Highlights 2021; Looking Ahead 2022

Happy New Year!

Photo credits from top: Snakes and Ladders (I) - Barry Cawston; Hope of a Tree - David Bird; All The Colours, ArtFirst - Laura Hylton; Octopus - Steve Richardson; Loft Residency - Dan Hopkins; Glut - Paul Tucker, Courtesy of The Ingram Collection & Unit 1 Gallery; Pyre - me; Hope of a Tree - Linda Ashe; Me installing Snakes and Ladders (I) - Kathryn Sewell

A few highlights from 2021.  It was a tough year, but with plenty of highs. I met and worked with some wonderful people, and grateful for all the support from friends, family, buyers, organisations and followers. 

It was great to have a short film made about my practice, commissioned by Art UK in partnership with Culture Street and Royal Society of Sculptors.  Aimed at secondary schools, it’s one of 10 films about sculptors’ techniques. 

I was delighted to be awarded first prize for Round Lemon’s anniversary exhibition ONE. I gave an artist talk and interview as part of it.

Thanks to Chris Greenwood Red Line Art Works for inviting me to give a Zoom talk.

Touring Inch by IN:CH was hard work but fun along the way. Collaborating with 10 other artists, we showed in some amazing spaces over 4 months, got funding, found new ways to show art and involve the wider community. I worked with Shirley Sharp on performative window drawing and shadow drawing events, and led workshops.  The research and development of work was as exciting as the final outcome. Thanks to all venues and funders including Somerset Skills and Learning, Somerset Art Works, The Arts Society and many other supporters.

It was wonderful to be selected for Wells Art Contemporary at Wells Cathedral. Snakes and Ladders (I) was suspended in the South Transept. Thanks to excellent curators Simon Periton and Robin Sewell.

I was thrilled to be a finalist for the Ingram Prize 2021.  My selected piece Glut was shown in a beautifully curated exhibition at Unit 1 Gallery along with some brilliant artists. Thanks to Jo Baring, Stacie McCormick and Alison Price.

My short film Life in the Undergrowth was part of In Pursuit of Spring at Black Swan Arts.

I loved my Loft Residency, which gave me a chance to explore, develop, make new work and document pieces in an incredible space. My solo exhibition was open during Somerset Open Studios.  Thanks to Heritage Courtyard Gallery and Studios for inviting me and for their support! 

Thanks to Spaeda Arts and Eastover School, Bridgwater for the Octopus and Sea Life wall commission. It was lovely to work with primary school children in the making of it and see their reactions when it was installed.

I enjoyed chatting to Polly Hall about my work for her Procrastination Station podcast.

I’m grateful to Seed Sedgemoor for commissioning All The Colours for Art First. It was a big learning curve: I designed a lenticular (holographic/moving) image of a chameleon changing colours for Buses of Somerset, made up of the community’s images, some created in workshops I led. 

I was really delighted that Pyre was selected for the International Biennial Exhibition Transfiguration: From Nature to Art in Taiwan, which is on exhibition at the National Taiwan Craft Research and Development Institute until 10th April 2022.

Thanks to Sculptors Drawing Space and Royal Society of Sculptors South West for ongoing zoom meetings led by Simon Hitchens.

I ran my second sculpture course last year, got to know some great artists through it, and am about to run my third (10 Jan - 13 Feb). I still have a few spaces so if interested, see this showreel for details.

Images: Martydom of the Ten Thousand (working title), for Chichester Cathedral

In the studio. Photo by Jack Robson

Sketch: ideas for installation

I have some exciting exhibitions lined up for this year including Together We Rise at Chichester Cathedral with Royal Society of Sculptors curated by Jacquline Cresswell, and Materiality with Kate McDonnell, Kelly O’Brien and Nicola Turner at Walcot Chapel. Fingers crossed it doesn’t get cancelled again.

I’m working on a large installation for Chichester, inspired by the plight of pangolins. Stitch by stitch, forms are emerging and a growing collection of bodily forms are gathering in my studio.  I’m using recycled materials that are hand-sewn, wrapped, tie-dyed with home-made plant inks, and waxed over woven structures.  It’s going to take me a few months, but I’m enjoying the labour-intensive process.  Louise Bourgeois said ‘The act of sewing is a process of emotional repair’. 

Here’s to a greener year in 2022 full of love, kindness and creativity!  

The Fall

The Fall (detail) - work in progress

The changing seasons here in UK are a poignant reminder of life’s cycle.  Falling leaves reveal skeletal structures of trees, signifying loss, decay, repression.  In this beauty there is sadness, but also hope and promise.

In Cranmore woods, where rusty autumn leaves thickly cover the ground, I found a couple of fallen trees.  Ripped from the ground, their exposed roots are a mass of interconnecting lines.  My drawings led to new sculptural work, in progress. 

Playing with lines, The Fall is a drawing in space using locally sourced, to-hand-materials: steel rod, copper wire, found wood, wool, sisal, leaves… I’ve been collecting feathers - picking them up wherever I go.  Waxing and burning them produces interesting results.  I’m thinking about Icarus, roots, life’s interconnectedness and lines that ‘give us life.’ (Life of Lines, Tim Ingold).  I’m reading a book The Overstory (Richard Powers) about trees, connections and human/nature conflict.  My thoughts often return to Donna’s Haraway’s phrase staying with the trouble - sticking with the entanglements of life.

Shepton On Show 

Last month I was involved in Shepton On Show - a community event organised by The Art Bank, involving window performances around Shepton Mallet.  I had fun creating a large scale backlit performative drawing in the window of One Craft Gallery in 2 hours, linked to The Big Draw.  Made with egg ink on paper (170 x 180cms), people watched it emerge, alongside other performances. 

The slideshow documents the event from prep drawing to live version.  It was inspired by my @life_intheundergrowth project. 

Exhibition News 

3 film stills from from my film Life in the Undergrowth are showing in the Being Human New Worlds Exhibition.  The work was displayed outside Queen Mary University of London last week and is currently online.  The exhibition shares people's experiences of Covid-19, and the Festival reflects on the radical global changes of 2020, from the Covid-19 pandemic to the Black Lives Matter protests and US election.

Our Somerset Reacquainted exhibition at Somerset Rural Life Museum, Glastonbury has been extended until 16 January. Once lockdown has lifted, do try to visit if you can, it’s a very moving experience.

Shop

I have developed a little sideline making small copper bowls, each annealed and hammered, plus other copper goodies, ideal for Christmas gifts and copper wedding anniversaries. The bowls are on sale at Hauser & Wirth Somerset’s new Durslade Farm Shop, Somerset, where you can buy locally made quality artisan eco products and foodstuffs.  Very pleased that they are selling well :-)

I’ve added a Shop to my website, which includes these, together with affordable drawings, small sculptures, prints and cards.  Enjoy a browse and if there’s anything you’d like to see added, please get in touch.

A few projects and exhibitions are in the planning stages for 2021. As part of an artist group IN:CH (Incubation Chamber), we are excited with developments for our travelling exhibition next year.  Inch by IN:CH is an artist-led project bringing contemporary art out of the protected space of studios and galleries and into communal areas of our everyday lives.  Small-scale works in cases will be transported from place to place, migrating outwards in a spiral. Artists will engage with local communities through workshops, talks and performances.  We’re seeking match-funding prior to our ACE application.  If you’re able to support in any way do please get in touch.

Next Online Sculpture Course

After the success of this year’s Online Sculpture Course, I’m running one from 11 Jan - 14 Feb ’21. It’s a 5 week course to create a nature-inspired sculpture using found & recycled materials. Aimed at adults, art students, teachers and those who want to get creative, it’s suitable for mixed abilities.  This showreel gives you a flavour of my work and Introduces the course.  Places are limited so book now if interested! To enrol (and receive your free tools list) e: fionacampbell-art@sky.com . It might make a nice Christmas present ;-)

I am thrilled to be featured in The Arts Society winter magazine about my sculpture workshops with art teachers! It was great to be involved in the initiative!

I was invited to run a wire sculpture bugs workshop at Preston School, Yeovil last week.   I really enjoyed being back in school working with young people face to face after so many months.  Students made a lovely range of small creatures.

Stay safe!