Beachcombing

One of the (many) lovely things about living by the sea is the opportunity for walks on the beach, combined with a spot of beachcombing. After all the wet and wild weather we've had recently, the beach was covered in mounds of seaweed and driftwood and I spent a happy hour searching for treasure......      Bits of blue and white pottery, pieces of clay pipe, shells, jet, fossils and interesting pebbles are all eagerly sought and today I was ridiculously excited to find a fragment of spongeware pottery......small pleasures!

I was so absorbed in my task I almost didn't notice these little birds hurrying busily back and forth along the shoreline, their plumage blended so beautifully into the colours of the sand and the seaweed. I think they are dunlins (?) - even on the photograph they are quite hard to distinguish from their surroundings.

It was great to have such a mellow start to what will be a busy week. Definitely good for the soul.

Laine & Co Art Gallery - Student Fundraising Exhibition

Fundraising for a final degree show is an added pressure on top of the already immense pressure to produce the work for the show in the first place. Luckily, those of us in our final year at Westwood have the enormous advantage of having a friendly gallery prepared to host our student fundraising art exhibition. Newly opened on Victoria Road, Scarborough, fellow student Janilaine Mainprize's excellent gallery Laine & Co is currently showcasing not only work by students, but paintings and prints kindly donated by lecturers Kane Cunningham, Steve Whitehead, Andy Black and Debbie Bell.

Jane Sullivan

Kane Cunningham

The exhibition is open to view tomorrow, Thursday and Friday 10 - 6 and their work is open to bid for by sealed auction. Visit if you can!

Kindled Passions

The results of two delightful and productive days spent this weekend at Jade Monserrat's excellent  Kindled Passions workshop at Crescent Arts in Scarborough. We learned how to make books from scratch, recycling and re-using all kinds of paper and incorporating our own material. I used some paper I had marbled on a previous workshop, pieces of an old map, handmade paper, bits of graph paper - the possibilities are endless. And I learnt so much - the whole weekend was a great pleasure. Thanks Jade!