On the wall

On the evening of July 10th, the artist's reception for Megan Chapman and my new body of work, A place called home, took place at Springdale's Arts Center of the Ozarks. While the evening was a touch quieter than we had anticipated, we nonetheless had a really lovely night. Around forty to fifty friends, family and patrons came out on a random Tuesday night, to look at our art in person and to talk to us.

We both spent the two hours of the reception in countless conversations, both about life and more specifically about our art. I love sharing my (and our!) work and there is little that can compare to speaking with a patron about a painting I have made, or in this case we have made. It is particularly great when someone gets what we have been trying to do with the work and also when they have their own, equally valid ideas about what we have made.

Our show, named A place called home after the series of paintings, is in the Arts Center of the Ozarks until July 27th. We arranged and hung the show ourselves and are really pleased with how it looks on the wall. This will be the only time that the full series will ever be shown together in public. If you're in Northwest Arkansas, or even eastern Oklahoma or southern Missouri, make sure you don't miss it.

For those of you further afield, you might not be able to see it in person however you can see the full series here.

Satisfaction

In a few days time, Megan Chapman and I will be delivering our new body of work for exhibition at the Art Center of the Ozarks. Creating the series has been a hard job and one that was not made any easier by the heat of the Arkansas summer. Up close against the the work in the confines of the studio, it was hard to get a sense of what we had been making. However, tonight as we varnished all fifteen of the paintings, we began to realise just what we had created and a sense of satisfaction began to manifest. Time and again we found ourselves commenting on how much we liked the particular piece being varnished. It was a good feeling.

We are nomads
Mixed media on board, 12x12" / 30x30cm
© 2012 Megan Chapman & Stewart Bremner.

Originally, we had intended to make more than the fifteen 12x12" pieces that we are showing. Knowing the space that the exhibition was to be held in, we originally estimated that somewhere between twenty to thirty pieces would be needed to aqequately fill it. Yet as the body of work progressed and its complexities revealed themselves, we realised that making more than the fifteen would needlessly complicate the series and that was something that these intricate pieces would not suffer. We further realised that by showing this smaller number of paintings, each piece will be given more impact, pulling patrons deeper into each of their universes. Quite simply, it will demonstrate clearly our conifdence in this work.

In a few days time, we will be hanging these pieces at the Art Center of the Ozarks. It hardly seems like any time has passed since we started this work and yet it has been almost two months since we took delivery of our expertly-crafted panels from local makers Perrodin Supply Co. It seems hard to believe what we have created in that time, pieces that neither of us could have created individually.

While a place called home might not exist for us temporally, a place called home absolutely exists when we paint.


A place called home
Megan Chapman and Stewart Bremner
July 3-27, Art Center of the Ozarks, Springdale, Arkansas
Reception: Tuesday July 10th 6-8pm  
For more information visit chapmanbremner.blogspot.com

Questions and an answer

Fifteen under-paintings Megan Chapman & Stewart Bremner

In a little over a month, Megan Chapman and I will be having an exhibition of new works at the Art Center of the Ozarks, titled "A place called home".

Megan and I have a home each, spaced four and a half thousand miles apart and we have both spent many months visiting each other's homes. Neither of us having planned to ever engage in such a long-distance relationship, there was never an expectation that not knowing where home was would ever arise. That was, of course, before the internet changed things, leaving us at a point where the places we once called home are no longer quite as clear in our minds as previously they had been. Where, then, is our home?

Given that this has become such a prominent, if unanswered question, and also that both of our recent bodies of work are so autobiographical, it therefore seemed entirely apt that we should title our next show with this in mind. Due to the nature of exhibition scheduling, these considerations, and the title that sprang from them, took place some time ago.

Now here we are, back in the sticky heat of an Arkansas summer and we have a lot of painting to do. Already we have began fifteen pieces, all of them underpaintings that contain a mix of shape, colour and texture. As these pieces progress, we are faced with squaring up the work we have began with the title we have given the show. This seems a difficult task, although one that as abstract artists we have faced before.

The problem has led to several discussions and not a few hours of missed sleep. In the heat and in the stress, the solution was not forthcoming. And then the answer occurred to me, the answer that is always the answer and yet is one that seems somehow to be easily forgotten. The work will conform to the title because the idea behind the title is so very much at the forefront of our minds that in our mark-making, we cannot help but reflect it. This is to hark back to the idea of éciture automatique, that I touched on almost a year ago. Basically, if we relax and just keep painting, we should find our way to a cohesive (and hopefully great) show.

Now to put that into practice…