Events

‘Sprezzatura’ – an exhibition

Art, Contemporary Women Artists, Events, exhibitions, painting

It’s action stations!

This week has been a full on one but it’s exciting. Two other artists in the studios have teamed up with me and we are going forward as a collective called ‘The Working Painters’. It’s a great boost to have a collaboration, and whereas I have generally worked a solitary bod I have really seen the power of working together this last few weeks. In the past we have loosely critted (is this a nice new word?) our work and thoughts together and now it’s time for a show of this year’s outputs.

Why now?

You know what? …. it’s hard to get gallery representation, or even work shown in the city art gallery where we work, and it’s sooooo easy to moan about that. So we decided to up the energy and organise a pop-up, renting the community hub which is a massive white ex-shop in the Mander Centre our city shopping mall here in Wolverhampton, England. The town is really down on its uppers, struggling to stay alive and the only thing we can do is to contribute to it with colour and hopefully inspiration for others to do the same. We want to buck the system!

Can we inspire?

We hope so – we want to show a way to beautifully curate on a limited budget to encourage others – individuals or groups – to have a go at doing the same. We are not having a catered Private View – but we are having one (!), and we are hanging in a way that others could replicate easily …. you’ll have to come to find out how.

‘Om Kara’ – Clare Wassermann – acrylic on paper – 73 x 73cm

About the title ‘Sprezzatura’

The exhibition title Sprezzatura typically means an appearance or style which assumes to be effortless but hides the endeavour involved in its creation. Many of the paintings exhibited here have been re-worked, painted back, painted over, scrubbed, rubbed, tonked, scratched, smudged, printed on, wrestled with and agonised over, and in fact the paintings often leave traces of these tussles. Some of the paintings came into being with less of a creative struggle as if not made by the artists at all. Nonetheless, the work of painting is always work, a matter of turning up and loading a brush. 

The artists

In a series of new work, Rachel Magdeburg has painted objects that have a personal resonance, and obliquely reference the practice, material techniques and processes of painting. Some of the pictorial imagery reveals a semantic playfulness, which is reinforced by the painting’s titles. Other paintings explore formal relationships within a work itself, and in relation to the motifs of other paintings. Rachel has just completed a doctorate in Fine Art and she is glad to be back to painting!

‘UnPalatable’ – Rachel Magdeburg – oil on board – 61 x 51cm.

Julia Burns’s recent large scale paintings employ a continuous dialogue, both intuitive and directed, with the very messy process of painting, along with a playful reference to a “mixtape” of Modernist and contemporary abstract painting, to create works that allude to the Urban landscape as an experience and an idea.

Julia Burns’s studio.

Clare Wassermann has been working with the symbolism of birds in her paintings as part of an ongoing investigation into the concept of liberation and alchemical transformation towards internal freedom as part of her PhD work.

‘River Swimming, Dolanog,’ Clare Wassermann – acrylic on paper, 120 x 79cm.

I you would like to purchase one of Clare’s pieces but can’t get to the exhibition 

There is an online catalogue here. Please get in touch to reserve your work – the beauty is there are no gallery fees so the work is affordable (subjective term I know!).
The work can be purchased online and posted at cost. Framing advice is available of course.

Please get in touch if you would like to purchase work by Julia or Rachel. Better still, come and meet us and see it in person. A catalogue will also be available online soon.

You can make quite a night of it!

You can go straight on to this if you come at the end of FridayEvery last Friday of the month, the doors of Wolverhampton Art Gallery will be opening after hours to welcome you in.

Each event will be inspired by current exhibitions. Expect live performances, music, workshops and curators talks throughout the gallery spaces.

Plus, the Glaze Café will be opening late to ensure you don’t go hungry or thirsty as you see your way into the night. Lates are adults-only, after-hours theme nights.

This Friday Lates is a double feature! Friday 27th & Saturday 28th October 6-9pm.

Friday 27th: there will be screening a documentary about the life and work of Derek Boshier.

Join British-Jamaican Artist and Educator, Exodus Crooks for an ink and collage workshop inspired by Derek Boshier’s Smile (1968). Throughout the workshop, participants will be invited to recreate an image they have on their phone, using found images, magazines and newspaper cut outs.

Info and booking here

How can we help you as an artist?

We are happy to work to mentor artists who would like to buck the system and put on their own show. We can offer advice and encouragement. Do get in touch with me if you think you would benefit from this service in the future.

And please do subscribe to my newsletter on Substack – I will be adding to it most weeks and I’d love your comments if you like!

Art Manifesto and exhibition details

Art, Events

An art manifesto is a public declaration of the intentions, motives, or views of an artist or artistic movement. Many arts groups have made manifestos creating new movements often rejecting previous movements and political views in the process. A group of four artist friends of mine decided to investigate more about this subject and in turn created their own personal manifestos. Here is mine which I can see is also a reflection of my Self and how my self wishes to be:

My Art Manifesto – September 2023

There is no space for the divided self, the divided people, the divided planet.

We must adopt a friendliness to the idea of the unity of all to understand that we are an ecological system of each other and to ever come to peace.

My heArt entangles with your heArt.

My heArt heals yours if I will only let it, if you will only allow.

Your heArt can heal mine.

My Art can be a painting or a form made from my hands and mind and might evoke something in you, or something beyond you, which you might want to explore with you heart and mind.

My symbols will not be yours but they could live in you for a while whilst you entertain them and breathe some of your breath into them.

You could be willing to see if your thoughts become less turbulent and settle in some place restful but inspiring, to a still point from where action could benefit you, someone else or other beings.

My art may generate new and helpful myths for the future and work upon the re-enchantment of human beings and human doings.

I am a process.

I discover my Self by making art.

I work on my Self through making art.

I save my Self from my self through making art.

My process affects others.

I am.

I renounce expectations

I leave hyper capitalism to others

I nurture the growth of my soul and those of others through curiosity, stillness and the wisdom of those who have been to useful places on their journeys.

I create with the intention of disrupting the status quo, of challenging the dominant narratives that keep us trapped in old ways of thinking and being. My art is a call to action, an invitation to join me in exploring new possibilities for ourselves and our world. It is my hope that we can create a more just, equitable, and sustainable future for all, meanwhile acknowledging the beauty we can behold in creation.

I create

because

I Am

by Clare Wassermann (18 x 29.5cm)

Exhibition

The ‘Working Painters’ group consists of Julia Burns, Rachel Magdeburg and Clare Wassermann.
We have an exhibition from October 28th-29th. It’s at the Community Hub which is a lovely large space in the Mander Centre, Wolverhampton – nearest entrance opposite Beatties.

There is a Private View from 4pm-6pm on 27th and the show is open from 10am – 4pm on the Saturday and Sunday.

There will be large and small works available to buy but we would love to see you to show what we have been working on this last year. Please do come.

by Clare Wassermann (71 x 120cm)

Please subscribe to find out more:

Open Studios Event in Wolverhampton

Art, Contemporary Women Artists, Events, painting

Just a quick post to say my studio at Makers Dozen Studios at the rear of Wolverhampton Art Gallery is open as part of the city wide open studios on October 8th and 9th from 11am – 3pm. If you miss it I can be there by arrangement the week after too – just email me clare.wassermann@gmail.com. The gallery has a new and very lovely cafe ‘Glaze’ on the ground floor overlooking St. Peter’s Gardens which could be a welcome pit stop.

Julia Burns and I have opened next door to each other at Wolverhampton Art Gallery.

Details of more places to visit on the art trail in Wolverhampton can be found here care of Wolverhampton Society of Artists. All venues are free to visit.

Anyway do come and see what I have been busy with this year. I will have cards and paintings for sale but do come and just say hi in our new more normal world.

Julia Burns is opening in the little gallery space next to mine. More of her work can be seen here – she is a wonderful Urban Abstract artist.