By the end of the day my mind was buzzing and I was quite 'popped' up but in spite of being tired I had difficulty getting to sleep, hearing the church clock chime at every hour. Somewhere around 2am I did fall asleep but awoke before 6am, a regular summertime waking time.

I did expect to have aching shoulders for I have been painting quite a lot; standing and stooping at not a very high table. I am very pleased with my discipline as I came with a list of things I wanted to do e.g. Paint every day on wooden panels in a small series , paint on a canvas roll, colour mixing, mark making etc. I may not have done all each day but when I can I have painted. It felt good to have that framework rather than arriving each morning and thinking what shall I do today.

I am not taking any of this work seriously, they are just play boards, a way of getting paint onto a surface. I have no expectations of making 10 masterpieces and most of my boards appear like the above after a day of painting. After a couple of passes /layers on the above board I kept seeing a face like shape. It was the end of the day so I thought what the heck let's have some fun . So with one or two tweaks a face emerged. I quite liked it in a quirky way so I think I will live with it for a while!

Day One

The anticipated nighttime thunderstorm did not arrive, although it did get quite windy and the rattling windows in the flat woke me 'asking' to be closed. So a sleep disturbed night for variety of  reasons. Heavy rain did come about 8:30am but it did not last long. I watched it from the kitchen window while I got breakfast. Facilities are challenging with the sink and very small worktop adjoining the cooker yet the kitchen room is quite large. Most of the furnishing are vintage and the decor basic but the whole place is in need of TLC and a good bottoming; it is likely that it is not used often and suffers from neglect. There is a large bath with shower over and lots of hot water. However, the power to the shower was lost after I had had my evening shower!

I was in the sun house studio (photo above) by about 10am but visitors are not admitted until 11am. It was a warm and humid day, getting very hot at times in the glasshouse. There was a steady trickle of visitors to the studio and we spent time from our work chatting to them.  A number were families with young children. now that the schools are closed for the holidays,  and many were retirees. Some lived locally out for a day trip and some on holiday at the coast. One couple were from Queensland, Australia and were taking in this area as part of their UK and Ireland tour. Some of our last visitors were Italian teenagers staying in Hull.
The rain and the thunderstorms came late in the afternoon, trapping me in the summer house for 45minutes!
Sue

Arrival

View of Burton Agnes Hall from the flat window - early morning.

I eventually arrived at Burton Agnes Hall on the hottest July dayto date. It was an uncomfortable and slow journey along main roads but through many small villages and rolling countryside. So there were numerous road works, tractors, white vans, day trippers and caravans, as the road to Burton Agnes goes onto the coast.

Arrival was a bit tricky as I has received no instructions of where to go, who to see, what to, where to get keys. However, there were some very helpful staff in the cafe kitchen, shop and admittance area so we soon got sorted and unpacked.

I am sharing the summerhouse Artist in Residence studio with a water coulourist. She produces some stunning loose, immediate watercolour paintings based on a theme of nature.. It proves to be quite a contrast from my few strong bold watercolour flowers and my equally strong coloured acrylics, loosely based on a minimal landscape theme. I have chosen to work with acrylics for the time I am here.

We had a good few visitors throughout the day, especially in the morning for a choir from Worcestershire were on a "national" tour to Hull,  singing in several venues around the area. Burton Agnes Hall garden was one venue and we were able to enjoy their lovely singing whilst we set up.

Sue

Burton Agnes Hall

I have been awarded an Artist in Residence position at Burton Agnes Hall, situated between Driffield and Bridlington, East Yorkshire. It is a stunning house with superb gardens open to visitors daily and I will be one of two artists taking over the small summer house situated in the garden to the front of the house.  Super excited but somehow reluctant to get my gear together. It is a challenge as I am a kitchen sink kind of gal and we will be there for two weeks! Lots of sorting to be done before Thursday, 25th July 2019.