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Wow – what an event! The Art Jam on Saturday, at the Harris Museum in Preston was amazing – so many visitors, at times it was difficult to move around. At its busiest, we had around 20 visual artists working on easels, another 6 or 7 sat on chairs with sketch pads, several more perched on tables or benches and one on the floor. In addition, several musicians playing an assortment of instruments, a singer, a poet, alongside people making model artists out of plasticine and others just enjoying the buzz. A huge thank you to all the artists that participated and to everyone that came but in particular, to the Harris Museum for allowing us to take over the Fine Art Gallery and trusting us enough to do our own thing. We loved every minute and judging by the messages we’ve received, so did all the artists that took part.
Here are some of the photos from the day. Click on an image to enlarge.
The atmosphere was amazing and everyone seemed to have fun and just enjoy themselves – which was exactly the point of course. People of all ages joined in. One lady of mature years, after insisting she had never had any imagination, was soon busy creating like everyone else after just a few minutes. Another small girl, after her mum had said she was too shy to take part, started building plasticine artists and didn’t want to stop. Artists kept turning up and sketching as things unfolded before them whilst others stopped for the duration and created some stunning work whilst visitors had the chance to wander around and see the works unfold. What a day!
Expanding Universe
Gordon spent the day on his hands and knees working on his ‘Expanding Universe’ artwork on the floor – it was onto that people were placing the plasticine models so that it transformed into another dimension. Some of the plasticine models were incredible, so much that we’ve kept the best for a future installation. After working with Tim to install his perspective Art Map, Caroline then spent her day spinning and weaving the wool from Lancashire-bred sheep whilst Evelyn engaged with visitors and knitted poppies for a forthcoming large-scale installation.
Art Jammin’
Tom, an old time friend of Oxheys, interchanged playing quietly on a violin, guitar, ukulele and didgeridoo, then young musician Liam firstly played guitar and sang some his own work before they were both joined by Tim who played a Himalayan drum and then an upturned wooden tea tray, as they started their own impromptu jam, which was a real treat.
In between, David from House of Misery also entertained with some poetry, alongside an installation on Denise’s bike featuring the Poem for Preston written by Winston Plowes as Spoke ‘n’ Wheel, made during the Making A Mark event back in the summer.
Poem for Preston? On yer bike!
Meanwhile Tim’s perspective Art Map gathered quite a bit of interest as artists checked to see if they had been included – all the artists who submitted were shown with luggage tags pinned to a large display board. Others explored the connections between the various studios and galleries throughout Lancashire on the Art Map – this is a work in progress so watch out for that being developed further and shown some time in the future when the artist labels will also be integrated.
