There has never been a better time to buy an original piece of art or handmade craft for a loved one or special friend. Across the country interest in unique, one off pieces is high. UK Handmade (http://ukhandmade.co.uk/buy-handmade-campaign) suggests that buying direct from the artist or maker "has advantages and benefits that you won't get buying from the larger stores on the high street.
Buying locally reduces your carbon footprint because products haven't been shipped from the other side of the world.
Buying locally also means the money you spend stays in your area and boosts the local economy.
Independent makers care about the things they make so building a relationship with local designer / makers means you are guaranteed outstanding customer service and exceptional quality."
So this Christmas, Glossop artists are opening their studios over the weekend of 3rd and 4th December to provide an exciting opportunity to view their work and shop for original and affordable gifts for Christmas.
Adrian Holt |
Ghislaine Howard |
Simon Parkin |
Linda Irving |
Michael Howard |
Rod Holt |
Tracy Cupitt |
Catherine Carr |
The Smithy Studios |
Ian Mood |
Wendy Smith |
|
Sixteen Glossop artists are taking part, some opening up their studios and others exhibiting their work in this celebration of arts and crafts taking place over seven venues in the town. Within the group are both nationally renowned artists and emerging artists and craft artisans. Working in a variety of media including oils, pastels, ceramics, glass, textiles, printing and stone this event showcases the creativity abounding in Glossop.
The event will give people the chance to see the artists in their studios, look at their work and talk with them about it.
Check back soon for full addresses and map of studios....
View Glossop Christmas Art Trail in a larger map
Adrian Holt is a ceramics artist living and working in Glossop. He has been professionally involved in ceramics for over 18 years, exhibiting at art fairs and galleries across the country. “I produce a diverse range of hand-built ceramics, their forms and finishes reflecting the many ideas and techniques used to create them. Important influences are natural history, the local environment and cultural traditions from around the world.” Adrian’s work includes animal and figurative sculpture, masks, busts, pots and tiles. His most recent work includes decorative wall hangings from the ‘Crack in the Landscape’ series and large installations of bugs.
Exhibiting at: 66 Surrey Street, Glossop, Derbyshire SK13 7AJ.
01457 867471 ceramics@adrianholt.com www.adrianholt.com
Ghislaine Howard is a painter of national reputation who was named as a Woman of the Year 2008 for her contribution to art and society. Her powerful paintings and drawings interpret our shared human experience and the dramatic landscape of the Dark Peak. Recent exhibitions include The Choreography of Walking at Salford University and Stations of the Cross: The Captive Figure at York Minster which marks the beginning of a three year association between Ghislaine and The Minster. She has exhibited widely at venues such as Manchester Art Gallery, Canterbury Cathedral and Imperial War Museum North and has work in major public collections including the Royal Collection.
Exhibiting at: Ghislaine Howard Studio Gallery, 7 Oak Street, Glossop, SK13 8LS
01457 854368 ghislaine.howard@btinternet.com www.ghislainehoward.com
Michael Howard is an art historian and painter whose paintings and prints celebrate the work of those artists he loves and the pleasure of colour, form and texture. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and Programme Leader of the School of the History of Art and Design at the Manchester Metropolitan University, where he teaches both academic and studio-based students. He has published widely including books on Lowry, Monet, and Van Gogh and has works in both private and public collections.
Exhibiting at: Ghislaine Howard Studio Gallery, 7 Oak Street, Glossop, SK13 8LS
01457 852368 m.howard928@btinternet.com
Ian Mood is an artist who is drawn towards the shifting vastness of the landscape; its unpredictability and awesome might. Through his work he seeks to capture some of the defining qualities of our brooding landscape: how, in the space of a single walk one can experience all the vagaries of the English weather system – from being caught in a sudden downpour to the unexpected flash of brilliant light that breaks through the pearly canopy of low-lying cloud. Ian Mood studied Fine Art at UWE Bristol. His current work features landscapes and seascapes of Derbyshire; the Welsh coast; Brooklyn, New York & Nantucket Island, Massachusetts.
Exhibiting at: Ghislaine Howard Studio Gallery, 7 Oak Street, Glossop, SK13 8LS
07989855559 www.ianmood.co.uk
Tracy Cupitt has painted all her life, but her experience studying textiles at Manchester Metropolitan University and her recent residence in Japan affirmed her belief in the significance of the decorative and her respect for the craft traditions of different cultures. A talented artist, she specialises in colour and surface pattern, still-life compositions, and, more recently, intricate portraits in black ink. Tracy’s paintings are imbued with light, not from without, but, it seems from within.
Exhibiting at: Ghislaine Howard Studio Gallery, 7 Oak Street, Glossop, SK13 8LS
http://ghislainehoward.com/tracy-cupitt/ http://gingerhoneycat.blogspot.com/
Linda Irving is currently working in the medium of felt and textiles producing both wearable pieces of art and abstract framed pieces which are all originals and made in response to inspiration from paintings and photography from the seashore and landscapes. There are felted and silk batik scarves with some other interesting pieces which take their lead from Linda’s training as an abstract painter. ‘I have always been passionate about colour and texture and to see my art as wearable has been really exciting’. Linda currently divides her time between practising as an art psychotherapist, becoming involved in some work in the community with children and exhibiting paintings and drawings produced in her studio in Glossop where she also offers fine art feltmaking workshops.
Exhibiting at: 1st Floor, Brook Street Studios, Glossop, SK13
www.lindairving.co.uk
The Smithy Studios is a contemporary art and craft centre. Our studios are home to the award winning Catherine Carr; Philippa Maye, ceramicist; Simon Denvers, laser cutter and engraver, and our MMU graduate award winners Lucy Harding, textile and ceramic illustrator and Leah Fletcher, working in surface pattern on textiles and ceramics. Over the weekend the artists’ work will be on display and they will be available to talk about their work.
Upstairs, we are thrilled to host an exhibition of artwork by Glossop artist Erika Robertson. Erika is a painter who has always had a fascination with nature, the huge spectrum of colour, intricate patterns and natural light. Her current abstract work uses oils on wood.
“I was born in Guatemala and grew up in Alabama, moving to England in 1999. Growing up I was surrounded by brightly coloured textiles from my mother’s culture. Such influences fed my love of vivid colours. My recent paintings, with their thousands of dots, hold a comfort within their simple repetition, revisiting shapes that return to me from my childhood. In some respect these mirror the repetitiveness of patterns in nature and everyday life. Living within the hills of the Peak District there is never a shortage of inspiration.
We have a wide variety of locally made crafts for sale including; button jewellery by Barbara Helm, unique and beautifully hand crafted stone and slate bird houses and feeders by craftsman Alan Timmins, silver jewellery from Jacqui Bayliss and Hannah Dodd’s wonderful felt designs.
Exhibiting at: 1 Smithy Fold, Glossop, SK13 8DD
01457 857200 www.thesmithystudios.co.uk
Catherine Carr has developed an innovative range of knitted and crocheted glass vessels. Inspired by the role of women in textiles, and by using recycled materials, she has pushed the technical boundaries of glass and demonstrated her ability to bring traditional iconography into the contemporary craft market.
Exhibiting at: 1 Smithy Fold, Glossop, SK13 8DD
01457 867656 catherine@catherinecarrglass.co.uk www.catherinecarrglass.co.uk
Rod Holt trained at Rochdale College of Art and the University of Northumbria. Since 2004, he has been working full-time as an artist. Recent pieces are inspired and invigorated by the wildness and uncompromising nature of the Dark Peak landscape. ‘Regeneration’ is one of his latest pictures and is of the contemporary Manchester city skyline from the perspective of the Dark Peak. The mills and chimneys have been replaced by concrete and glass towers. The pollution from the industrial past is locked up in the peat moorlands,and restorative seeding helps to conserve the environment. And the viewpoint? Well, that's for you to decide!
‘Water Over the Edge’ has an unusual perspective from behind the curtain of water and captures the wind infused spray from the Downfall.
Exhibiting at: 64 Simmondley Lane, Glossop, SK13 6NS
07709240893 newleafdesignsuk@gmail.com www.rodholt.co.uk
Simon Parkin has been exhibiting nationally since 1995 and running successful open studios for 10 years. His paintings are a response to the environment here in Derbyshire. He uses memory and observation as well as found objects which he embeds in the surfaces of paintings. Simon then uses various techniques of applying paint in order to capture the persona of the changing colours, textures and light of the High Peak.
Exhibiting at: 43 High Street East, Glossop, SK13 8PN
01457 855936 simon@simonparkin.co.uk www.simonparkin.co.uk
Wendy Smith is a stained glass artist who designs and makes window panels and light- catchers. Inspired by the contrasting landscapes of the Kentish coast where she began working with glass 8 years ago, and Glossop and surrounding Dark Peak where she now lives. Her exhibitions reflect an interest in wildlife and the great outdoors. For Wendy, the appeal of stained glass is that its mood consistently changes with the light of the day, the weather and the season.
Exhibiting at: Flatt Farm, Cliffe Road, SK13 8NT
01457 860399 aheartofglassuk@hotmail.com