November 2020 - | Royal West of England Academy | Shop Sale | Hastings Open, not open | Mailing list

NOVEMBER 2020

For the past few weeks I have been dedicated to a work in progress that I hope to fully reveal in December. This month’s update just contains some revised exhibition date details due to National Lockdown 2.0. I suppose we can call the post-Dec 2nd tier levels Lockdown 2.1?

Royal West of England Academy 168th Open Exhibition

As I mentioned last month I am delighted to have had ‘Kerala, rewilding’ accepted to the 168th edition of the Royal West of England Academy’s annual Open Exhibition in Bristol, UK.

Unfortunately the opening has now been delayed until 2nd January at the earliest as Bristol falls into Tier 3. The exhibition will still run until March so there will hopefully be plenty of opportunities to view the show in person. That said the RWA is also going to place the whole show online so even if you cannot make it to Bristol then you will be able to experience the huge range of work. For more information click through to their website here.

‘Kerala, rewilding’ - on show at the RWA’s 168th Open Exhibition in Bristol - soon…

Shop sale and discount code

My webshop has been repopulated with several pieces of work that I have either forgotten to offer to the public before now or have finally managed to mentally let-go from display in my own home.

What’s more there is a 30% discount code in effect from now until the end of 2020 if you wanted to spruce up your home, or someone else’s. Use ‘SPRUCE’ at the checkout to claim the price reduction. I will endeavour to send out all purchased artwork as soon as possible (you-know-what permitting).

Here are a couple of examples of new additions to the shop:

The Downs at Seaford (Copy)

The wave (after Courbet, 1870) (Copy)

Not far now (Copy)

Denham marina (Copy)

Arrowhead Lane (Copy)

Parc Güell (Copy)

Hastings Open Exhibition, not currently open

Although ‘Let go’ is still hanging in Hastings Museum the venue is sadly closed due to that thing that’s going on. The exhibition may reopen once lockdown ends but for now, alas, it isn’t possible to view this piece in such a great show. They do say that they will endeavour to reopen once local restrictions ease, so I would expect it will be possible to view the show from December 3rd, but check with the Museum here before you make the trip.

‘Let go’, currently locked-down in Hastings Museum and Art Gallery until they’re able to open up again.

Mailing list

From next year I plan to release shop discount codes to mail list subscribers before the main publicity goes out on social media. If you want to join it please do enter your details here. And if you ever want to leave the list I’ll make sure that happens too.

Continue to look after yourselves and those around you. Hunker down, enjoy the winter sun whenever you can. Mushroom-picking may be seriously over by now but birds are still swirling in huge murmurations down here in Sussex so perhaps your locals will be putting on a show for you too. It’s worth leaving the house for!

October 2020 - | Royal West of England Academy | Shop Sale | Hastings Open, not open | Mailing list

OCTOBER 2020

Not much happened in September so here’s October’s news in a delayed release.

Royal West of England Academy 168th Open Exhibition

I am delighted to have had ‘Kerala, rewilding’ accepted to the 168th edition of the Royal West of England Academy’s annual Open Exhibition in Bristol, UK.

Unfortunately the opening has been delayed until 5th December due to you-know-what but it is planned that the exhibition will run until March so there will hopefully be plenty of opportunities to view the show in person. That said the RWA is also going to place the whole show online so even if you cannot make it to Bristol then you will be able to experience the huge range of work. For more information click through to their website here.

‘Kerala, rewilding’ - on show at the RWA’s 168th Open Exhibition in Bristol - soon…

Shop sale and discount code

My webshop has been repopulated with several pieces of work that I have either forgotten to offer to the public before now or have finally managed to mentally let-go from display in my own home.

What’s more there is a 30% discount code in effect from now until the end of 2020 if you wanted to spruce up your home, or someone else’s. Use ‘SPRUCE’ at the checkout to claim the price reduction. I will endeavour to send out all purchased artwork as soon as possible (you-know-what permitting).

Here are a couple of examples of new additions to the shop:

The Downs at Seaford

The wave (after Courbet, 1870)

Not far now

Denham marina

Arrowhead Lane

Parc Güell

Hastings Open Exhibition, not currently open

Although ‘Let go’ is still hanging in Hastings Museum the venue is sadly closed due to that thing that’s going on. The exhibition may reopen once lockdown ends but for now, alas, it isn’t possible to view this piece in such a great show.

‘Let go’, currently locked-down in Hastings Museum and Art Gallery until they’re able to open up again.

Mailing list

From next year I plan to release shop discount codes to mail list subscribers before the main publicity goes out on social media. If you want to join it please do enter your details here. And if you ever want to leave the list I’ll make sure that happens too.

Hope everyone out there is doing well and coping with things. Don’t forget to talk to people if you aren’t feeling so great, take a minute to rest, and if you need to turn off the news for a few days that’s nothing to feel guilty about. Look after yourselves.

June 2020 - Leukaemia | Dark Mountain | Romney Marsh Project | Whimsy

June 2020:

Lockdown feels like a thing of the past. The traffic surges back to normal. Nature’s chirrups and peeps subsumed under the shudder of HGV tyres on crumbling British roads. I cannot deny feeling a sense of profound loss from those early weeks of the lockdown. Yes, things were dire with death tolls climbing hideously, but there was a real sense of a deep-breath and a grasping for something calmer among everyone who could take a bit of time to just. Pause.

Life is returning to how it was. But with more confusion than before (how is that possible?!) and an ugly overt self-centeredness. Deliberate misunderstanding of the goals of Black Lives Matter being just one of the pillars of the freaky society we are cultivating. It all got a bit much for a while but I am trying to inject a little more hope and whimsy into what I’m working on.

Chronic Neutrophilic Leukaemia

But first: A friend has been diagnosed with this incredibly rare form of cancer. She is probably patient 212 in the entire world (no joke) so I have pulled some work from the #artistsupportpledge in order to try and send some funds her way. Whether that is for research or just basic help to go and travel to specialists. The latter being unlikely as she now definitely cannot leave the house in these virulent times. I have chosen work from my High Ground Series as it came from thinking about personal struggles and injury. The paths we take literally and figuratively to try and work ourselves out. If you buy any pieces in that series from my shop then at least 80% of the sale cost will go to my friend’s needs. If you contact me directly we can circumvent some web host’s commission charges and even more goes to her. Reach out to my via Instagram @christopherjbooth if you want to do that.

Dark Mountain

‘Let go’, one of my large pen drawings from 2019, has been published in issue 17 of Dark Mountain.

I have been a fan of the Dark Mountain Project for several years now and so it’s a real honour to have a piece of my work published in their printed volume. Plus, it is wonderful to see my work published at all.

‘Let Go’, 2019, ink on paper - published in Dark Mountain Issue 17

Romney Marsh Project

I have continued delving into the Marsh with some long hikes and long meditations on what I’m discovering and learning. As a result there are four new pieces of work in progress. One heavily impasto oil painting that has already consumed over 1 litre of Titanium White, two maps being altered, and a metal box full of soil I pilfered from the Marsh under a Strawberry Moon. Watch this space for updates.

I also found that the old cliche of walking and poetry is real. On one 22 mile walk I noticed my brain responding to the rhythm of the plod by putting words into poems. It started with place names, like an invocation for the Marsh. I got home and a few days later remembered that I needed to write these poems down. They aren’t much good but they are:

Whimsy

I wanted to bring along the joy that walking gives me. It is a deeply satisfying pursuit and I feel that doesn’t necessarily come across in my artwork. Undeniably half-baked, amateur, naive, but I enjoyed them all the same. Here’s one of my shit poems to finish off this month’s news and to usher in what will hopefully be an uplifting, rewarding, productive, and also somehow peaceful July.

Hexden, Caldecot, Swallowtail, Tore

Rainbow Petty, Wainway Wall

Snargate, Brenzett, Snave and Stone

Dengemarsh, Lower Wick, Kentpen, Appledore

Promises by grid-bound concoction

Suckered onto wide marshes

Footpath, byway, my way clear

Consuming deep draughts of the potion

Exploration is a funny thing

When the names are only that

Nodes, synapses, on a map

There’s no defence ‘gainst ordnance hexing

— The Spell, Chris Booth, 2020