A very sunny Luton Carnival 2017

Thankfully The Luton Carnival was a very peaceful event, people for all religions and cultures celebrating together, the costumes were inspiring and the music loud - brilliant! Nice to visit my old stomping ground too as I grew up in Luton. It felt very nostalgic to be back in such a familiar place.  : )

International Women's Day - Frida -female icons

March 8th is International Women's Day. It celebrates the social, economic, cultural and political achievement of women. My Frida Kahlo obsession continues. What an amazing woman she was and one of my female icons. Frida is the start of a series that I will be illustrating over the next few weeks...

Naomi Ryder

I love Naomi Ryder's work and was lucky enough to see some in the flesh a couple of weeks ago at Bucks County Museum. They have an exhibition on at the mo called "Stitched into Life" which runs until 29th June and features Naomi's delightful, beautiful and humorous work. Her work is so free and uninhibited, I can only dream to be able to work like that AND she does it all in stitches!

It's a bit of an embroidery fest at the museum as there is another exhibition running in tandem to Naomi's called "Splendid Stitches & Exotic Embroidery", this runs until 6th July.  Sumptuous embroideries and textiles have been selected from rarely seen treasures from three collections: the Embroiderers’ Guild, the County Museum’s Buckinghamshire collections and a rare 17th century group in the care of the National Trust at Claydon House. Featuring Indian inspirations, gorgeous garments and textile treasures from past and present including contemporary work by local embroidery groups. It's free to get into both exhibitions. For more info follow this link here.

Hemmed in

Copyright Zoe Williams 2012

 Our local Art Gallery has a great textile exhibition on called Hemmed In: Embroidery and Needlework from MK and Beyond. It presents work from the 1930s to the present by over fifty practitioners and is organised with MK Embroiderers Guild and Jamie Chalmers, otherwise known as Mr X Stitch. Ranging from the local to the international, the exhibits include needlework through unusual media, techniques and unexpected subject matter, including street art, rock music and internet spam.

Copyright Stephanie Thannhauser 2012

I took part in the MK Embroiderers Guild (MKEG) part of the exhibtion (see my work above) which challenged their members to represent ‘Milton Keynes in an eight-inch square’, to create small, needle and thread portraits of their favourite places in the city. The results constitute a real celebration of the city in stitch. In addition to work by the members, the exhibition includes a number of rare and significant pieces on loan from national collections, including such luminaries from the embroidery world as Rebecca Crompton, Rachael Thompson, Julia Caprara and Beryl Dean.

The exhibition at MK Gallery runs from 7 December 2012 – 6 January 2013, and admission is free.

Missing the Olympics/Paralympics?

Pic fom the BBC - to watch video follow this linkhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19540587

I am! I have just watched the victory parade and now it's truly is over : ( I have really enjoyed the last 6 weeks, marvelling at the world records, in awe of the athletes courage and determination and checking the medal tally everyday. Plus it's been FABULOUS publicity for the UK - hurray!

Collective Spirit

We went and saw a remarkable boat - Collective Spirit - at the weekend. It will soon set sail on its maiden voyage but before then it somehow made its way inland to Central Milton Keynes (one of the furthest points from the sea in the UK!) and featured as part of our IF Festival.
The 30ft boat, crafted by a fearlessly adventurous team of boat builders and volunteers, has been made from wood donated by people from Milton Keynes and across the South East. All of the donations have special stories behind them - some profound, some happy, some unique and some that are quite simply extraordinary. It was great looking at how the wood had been sliced and pieced together and working out the objects original use. See this link here to see if it's visiting somewhere near you.

Bond, Bean, Beatles, BRILLIANT!

Wasn't the Olympic opening ceremony FABULOUS? Well done Danny Boyle and all the folk involved and good luck team GB!

La Compagnie Carabosse

We are enjoying the Milton Keynes International Festival (IF) at the moment and looooved the Fire Gardens or La Compagnie Carabosse. The company are French fire alchemists who lit up the night sky in the beautiful setting of Campbell Park in Central Milton Keynes. Dramatic fire, flames, music and sound were created and you are invited to wander through avenues, explore labyrinths and experience specially created fire gardens. Surprisingly, there wasn't a whiff of health and safety, very refreshing and our kids loved being up really late too.

Please come out.........

We lost

For the last two weeks I have been consumed by trying to save our local swimming pool. Tonight planning was granted to demolish a perfectly good pool in favour of ANOTHER supermarket. I am gutted :  (  If anyone out there knows anyone or knows anything we could do to save this pool at the 11th hour please contact me. It is appalling that a perfectly good asset should just be bulldozed. See here for the history of the fight.

Embroidered Graffiti

 
If you live near Ashton-under-Lyne, this fab. exhibition
called "Pulling threads - Embroidered Graffiti" looks well
worth a visit. Sarah Greaves creates work which pushes
the tradition of embroidery and questions women’s roles
in society. I love the fact that Sarah has to use ‘masculine’
tools such as drills and clamps to create her work. She uses
the traditional craft of embroidery in the same way a graffiti
artist would spray-paint his or her comments in public spaces.
According to Greaves we live in a world where the image
reigns supreme. We judge ourselves by the perfect ideals
we see every day in magazines and television programmes.
In her piece ‘Kitchen’ she lays bare our thoughts around food
and how we automatically weigh up the pros and cons of even
eating a piece of toast. The exhibition is on now until the 3rd
of September at Central Art Gallery located above the library
on Old Street in Ashton-under-Lyne. To see more images and
information take a look at Sarah's brilliant website
www.sarahgreavesart.com

If you live near Ashton-under-lyne, this fab. exhibition

called "Pulling threads - Embroidered Graffiti" looks well
worth a visit. Sarah Greaves creates work which pushes
the tradition of embroidery and questions women’s roles
in society. I love the fact that Sarah has to use ‘masculine’
tools such as drills and clamps to create her work
and I like the diversity of the sufaces she has embroidered
onto. She uses the traditional craft of embroidery in the
same way a graffiti artist would spray-paint his or her
comments in public spaces. According to Greaves
we live in a world where the image reigns supreme. We
judge ourselves by the perfect ideals we see every day in
magazines and television programmes.This bombardment
of body ideals influences the way we see ourselves; we
try to conform or deviate from these ideals of beauty and status.
This means that we often find ourselves in conflict with
society and how we view ourselves. In her piece ‘Kitchen’
she lays bare our thoughts around food and how we
automatically weigh up the pros and cons of even eating a
piece of toast. The exhibition is on now until the 3rd of
September at Central Art Gallery Located above the library
on Old Street in Ashton-under-Lyne. Take a look at Sarahs website
for more brilliant images http://www.sarahgreavesart.com/

 

www.sarahgreavesart.com Version:1.0 StartHTML:0000000190 EndHTML:0000006488 StartFragment:0000003087 EndFragment:0000006452 SourceURL:file://localhost/Users/imacg5/Desktop/correspondance/counciltaxletter.doc If you live near Ashton-under-lyne, this fab. exhibition
called "Pulling threads - Embroidered Graffiti" looks well
worth a visit. Sarah Greaves creates work which pushes
the tradition of embroidery and questions women’s roles
in society. I love the fact that Sarah has to use ‘masculine’
tools such as drills and clamps to create her work
plus I love the humour and the diversity of the sufaces
she has embroidered onto. She uses the traditional craft of
embroidery in the same way a graffiti artist would spray-paint
his or her comments in public spaces. According to Greaves
we live in a world where the image reigns supreme. We judge ourselves
by the perfect ideals we see every day in magazines and
television programmes.This bombardment of body ideals
influences the way we see ourselves; we try to conform
or deviate from these ideals of beauty and status.
This means that we often find ourselves in conflict with
society and how we view ourselves. In her piece ‘Kitchen’
she lays bare our thoughts around food and how
we automatically weigh up the pros and cons of even eating a piece of
toast. The exhibition is on now until the 3rd of September at Central Art Gallery is a real gem. Located above the library on Old Street in Ashton-under-Lyne,her website 

Take That

Hello my name is Stephanie and I am a Take That fan. They are my guilty pleasure. There, I admit it, I went and saw them at Wembley last night. I wish I had trendier musical taste, (I do like some trendy bands honest) but they just make me feel so happy. They put on a FANTASTIC visual show, it's great to have a sing and dance and to get really groovy, to be part of the huge crowd makes me feel like I am at one with the world. I know they are a boy/man band and that they are seen as a bit naff but wow what a show.  It's amazing what five men (and a creative team of 100's) can do to a crowd of 80 000 people.

It's that time again!

I can't believe it's already Summer Fayre time at my kids school. Where has the year gone? I have been banner making, tombola numbering and begging (for donations). For anyone that lives locally and fancies coming along, it's at Holmwood School, Kensington Drive, Great Holm, Milton Keynes 11- 2pm.

Archiects of Air

We visited the "Architects of Air" last year and I have just discovered it's a touring event. The "exhibit" is like a giant blow up bouncy castle that you go into.  Once inside, the colours and patterns that natural light creates is amazing and it feels very relaxing and womb like too. You can just lay around and chill out! If you get a chance to go, it's a fantastic sensory experience and will be in the UK in Nottingham on the 27th May till the 5th June. See this link for more info. and for the other places in the world that it will be touring to http://www.architects-of-air.com/touring.html