exhibition ends...

So my exhibition at the 14th moon Galerie Centennial finally ended a couple of days ago.

My huge thanks to friends and family who sent me emails and photos from their visit! So nice to see the exhibition through different eyes, and to hear their thoughts. A special thank you to Masae-chan and Deko-san, whose pictures I have posted here on my blog :)

Ooh, looks busy!

My postcards sold out!

Oh look, there's my comments book!! I am most looking forward to getting this back, to hear the thoughts of everyone who visited the show.

Ibe-san from the gallery has also told me I've sold a painting (hooray! I wonder where it's new home will be?), and there is some possible exciting news, but I don't want to say anything until I know for sure...

conker and flump

I've been getting back into sewing felt toys again.

Here are a couple of new friends...

I spent a lovely sunny afternoon in town the other day, just wandering around. I popped into one of my favourite shops in London, The Cloth House. They have such lovely fabrics there, as well as some beautiful ribbons and buttons. Like another favourite shop of mine Loop, it is a place I like to just hang about in, looking at all the lovely things, wishing I could sew or knit properly. Usually, I just buy one tiny little inexpensive treat after spending so long browsing. I must be such a disappointing customer!

I bought these ribbons at The Cloth House and good old John Lewis. I'm hoping to use them on my felt toys soon :)

the exhibition!!

Here are some photos of the exhibition space, kindly taken and sent to me by Mr Ibe of the 14th Moon Gallery. It's so strange and exciting to see all the work now in place, hanging in the space that I could only imagine from my messy little studio in London.

I hope people will pop in to have a look!!

The gallery website has added a couple more pictures to my post. You can see them here.

14th Moon part 3

These pieces were also difficult to translate, so I didn't for most of them...

The title of my exhibition is "おはなしの森" (Ohanashi no mori), which roughly means "The forest of stories".

"銀河鉄道" (Gingatetsudou)

"わたり鳥" (Wataridori)

"ぞうの丘" (Elephant hill)

"カシオペア" (Cassiopeia)

"やどりぎのまり" (Yadorigi no mari)

14th Moon part 2

I didn't do so well with translating these titles - it's tricky as different languages can completely change the feeling of a word.

"あやとり" (Ayatori)

"コン" (Kon)

"コンのしっぽはせかいいち" (The best in all the world)

"しっぽ" (Tails)

"すかんぼ" (Sukanbo)

"電柱" (Denchuu)

"輪まわし" (Wamawashi)

"椿" (Tsubaki)

14th Moon part 1

For those who won't be able to make it to the 14th Moon gallery in Osaka, Japan (including myself...sniff...), here are the pieces one by one, with the titles in Japanese, loosely translated into English - the English titles are a bit weird!

"雨のすきま"　(The gap in the rain)

"雲ひつじ" (Sheep cloud)

"シャボン玉の森" (The forest of bubbles)

"シャボン玉" (Bubbles)

"まよなかのお客さん" (The midnight party)

"まよなかのバス" (Midnight bus)

"まよなかのタクシー" (Midnight taxi)

The three walls

Here are my pieces grouped together for the exhibition.

This is wall one, consisting of pictures inspired by the stories of Miyazawa Kenji. These canvases are roughly 40cmx50cm.

This is wall two. Canvases are 25cmx30cm. Inspired by the words of Aman Kimiko and Niimi Nankichi.

This is the third wall, inspired by the stories of Aman Kimiko.

20 pieces finished in 1 month...I don't know how I did it but I did! I'm enjoying a bit of time off these days yey :D

The pieces have reached the gallery safely (phew!), and the exhibition opens on Monday!!

waiting, tidying, gathering

I spent most of today waiting for the man from Fedex to pick up my big box of artwork, to be delivered to Japan for the exhibition. I hate being stuck in the flat for these kinds of things...I've had bad experiences in the past, waiting all day for the man who never showed up, so was really anxious.

I needed to keep myself busy while I waited, so decided to tackle the big mess in my studio. As I went through the big pile of paper bits on my desk (a very boring task, where I go through all of it, deciding what to keep and what to throw away, when really I should just chuck the whole pile in the bin!), I thought about the words of Tove Jansson from her brilliant story "The Magic Forest":

"Gathering is peculiar, because you see nothing but what you're looking for."

I started gathering bits from my big pile, and stuck down the pieces. This is what I ended up with. I don't know what it is, but it helped pass the time :)

I think I prefer it cropped.