Falmouth Jumble Trail

Recently we had a flyer through the door advertising a Falmouth Jumble trail.  As we love to hear about anything going on in the local community and this looked interesting, we met up with the organiser Amy Cook and asked her a few questions;

So, what exactly is a jumble trail (what kind of stalls do you have)?

A Jumble Trail is like a car boot sale but on your street. Communities co-ordinate to set up stalls outside their houses to sell anything and everything! Bric-a-brac, furniture, toys, clothes, cakes, plants, artwork. It’s the perfect opportunity for a clear out, or to sell your creations. The best part is, as a stallholder you don’t have to lug all your stuff around – you just set up outside your house, what’s easier than that?!

The whole thing is coordinated online at jumbletrail.com providing visitors with a colour coded map to explore the treasure on sale in your neighbourhood. On the website, stall holders can write a description of their stall and add pictures of various items they will be selling too. 

Do they happen anywhere else?

Jumble Trail was set up in 2013, since then the idea has really caught on and now they happen all over the country at any time of year.  Clapton, London are in their 3^rd year this year and already have over 180 stalls confirmed!
 

How did you get involved with them?

Last year I was a stall holder at the Montpelier Jumble Trail in Bristol. It was their first year and they racked up 65 stalls in total. It was a really fun day, I met lots of new people and it was lovely to see Montpelier come alive! They are holding another one this year on 21^st June.

I moved to Falmouth at the end of last year. I didn’t know anyone and didn’t know the community. I wanted to feel involved in Falmouth so thought the Jumble Trail was a good place to start.
Anyone can set up a Jumble Trail! I registered on the website and the rest has been all about promotion.

How can I get involved/ How can someone get involved?

If you want to get involved as a stall holder in Falmouth then go to the website Here
Its £4 to register which covers the cost of promotion (printing flyer/posters etc). Any extra money raised will be donated to the British Heart Foundation. 

Talk to your neighbours and get them involved too. It’s good fun when you all get out there together!

Studio Snoop: Patrick Woodroffe (Falmouth Art Gallery)

Last month Falmouth Art Gallery had an interesting exhibition on about Patrick Woodroffe, an artist with strong links to the gallery and Falmouth.  Within the exhibition the curators had re-created Woodroffe's studio.  They invited us to come and have a snoop, however we've decided (as we couldn't ask Patrick himself about his work) to let the pictures do the talking.  

Following the path of the exhibition, here begins our strangest studio snoop to date.... 

Welcome to the wonderful world of Patrick Woodroffe.

How his desk would have looked on a working day. You may not be able to see in this image the ultra fine points of the pencils.

Woodroffe made his easil himself as he couldn't find one that suited his needs

To do lists are an interesting insight into his organisational process

There is a lot of wit and humour in Wodroffe's work

Woodroffe was perhaps the first painter to make use of the 'tomograph' process 

Believe  it or not, the picture on the right is a painting; Woodroffe was well known for his intensly detailed work

Close up of a larger work (and quite possibly our favourite from the exhibition)

He also created a lot of etchings, drawing everything, including text, in reverse 

An artist through and through, his wife came home one day to find her trainers preserved in resin

Woodroffe would have displays of interesting objects (that often appeared in his paintings) in his studio

A doll from one of the displays

Another interesting insight into the mind of Patrick Woodroffe, collecting found coins

If you've enjoyed this post, let us know by commenting below.  For more information on Falmouth Art Gallery or Patrick Woodroffe click on the links at the top of this post.

Studio Snoop: Laura Menzies

If you've been following  our blog you would have seen our 'Artist Introduction' series for our Storm Front exhibition.  Well, we've revisited one of our artists from that show to see what she's up to now (and to have a good old nosey around her new studio!)  If you want to read a bit about how Laura got into art and her processes, click here before you read on!

Laura in her studio

Lauras Studio is located in the Troubador building on Falmouth Wharves.  We climbed four flights of cold concrete stairs to a dim corridor but once inside Laura's studio we could see why she chose it, so read on to find out what Laura's been up to, and to have a glimpse inside the studio...

 

Another Space on the Warf

What have you been up to in your artistic practice since we last spoke to you?

I moved into my studio at Falmouth wharf in Feburary and have started work on a new body of paintings which are slowly taking shape. I have also been involved with several exhibitions and in July I completed my first residency at TAP project space in Southend, which was a fantastic experience that I learnt a lot from. 

Laura's Desk

Have your inspirations changed at all?

The paintings I make are abstract works that reference my surroundings, my personal life and my everyday experiences.  I have recently been introduced to Japanese aesthetics and the concept of Wabi Sabi which I am excited by, as it directly relates to some of the principles I strive to achieve in my paintings such as simplicity, suggestion and incompleteness. 

New work

Laura uses layers in her work

Are there any other areas of art you want to explore within your practice?

As a painter I feel I have just scratched the surface on what I hope to achieve artistically and want to keep challenging and extending my painting practice.  Having said that I would like to incorporate some printmaking back into my practice, to see how another element would change the dynamics of my paintings and open up new possibilities for different formal and narrative relationships to become evident. I am also becoming increasingly interested in poetry and text and would like to experiment with these in some way in the future. 

  

Stacked work

You are doing a talk as part of your week in the 'limelight' at Falmouth Art Gallery.  Can you tell us a bit more about that?

I approached Falmouth Gallery several months ago now enquiring about their Limelight space and was told that I could have the space for a week in October and could do a talk to coincide with my work being in the space. I thought that doing a talk on my work would allow me to engage with a new audience, would push me out of my comfort zone (which I feel is important)  and would also be a good opportunity for me to reflect on my practice and review where I current am. 

Work on an easel 

Could you tell us a bit about how you use your studio? 

When I am working I am very messy and have lots of paints, pallets, tools and paintings all around me. I do however always make sure that I leave the studio clean and tidy so that when next go in everything is in its correct place and I can start working straight away. 

Ready for work!

In these posts we like to give you a taster of the artists work environment but if you want to see more of Laura's work, head to her website:

lauramenzies.co.uk

And if you want to keep up to date with her work here's a link to her Facebook, and the event page for her talk at Falmouth Art Gallery tomorrow:

facebook.com/laurajmenzies

Click here for the event page

We hope you've enjoyed this post.  If you are an artist and you are interested in having us snoop around your studio comment below, or drop us an e-mail!

midsummernights21@gmail.com

An Evening Of Art Outdoors

An Evening of Art Outdoors

Starting up as a new creative events group we wanted to make sure that our debut exhibition was not only successful, but unforgettable. We decided to host our experience outside allowing both the artists and the guests to be inspired by the context of the arts surrounding as well as the pieces themselves.

Through this event our artists explored our theme of 'A Midsummer Nights Dream' in a variety of mediums and styles. The work on display ranged massively and included; Performance Art, Sculpture, 3D Design, Illustration,  Fine Art, Installation Work and Photography.

Due to the unconventional layout of our outdoors exhibition we decided to create a map, which would help people to navigate the garden as well as to provide details and information on the artists.

Our event took place in the gardens of St Michael’s Hotel & Spa in Falmouth, Cornwall.

 

 These are some of our sculptures created for our exhibition by Alistair Dean.

These photographs were part of an installation piece by Natalie Lauren based on the quote;

"With the juice of this I'll streak her eyes, and make her full of hateful fantasies" - Oberon

 

 Some of the illustrations created for our event by Briony Smith.

 As the evening began to draw in and the sun went down the garden seemed to come to life as the pieces of work started to light up drawing more guests in from the nearby beach to have a look.

 Involving our guests in releasing beautiful Chinese lanterns as it became dark created a lovely friendly atmosphere and rounded off our evening perfectly.

The evening was such a success and we are so grateful to everyone who helped us along the way, but particularly a big thank you to all of our contributing artists;

Ali Gibson - Alison Pascoe - Alistair Dean - Briony Smith - Cathy Evans

Natalie Lauren - Safia Megtali - Sally Crabtree

[Our Photographs come courtesy of Lewis G Manners]

Midsummer Nights founders, Natalie Lauren & Cathy Evans.

Midsummer Nights on the Air.

Check us out on the Radio!

 
We were privileged enough to be invited on to the 'Cosmic Art Show' at the Source FM in Falmouth to be interviewed about our upcoming event 'An Evening of Art Outdoors'.

This interview took place on Friday the 21st of June at the studios, at which point we were still looking for artists to contribute to our exhibition.

If you would like to listen to the podcast of the show it is available online here:

Cosmic Art Show Guest Interview

 
We were also interviewed live at our event by the 'News Source Show'. Our interview was then played out on their show on Wednesday the 28th of August.

In this interview we discussed how the event itself went as well as our inspirations and the process of putting the show together!

If you would like to hear our interview live from our event the podcast of the radio show is avaliable here:

News Source Show Interview