A busy couple of months preparing and delivering workshops in primary and secondary schools, resuming work with Ballet Cymru pre-professionals, and reflecting on my 2019 project Painting Dance.
As discussed previous posts, support from the Arts Council of Wales last year enabled me to experiment with ideas, materials and scale with a freedom that I had not had before, and culminated in exhibitions that would not otherwise have been possible. I’ve learned a great deal from the experience, which I am now looking to build on as I continue to explore movement and narrative in figure painting with the dancers and choreographers of Ballet Cymru – in particular, developing the collaborative approaches employed in making my pictures of Giulia Rossi and Renan Manhães playing with their piece Untitled Yet, and the Montagues series, made with Andrea Battaggia, Maria Brunello and Miguel Fernandes, and inspired by their roles in the company’s production Romeo a Juliet.
I’m hugely grateful to the Arts Council of Wales and to everyone at Ballet Cymru – and their guest choreographers – as well as to Ffin y Parc Gallery, Wales Millennium Centre, Alastair Sill of Word of Mouth, Newport’s Riverfront art centre, and all the other organisations and individuals that made the project possible. It has strongly consolidated my practice as an artist, and I’m looking forward to properly getting back to work and taking things further.
I have had postcards made of eight of the pictures from the Painting Dance exhibitions. If you would like a set, do drop me a line.