Voices carry away on this mornings gusts.

Notice Board

Exhibition 34 – Jayne Cooper

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Exhibition 33: Eyes Down, at The Notice Board features new collages and a fabric flag by Jayne Cooper.
The work is inspired by early Renaissance Maiolica floor tiles from a convent in Parma, Northern Italy. The tiles (now in a museum) are a mix of religious and secular imagery seemingly quite at odds with such a pious setting. Particularly as their strange depictions filled, and arguably compelled the downward gazes of the nuns as they went about their monastic business, helping or hindering their concentrations.
Pleasure is at the heart of Jaynes work be that through the joy of looking, the choice of subject or the act of making. We see a playful set of constructions, based on contested imagery, shown in this beautiful setting, which invites you, the audience, to join the ‘fun’. But let us not forget how pleasure can also be considered a violation and against social mores. Hence this work being perfect for The Notice Board, which aims to question, through contemporary art, what many consider right or wrong.

Jayne, who has recently been awarded the Claire Peasnall Memorial Award by the St Hugh’s Foundation for the Arts says: For me, the pleasures of making lie in the manipulation of materials; the joy in seeing colours and surfaces working with and against each other is probably what sustains me the most. Collage too can be seen as transgressive, an ‘unauthorised collaboration’ which relies on the pre-made – it offers a freedom to rip apart, deconstruct and recombine. By using cardboard and non-precious materials goes against the tradition of painting and perfectly primed canvas. But I like to think this sense of freedom is echoed in the nuns gazing on the provocative tiles, gaining pleasure against their order to find an inner freedom, that indeed we all have as gatekeepers to our own private worlds.

 @jaynecooperangel

Exhibition 33 – Kate Genever

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For Exhibition 33 at the Notice Board I will be showing 2 prints from the set With bliss I imagine this…..

For the last six months I have been artist in residence in Shinning Cliff Woods in Ambergate, Derbyshire. Shining Cliff has a long industrial history, which includes quarrying, charcoal burning and wire making. They now comprise of managed Pines, veteran Oaks, Yew, Beech and Sycamore and are a tourist destination.

With bliss I imagine this, engages with an alternative history of the woo. That of the nature-loving-utopian group Grith Fryd Pioneers. [Grith Fryd means Peace Army in old English]. Originally a radical educational movement formed in the 1930s. It created two work camps, one at Godshill in Hampshire and the other at Shinning Cliff. Both took in unemployed men and tried to create a land-based self-sufficient community that exchanged goods and services with one another. The movement’s outlook was a mix of socialism, co-operation, anti-urbanism and internationalism. Present day Pioneers still provide camping in Shinning Cliff giving people scope for self-realisation and the development of personal, wider educational opportunities, and a sense of responsibility towards the protection of the natural environment.

Kates says: I took the original photos as I walked in Shinning Cliff. The collages reimagine the original Pioneer peace huts for our time. And if we too lived freely in the woods and acted responsibly towards the natural environment. The flag with an olive branch extends this ambition while also declaring The Notice Board as a gathering point of a new Peace Army.

More of Kate’s work will be on show in Shining Cliff from May 7 until May 28

Exhibition 32 – Valentyn Odnoiun

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Valentyn lives in Vilnius, Lithuania but was born in Ukraine. He and his family escaped via political asylum when he was younger. The Notice Board see’s this escape as the fuel at the core of his work. Work which pays homage to the people who tried to, didn’t, haven’t or can’t set themselves free. Particularly at this time of war as the population defends itself against Russia.
This show featuring 3 examples from larger bodies of work: Painted over prison window, Surveillance and PW44. These deeply profound, political and perceptive photographs show us the shadows of atrocities and haunted sites. Shadows that reveal a strange beauty that lures us in and then evokes imaginings. Yet it’s a beauty that doesn’t save us and nor should it. Rather we are confronted with a truth. A truth that many of us may be unable to bear or believe yet did and does still exist.

Valentyn says of the work being shown Surveillance feature the walking yards and prison cell door spyholes in former political prisons in Eastern Europe (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Poland, Germany). Previously, to keep people under control, they were isolated in special places and/or were under different methods of surveillance. Nowadays surveillance is taking new (digital) forms, but the main essence remains. Total physical and mind control of society. In PW44 – plastered bullet holes the photographs were made in Warsaw, Poland. They show walls of plastered over bullet holes – traces of events that occurred during the Warsaw Uprising from August 1st  – October 2nd in 1944 against Nazi German occupation. The plaster repair does not however remove the scars or disappear the oppression. In Painted Over Prison Window. We see a former Gestapo and Later KGB Prison window in Vilnius, Lithuania, smeared over. This window is of a prison cell in the former Gestapo and later secret KGB prison in Vilnius, Lithuania. This window faces onto a main street.

Valentyn uses photography to research historical or social events. Events linked to political and violent situations or doctrines. He explores the relation between what we see and what we perceive as we come to understand what’s represented. The photographs show traces that emphasise the borders of human perception but also where the consequences of human action meet reason.          

Exhibition 31- Joyce Davis

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The Notice Board is proud to be able to share Joyce Davis 60° North exhibition. Joyce lives with complex physical, psychological, and neurological illness which is helped considerably by making art. This making, The Notice Board believes, offers Joyce a type of freedom. A freedom that is available to all of us if we care to embrace it. It’s a space where we can reflect on our pasts, presents, and even imagine a future. A place to manage feelings and share ideas.

Joyce says: For me Art is therapy. I think it found me. I know I needed it.  The works that I’m showing here are part of this therapy. They are a variety of prints (Mono, Intaglio and Riso) and drawings in pen. All of them are faces that you may recognise as familiar to you, but they are of people I have known personally or at a distance. I live 60° North of the equator, but the world is accessible to me from my Shetland home.

People make places but one thing I truly believe is that we all share much more than we are different. We all experience love and joy, pain and hurt. We all feel safety and fear. We can all reach out and change other people’s lives for the better or the worse.  I want my art to reach people and to give them an opportunity to reflect, to pause and to feel – a moment of escape from the stresses of their lives, a gift from me from 60° North.

Joyce firstly trained as a nurse working with people with learning disabilities and then in mental health. She went on to further study and completed a Masters in Psychology at the University of Glasgow and followed this with a Post Graduate Masters in Clinical Psychology at the University of Liverpool. Joyce worked in the NHS in both England and Scotland as a Clinical Psychologist and was  Head of a number of Clinical Child Psychology Departments.

Illness meant an end to Joyce’s career, and she began to make art and to write creatively through initially going to well-being classes at Shetland Arts.  Her career as an artist developed into print making and she has found a whole new world has opened up to her. Joyce has enjoyed an art residency at Peacock Visual Arts in Aberdeen and has shown her work both in the UK and in the US. She has been awarded a number of Artist Bursary’s and currently has a Solo Exhibition at the Mareel in Lerwick. (www.shetlandarts.org) Blogs written by Joyce are on the Shetland Arts website.  Joyce is represented by www.jenniferlaurengallery.com Instgram: @joycedaviesart

Exhibition 30 – Nadya Monfrinoli

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Nadya Monfrinoli
Born: UK
Title: Stay Safe

The Notice Board this month showcases work that raises awareness of EDAN Lincs and celebrates work of Nadya and women she has worked with. Nadya says: The refuge is covered in inspirational quotes in the Live, Laugh, Love vein. This work draws on this tradition of using words to empower, but instead of using existing phrases we created our own. Turning them into posters that can be shared more widely. Women involved wanted their work to be seen by others who might be experiencing domestic violence to “build them up, offer courage, to say I believe in you, it is possible to make a change”.

In response I created the flag which shows a piece of chalk graffiti found inside of the refuge’s smoking shelter. In this small brick shed many take the time to offer each other messages of solidarity, leaving them for those that come after. I was struck by how the now familiar ‘Stay Safe’ refrain taken up by us all since Covid assumes further complexity in this context. Particularly as the last two years has seen incidents of domestic violence soar.

Nadya makes site-responsive installations and other ephemeral works that enable the viewer to interact with them. She is interested in different ways of engaging with people and this often includes collaboration. For more information visit: monfrinoli.com  @nadya_monfrinoli

The Notice Board – Kate Genever

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Kate Genever. UK

Title: She loved, loved and loved. Woodcut print. 69cm x 59cm

During a residency in Wakefield I worked in with Wakefield City of Sanctuary; a charity which promotes and encourages the inclusion of refugees and asylum seekers in their district. This opportunity helped me understand more about the UK’s asylum system, and the fate of refugees as they are processed before being deported or offered safe and stable homes. While their status is determined all are supported by many volunteers and organisations who offer expertise and care. This effort and the emotional toll it took shaped the artwork I created. This print is one outcome.

At the time of my residency in 2017 people were walking across Europe, before entering and hiding in channel crossing lorries to get to the UK. Now they also come by sea. Imagery of overloaded boats, and worse the drowned, is heart-breaking. Which makes this print still relevant. So I share it again to highlight the ongoing, politically complex, international refugee crisis and the toil of volunteers and charities who help. Asking all the time what would you do for freedom?

The Notice Board – Jane Wheat

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Jane Wheat is based in Nottingham. For Exhibition 28 at The Notice Board she has created an exhibition under the title: Fixed Point Semaphore.
Of the work Jane says: My interest in rituals and the characteristics of cultural events has underpinned much of the work I have been making for several years.
I have a large extended family in South East Asia and visits there have given me a great insight into their traditions, which date back centuries.  I have made several films based on their colourful celebrations conjuring a sequence of images & sounds that are redolent with meaning.
During the on-going pandemic the separation from loved ones has proved difficult and distressing. Families living maybe only a few miles from each other became isolated. There are many families separated by continents that, even in pre pandemic times feel this separation often for years. These thoughts have led to this exhibition and a dialogue between me, my grandson and his maternal grandparents who live over 6,000 miles away. The idea of personal message from a grandchild drifting through space and time is something that I hope could amuse and entertain my relatives in their faraway country, which they can view on social media.
Flags have evolved as a tool of national identity and as a means of communication as well as decoration and demarcation. Semaphore is an international flag based language. So I asked myself ‘How can I create a flag relevant to my situation?” In response I’ve made one that contains  a personal message that can only be read by people who speak this foreign tongue.

The Notice Board enjoys the layers of code in Janes work – with private languages only available to some of us. Technology be it flags, telephones or the internet have always offered a potential freedom to speak privately and connect across great distance. The Notice Board enters itself into this list happy to support a family connect and laugh.

Jane’s website: janewheat.com

As part of her exhibition Jane has created a quiz and invites you to join in. Find the Quiz here and Answers here

The Notice Board- Tobias Loemke

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Born: Augsburg. Germany
Lives: Nuertingen. Germany

Title: Generating Pictures (under the table)
The Notice Board remembers playing under a sheet suspended across a clothes horse or kitchen table – using cushions, blankets and toys to add to the magic. Perhaps you too built imaginary homes where you sailed away or just explored a space that was uniquely yours? It’s those ‘Free Lands’ that Tobias’ images draw on, coupled with experimental making explored in a recent summer class led by American artist Francis Ruyter.
Tobias says: In terms of picture generation I knowingly play with relationships, constellations and the compositions of things, … like playing as a child under my grandma’s kitchen table, where I was protected but also curious about the unexpected and strange …
Tobias Loemke is an artist, teacher and researcher, working at Nuertingen Geislingen University (Art Therapy). www.tobiasloemke.de Insta: tobiasloemke

The Notice Board – Rose Croft

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Exhibition 26 is by Rose Croft with “Chromacells” – hand tufted pieces which begin by Rose painting fast and abstractly with coloured acrylic onto large panels. Her aim is not to make large finished paintings rather a surface that when cut up produces small pockets of pleasing areas. Each cell’s composition is therefore a product of chance. Rose often displays these cells individually or as an assemblage. But more recently they have become inspiration for the hand tufted woollen wall hangings.
Rose says: We are often consumed with the idea of “What Next?!” and that those feelings can suffocate our ability to enjoy the present moment.  The wall hangings are about being awake and present to the beauty around us. They are an attempt to focus in on moments of joy, experienced as I make, but also then an invitation to join in on the radical act of being present for that beauty too.
The Notice Board asked Rose to show her work for two reasons. Firstly because she said: This work is about those small moments of awe we can see in the world and this determined attempt to pay attention to small, often fleeting, moments of beauty feels potent. Secondly The Notice Board selects artists based on a theme The Lands of the Free? In Rose’s case it thinks the freedom is about focus – a metaphorical “land” that is freeing. The world offers itself and we choose to attend to certain things, sometimes being guided to look or by letting our senses and mind wander. Both are in Rose’s work and process. When she paint she lets things come and then in the deliberate, strand by strand creation, the focus is concentrated and studied.
Rose will be show 3 wall hangings across the month. The flag is made specially for this show.
Rose Croft is a story teller, teacher and painter and colour rules her world.
www.rose-croft.co.uk  Instagram: @rosecroftart


The Notice Board – Sera Waters

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EXHIBITION 25                                                           15 Aug – 15 Sept 2021
Sera Waters
Lives: Beulah Park. South Australia
Title: Familiar Activism: Truth-Telling

The Notice Board is proud to share Australian artist Sera Waters’ work. In the mid 1800s Sera’s ancestors migrated from Lincolnshire to South Australia where they spread across Kaurna, Bunganditj, Nukunu, Adnyamathanha and Ngarrindjeri Country. Along with welcoming her and her work back to Lincolnshire the Notice Board wanted to invite consideration on the question about what or who is free?
Sera says: My ancestors propogated roots in waterholes, down mine shafts, upon woolly backed sheep, in the crevices between stacked bricks from which they made homes, and in the bitumen of highways. They flourished and my art reckons with the knots from these inherited settler colonial pasts and the resulting ecological damage. But now it’s time to reckon with and redirect intergenerational colonial mindsets which have normalised colonising acts – family traditions like gardening, mining, farming, imported to a land where they do not always fit.
These artworks are acts of truth-telling; a flag exposing the land grab of unceded Aboriginal country and a set of artifacts revealing the dry that comes from draining for pastoralism. Today in Australia towering cabbage palms indicate some of the earliest colonial homesteads. They were planted to send out a visual signal of claiming land, declaring far and wide “this is MINE”.
Water exits the drought stricken land of Australia at a quickening pace. Once, before rocks and trees were removed en masse and drains were cut to make land suitable for pastoralism, chains of ponds and thin creeks allowed water to slowly trickle toward the sea. Now trickles have become streams, rivers, a mass exodus, a road across dry land.
These artworks are part of a larger project where I’m grappling with how to navigate a future of growing ecological disasters. I am asking what art can pragmatically contribute to going forward care-fully?
Going forward, for me, equates to looking back to past ancestral traditions from slower pre-industrial eras. I am scouring archives and artifacts and locating intergenerational knowledge in domestic textile traditions: evidence of how to repurpose, repair and preserve; traditions of comforting with soft furnishings and warm protective clothing; of how knowledge-filled stories and narratives of hope have been displayed to propel us on or enable us to learn from the past; how we remember and tell-truths to serve justice and social equality and shift trajectories; how we slow down bodily to fall in rhythm with the ancient roots and seasonal pulses around us to live more mindfully and calmly.
This project does not deny advancing technologies, we live in different circumstances to our ancestors and not all traditions are beneficial to reinstate, yet examining traditions critical to sustaining humans humbly for thousands of years (until disrupted in the last few hundred) revives knowledge worth preserving.

Sera Waters embroideries and hand-crafted sculptures dwell within the gaps of history to examine Australian settler-colonial home-making patterns, especially ‘genealogical ghostscapes’. More recently Waters has been exploring how textile traditions can be restored to navigate a threatened future. www.serawaters.com.au 

Instagram: @serawaters

The Notice Board is a contemporary art project showcasing the work of international artists. Featuring month-long exhibitions curated to the theme: The Lands of the Free? The project connects audiences to artists work, whilst offering artists unusual exhibition spaces in the form of a Notice Board and Flagpole.   

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