61...AAF Hampstead and La nuit blanche

Lara arranging stand

Back to Brighton this weekend and had to pop up to the prestigious new Affordable Art Fair on Hampstead Heath as all my small sculptures had sold at the private view and I had to load my trusty trolley up with more and hot foot it up to renew the display.
This fair is a well known international franchise but this was a first one in this location. It looked great, spacious and light with a really well curated collection of artists and galleries. It was busy and buzzy and I spent a happy couple of hours looking around. While I was there, Lara (my agent) sold the last Little Artichoke on the stand, and the lady who had bought it over the phone, came rushing round to pick it up, and bought me a lovely artichoke that she had seen for sale at a  local greengrocers, what a lovely thought.

Pheonix installation

This week the clocks went back, and in Brighton to celebrate this fact we have a white night. It is only 3 years old, but is already becoming a hugely popular event, and the streets were packed. I think this started originally in Amiens, France...but has spread to other French and British cities.

Dolly mania

H and I wandered around the streets enjoying all the different shows. Here we saw a couple of funny Dolly Parton trannies belting out her most popular numbers from balconies above the crowd...everyone was dancing. We also popped into the alternative (everything in Brighton is alternative!) village fete where I joined in with some Jive lessons.

Audience at Sallis Benney theatre watching clubbers on West Street

Later we joined an audience at the art college theatre who were watching an experiment run by the noise abatement society with a member from the 80's group The Human League. They were playing ambient music from many speakers situated in West Street in Brighton and filming the results while simultaneously streaming them back to the theatre. There was a body language expert there who was giving us the low down on how people were reacting to the music, and discussing whether it was changing behaviour. West Street is not a place where you would casually wander on a saturday night, it is full of very high spirited, often quite drunk youngsters who are out for a dance, a laugh and maybe a bundle....it has ever been so. So it was funny to watch the reactions to the ambient music all around them, and certainly it all seemed relaxed, clubbers and police, while we were watching. Maybe this idea could spread and calm down saturday nights in city centres?

Open market party

On the way home, we popped into the local fruit and veg market and found a full on party with DJ's and art installations. It was great...really good music and atmosphere...with a typical alt Brighton crowd. Plenty of ghouls and zombies having a bit of a dance.

Knitted bollard cosy

When we finally headed for home, we saw a row of bollards that someone had thoughtfully knitted some cosies for.......

60...Summer tiles and more guests

Detail from new wallpiece

Autumn is here, the students are all back at Uni and I have time and space in my mind to do some new designing now. I have got several new projects in mind, one line of which is a series of wall pieces. These are not always easy to display and sell, there is not yet a familiarity with hanging ceramic on the wall, nevertheless I like them myself and it makes a change to work on a flatter plane.

Blue Bells drying

I am also working on several commisions. The forms above will be glazed with a crystal white glaze and filled with crushed blue glass. Once attached to steel rods and mounted in wood, they will sparkle in someones garden.

Kieran's tile...guess his profession!

As ususal this summer, all my visitors have made a tile for the collection on my studio wall.

James's tile

I love these little self portraits.  This one was James who featured in an earlier blog...he is cycling around for a couple of years raising money for the McMillan fund. Last heard of in Budapest.

Hannah's house

Kiku's witch

Mika's dormotory

The girls who come to visit every summer get better and better with their tiles and now work on little 3d sculptures too. They have to take those home with them of course.

Teal's Death cap tile

Teal our visitor from last week was convinced we had poisoned her with wild mushrooms....however she survived to make her tile.

Teal and Laila hedging

Another Workawayer this week, Laila from welsh Wales who is staying for a while......

Houdini

mainly because of this little fellow who was rescued from a life in a cage in Greece, but who can't go back to Britain until 6 months after his jabs. We are now getting used to having our slippers and gardening gloves retrieved.

59...Mushroom season and help in the garden

Destroying Angel

This weekend we have been out in the local forest foraging for mushrooms. We took some friends with us and made sure they knew the fatal mushrooms (above) to avoid before looking for edibles. There are 3 main mushrooms to avoid, all part of the same family (Amanita) and called the Death Cap, Destroying Angel and the Citrina. Even eating a small amount can kill you......slowly...over about 6 days, so it's good to know which these are right at the beginning.

Cleaning mushrooms for lunch

It is a little dry at the moment for a really good crop of mushrooms, a few days of rain will bring them all up, but nevertheless, we found a large amount of Trompettes de la morte and a few others to add to the mix.

A couple of weeks ago I joined another website called Workaway, which is a site for people looking to work around the world in exchange for food and accomodation. I always need help in the garden so posted a profile, and this week my first helper arrived,

Teal

This is Teal, she is from New York state and has been working on a farm in Belgium, and is now helping to get my garden into order. She arrived with a guitar and a great singing voice, so there are strains of music drifting in from the bathroom or garden as she works...lovely! Another lady arrives on tuesday...with a little dog she has rescued in Greece so at this rate I will have a show garden in no time. What a great scheme.

Blue seedcase

Three new sculptures out of the kiln in the last couple of weeks,

Green seedcase

These two are destined for the new Affordable Art Fair in Hampstead at the end of the month. If anyone would like to go, please contact me through my website  www.francesdoherty.co.uk

Spidery Poppy

This one is one of a new range that are designed to go on the wall. The next one I am going to make will be based on the Echinacea 'Green Jewel'....it has the most gorgeous centre, I'm looking forward to constructing that one, once I've got the long list of sculptures made that are being waited on.

Oh I musn't forget.....Hi to Ryans dad Mike who I've been told reads my blog from across the pond in Americay.....How you doing?!

58...La Linerie and Brighton Museum

http://lalinerie.monsite.orange.fr/

I was contacted this week by someone who owns a large old flax factory near my town in France. It is a semi derelict building, last used as a working Linerie in the 70's. I have often driven past and been intrigued to see various colourful pieces of art on or in the buildings, and I knew there was some sort of artist collective working there but that was all, so it was good to be asked to go and have a look around it with the view to showing some work there in the future.

Cistern creature

It is an amazing space and lends itself to all sorts of ideas. They have a festival here each May and invite many different artists working in various arenas, performance, music, applied arts, graffiti etc. to exhibit.

Oyster rabbits

The buildings and land were bought just a few years ago by a couple with a vision to make it a cultural centre, a lifelong project if ever I saw one!

View through a frame through an apeture

Many of the artists who have exhibited previously have responded to the space, as it is now or how it was then. Flax is used frequently, or as in the image above the ideas have come from the space itself.  So, I will have to get my thinking cap on and see what I can come up with.

Grayson Perry

Back in Brighton for the weekend and wondering around the Laines I decided to pop into our museum for a quick look at the Grayson pot. It's a shame it is no longer on a turning plinth as you can only see one part of it so you don't get the full story...nice to know it's there though.

Domestic violence in Porcelain

What I hadn't realised was that they have a huge ceramic collection there from a collector called Willett. It was presented to Brighton in 1903 and was collected by him because he thought that ceramic figures and vessels told stories of political, social and cultural history through their form and decoration.

There are some really interesting and often quite funny and occasionally sad pieces there. Definitely  worth a look.

When we came outside we spotted this fella in Pavilion Gardens....

....dead, drunk or just dead drunk, whichever he looked peaceful!

 Find me now over at http://theceramicgardener.com

57...October swimming and a sundowner at Pourville

What an amazing week we've had! A full blown scorching heatwave to see us into autumn and confusing all the senses.

Looking towards Dieppe

We have been leaving the studio late afternoon and escaping to the beach for a swim. There has been very little breeze and the sea and horizon meld into each other in a fusion of pink and blue. The coast here is very different from just across the channel in Brighton. The cliffs are green and wooded with pretty houses teetering on the edge and the little towns are not over developed. The beaches have concrete runways going into the sea which are used by tractors to pull the fishing boats out of the sea, the catch is then sold on the front.

Golden ferry on way to pick up Henry

As we sat drinking a Kir on the promenade friday evening, we caught sight of the ferry leaving Dieppe on its way back to Newhaven. The sun was so low and as it hit the side making it glow, it appeared to be floating in the sky. Henry came back on this ferry later on in the evening and cycled up through a starry night to arrive here early on saturday morning.

Sundown at Pourville

As the sun sunk down behing the cliff, it turned the sea a series of amazing blues, cereulean, colbalt, aquamarine, petrol. Impossible to capture with a camera. It looked like a painting which you would have believed to be an exageration. The whole of the promenade was stilled....all looking to the west, it was an amazing moment. We popped down again to show it to Henry on saturday and waited to see if it would happen again. It did, and this time we were able to watch it happening as the sky turned from golden to pink. It must be a phenomenon of the time of year, the position of the sun etc.....but who cares...it was just gorgeous.

Chateau d'eau

On the way to the beach we passed this water tower. They are often painted witth fairy tale scenes, but this one being not far from Fecamp, was painted with a lighthouse and a sail boat almost crashing against the rocks. Often they are painted with Rapunzel.....which I suppose you would.

Mist above the river

On the way home we saw the mist lifting above the river. It has an ethereal, almost medieval look about it... as if Arthur might go riding by.

 

Back in the studio the kiln has been firing every other day, with a mixture of students work, a commision to be finished and some clouds which are destined for a primary school. Lots of glazing to be done next week........