Summer Sale and Support

Photo by Jason Bryant

I am fundraising to help pay for 3 events, amounting to £2000. The funds will enable me to:

• build a new shed for art storage, easing workspace in my studio

• support the development of Riot into a performance, by working in collaboration with Melanie Thompson towards a transient happening at Tout Quarry during One Island - Many Visions.

• film documentation of the performance by Andy Ralston.

Donate

The latter two will be part of a new body of work which I plan to show in a future solo. You will be invited to visit all 3! Your patronage will be hugely appreciated and acknowledged. Just a donation of £10 can help me reach my goal!

Riot is a site-responsive intervention at Tout Quarry for @oneislandmanyvisions, and also wearable sculpture. Inspired by Maritime Sunburst Lichen growing on the rocks at Tout Quarry. Created from recycled materials including ocean waste & textiles (some home-dyed with natural pigments), Riot is a reflection on ‘troubled beauty’, Arts Precario, beauty tinged with sadness. Currently working on Riot (part II). Thanks to all who have donated materials including Weymouth and Portland Litter Marine Project, Jane Fox, Caroline James, Victoria Grinter, Marilyn Keemar, Linda Staines, Nigel Evans, Vanessa Lloyd-Jones, Gill Sakakini.

Part of my fund-raising is a SUMMER SALE of work. I’m offering a discount on drawings in my online shop.

Large Moth

COURSES

I recently ran an Eco Sculpture course via Frome Community Education, see below results

New courses start in the Autumn: Please visit these links: Drawing & Creative Sketchbooking 

UPCOMING WORKSHOPS

Eco Sculpture workshop: Hidden Cabin, The Grange, Charlcombe Lane, Larkhall, Bath BA1 8D, Friday 25 July, 10am-3.30pm. Book here

Drawing in Space with 3-d Materials: The Sherborne, Tuesday 5 August, 10.30-4.30pm with luchbreak.

Sculpture Workshop as part of Hauser & With Somerset’s Myths & Machines exhibition, Sunday 21 September, details coming soon on events programme.

TUFTED DUCK

I invited the community to take part in creating a Tufted Duck sculpture at Collett Park Day, Shepton Mallet, for an Eco-Arts Festival Trail ’25. Delighted with lots of engagement. Themed ‘Flock, the trail is about water life and takes place in Shepton Mallet, Cranmore & Doulting during the summer holidays. Look out for sculptures made from re-purposed materials & pick up a trail map from the Art Bank, library, One-Craft  Gallery, Shepton Mallet, or Station Cafe, Cranmore.

Article of interest:

Donald Trump’s Cultural Revolution

Follow my instagram channel for more regular updates

Wander_Land, DYCP, Sovereign Nature

Above and Below (detail)

I’m delighted to invite you to

Wander_Land

1 July - 5 August
An exhibition of sculpture by members of the Royal Society of Sculptors at Tremenheere Sculpture Gardens and Gallery. I will be showing 2 new works made this year, Flags of the Forest and Above and Below, around the theme of woodlands/forests, biodiversity, rhizomic systems and entanglements of matter. I’ve been developing the Flags as an outdoor installation. Both works are made using eco-friendly materials and approaches: recycled, found, discarded and re-purposed materials, including home-made botanically dyed textiles, hand-stitched.

Inspired by a pilgrimage route that passes through Tremenheere Sculpture Gardens, Wander_Land explores our relationship between landscape and wandering. 

Please join us for the Private View:
Friday 30 June, 6 - 8pm

1st July: Artist Talks 2.30-4pm

5th August: Closing Event am & pm

Open 11am-4pm daily
Tremenhere Sculpture Gallery, Nr. Gulval, Penzance, Cornwall TR20 8YL (T: 01736 448089)

Instagram: @wanderland2023

Below: pics of work in progress for Flags of the Forest. Thanks to Nigel Evans for his assistance.

As my Arts Council England ‘Developing Your Creative Practice’ Award draws to the end of its year, I’ve been looking back at what I’ve learnt and achieved. Huge thanks to ACE for the grant, Mark Devereux Projects for the bi-monthly mentoring sessions, and all who’ve contributed, engaged and followed my progress.

I’ve really appreciated the conversations and advice given my Mark Devereux over the 6 sessions. They were helpful in staging my progress, each building on the last. Mark helped to pinpoint key aspects of my practice, made sensitive observations and offered suggestions for development. In light of his questioning, I’m thinking more about presentation, the sensory, and my Kenya connections.

Kenya (my birthplace) is an underlying thread which I’m drawing out in my work. The tie is emotional. I’m focusing more on making do, ingenious uses of materials, embedding life and art, use of colour, textiles, space, connecting with earth, creatures, plants.. In my new series of work, I’ve explored and tested scale, materials, processes, ideas and different qualities through maquettes, drawings and larger pieces. I’m planting a dyers garden which will enable more home grown inks to be produced, expanding my repertoire of botanical dyes and eco prints. 

I was asked to create a river train and oak copse crown/headdress for a giant puppet’s costume (ACE-funded project via Spoken World). I used recycled/found materials to create the pieces, including eco-dyed fabric, wire, plastic, found wood and leaves for the crown. The river train took many hours to stitch together! I led a community workshop at Create@#8, Shepton Mallet to create some of the elements, and grateful to all those who helped. The giant Sovereign Nature has been processioning at Somerset Festivals. I enjoyed performing with her at the Green Scythe Fair.

Jem Dick made the giant and worked with project director/storyteller Sharon Jacksties and community groups to create the gown.

Upcoming giant processions:
15-16/7 Pitchfolk Festival
3-6/8 Fanny’s Meadow
and appearances at various residential care homes. 

My work House on Fire is showing at Stone Lane Sculpture Exhibition, Stone Lane Gardens, Stone Farm, Stone Lane, Chagford TQ13 8JU, 1 June-31 October. The gardens are magical and there’s a great range of sculpture on show - do visit!

Flags of the Forest, Residency, Exhibitions, Workshops

Flags of the Forest (in progress). Photo by Russell Sach

Happy New Year (I think I can still say that as it’s still January, just)!

Knuckling down to studio work has been a priority this past month. I’m developing new work as part of my Arts Council England ‘Developing Your Creative Practice’ Award. The award supports a year’s development, including my recent research trip to Kenya (see film), and mentoring with Mark Devereux Projects - which helps motivate me. I’m working on several pieces, leading to upcoming shows, including a residency/solo exhibition in a large empty space, Create@#8, Shepton Mallet, and Wander_Land at Tremenheere Sculpture Gardens and Gallery, with Royal Society of Sculptors this summer.

Inspired by walks in woodlands, I’m creating a series of Flags of the Forest. The flags celebrate bio-diversity, hopeful of nature being more cared for, and thriving.  These involve a combination of sculptural lines and fields of colour in space - hand-stitched patchworks of semi-translucent fabric and plastic remnants.  Some I’ve botanically dyed, eco-printed or embedded with found objects collected on walks.

I’m really grateful to photographer Russells Sach for visiting me last week for a photoshoot in my studio. It was a great opportunity to test out how the separate elements of my Flag pieces work together (and have a tidy up!).

Flags of the Forest (in progress). Photos by Russell Sach

Woods and forests provide vital ecosystems - crucial to our survival. Trees and their underground connections with mycelia fascinate me. Trees inspire awe, such slow-moving tolerant beings with ancient energies. My labour-intensive process is key to the work. Care and repair, making do, reusing, avoiding wastefulness. The binding, weaving and hand-stitching is cathartic, a form of suturing - healing through making.

If you have any green fabric/old clothing you’d like to get rid of, please let me know. I can collect if in the Somerset area.

Collage for Above and Below - a sculpture I’m developing

Botanical-prints on khadi paper, created after watching online demo with Suzanne Ledesma-Sikkerbøl

I plan to create a dyers garden. This will take time, so while I set up, I’m on the look out for certain leaves and flowerheads (unwanted) for eco-printing eg: eucalyptus leaves, african daisies, chocolate cosmos, dahlias, coreopsis, madder root… If you’re able to save me any of these, please get in touch!

During my residency at Create@#8, 20 Feb-10 March. the space will be open to visitors on Fridays and other days by appointment.  From 11-19 March, ongoing work will be showcased in a solo exhibition (Mon-Sat 11am-4pm, 8 Town Street, Shepton Mallet BA4 5BG). The Opening Event is Saturday 11 March, 2-4pm - save the date, I’d love you to come!  There will be a compositional soundscape in response to works by Ushara Dilrukshan. I plan to show a range of suspended, wall-mounted and freestanding works in the empty shop space, including a few pieces from my Life in the Undergrowth project. All welcome! 

I have some workshops you might be interested in (pics below of one I ran last weekend):

Join me in creating small snowdrop-inspired sculptures as part of Shepton Mallet's Snowdrop Festival on Friday, 17 Feb, 2-4pm, at The Art Bank Cafe, 13 High Street, Shepton Mallet BA4 5AA. Supported by Snowdrop Festival. Tickets £5. Book: eventbrite.

Shepton Reflections: a FREE one-day art and creative writing workshop with me and Polly Hall, Fri 3 March, 10am-4pm at Shepton Mallet Library. Using written word, poetry, botanical dyes and textiles we’ll make a suspended artwork featuring the Market Cross.  Supported by Shepton Mallet Town Council. Book: eventbrite.

Linked to my exhibition at Create@#8, I’ll be running an Eco Sculpture Workshop on Sat, 18 March, 2-4pm. Tickets: £18. Book: eventbrite.

Very happy my piece Entangled VI was selected for an exhibition Darkness to Hope at Atkinson Gallery, Somerset, opening 27 Feb. For more details please visit current and forthcoming events.

Looking forward to Spring!

New Work Developing

Maquette; found objects: pondweed, buddleia dyed fabric, khadi paper, plastic netting, leaves, wire, sisal, steel, aluminium

Developing Work (Developing Your Creative Practice funded by Arts Council England)

I’ve been revisiting concepts of Life in the Undergrowth, reading Entangled Life (Merlin Sheldrake), and experimenting with making new plant dyes and ink. My latest discovery, literally on my doorstep, is buddleia, which produces a wonderful vivid yellow, ochre and olive green.  So abundant, buddleia is ‘one of our best wild sources of yellow in the UK… plenty to share with butterflies and bees…’ (Flora Artbuthnott).  A studio tidy up gave me a chance to pick through a few collected objects to inspire.  I’ve been drawing roots and iris bulbs, which had survived in a bucket since a pond clean up 2 years ago.  They will potentially provide me with some black iris bulb ink soon..  This has led to a few small trial sculptures. ‘Radical’ derives from the Latin ‘radix’ = root. Excited to see where the roots take me.

For more info and to follow my development please visit my new instagram page: fiona_campbell_dycp dedicated to my ACE DYCP work.

Together We Rise

It’s been over a month since Together We Rise opened at Chichester Cathedral.  Last Saturday I revisited and really enjoyed showing London Art Critic Tabish Khan round our exhibition, along with Maria (Royal Society of Sculptors), Jo (Jo’s Art History) and Nia (Tate). Photo credits (below): 2 Martyn Sheppard, 7, 8, 9 Paul Gonella

I’ll be taking part in an Artist Talk event alongside fellow sculptors and curator Jacquline Creswell, this coming Wednesday 17th August at 11am and 2pm, Chichester Cathedral. ‘Hear about how the show was conceived through meetings on zoom during the pandemic, learn about materials and processes, and join in the discussion on how the works resonate with the architecture and context of the Cathedral.' Tickets £6, book here - or call: 01243 813586

Hope to see you there! There’s a month left to visit the exhibition - it ends on 6 September.

The Gleaning

I’ve been working on textiles panels and leading workshops for The Gleaning - a community arts project I’m co-curating with Gill Sakakini.  The work involves gleaning materials, ideas, people, cultures..  We’ve had some wonderful collaborative sessions, most recently at Collett Park with a group of people drawing together on fabric for our Shepton panel, which will represent the town’s iconic landmarks.  We used wax crayons and oil pastels, followed by ink - mainly homemade botanical mixtures including turmeric, onion skin, avocado pit, oak gall and buddleia inks. The wax resists the ink - a great way to build up colour in layers. We return to the bandstand on Tuesday 16 August, 10-12 for another free workshop. Do join us!

I’m delighted to have been supported by The Eaton Fund, enabling me to buy a sewing machine and other materials for The Gleaning.  Hand-stitching is important for some of my work, but it’s not always ideal for large-scale pieces! Thanks also to our funders Shepton Mallet Town Council, The Arts Society Wessex Chrisi Kennedy & Cranmore Parish Council. We’re still seeking some funding - get in touch if you can help.

Check out our instagram page: thegleaning_shepton

Tomorrow I’ll be running a free swan sculpture workshop at Wells Museum via Somerset Art Works - free drop-in!

'Art is always about reappraising the way we look at the world. It can speak more eloquently than propaganda because it can inject emotion into facts. And sometimes it can work like a Stealth Bomber: it can slip under the radar and hit home’ Cornelia Parker.