Bridlington Contemporary Art Gallery

A couple of weeks ago, I had the pleasure of attending the opening of Bridlington Contemporary. Supported by East Street Arts, an old Cooperative supermarket has been converted to the new exhibition space and studio of contemporary artists, Nigel Folds and Vivien Stamford.

Lots of the supermarket features remain, including fridges and checkouts, used as stands for Nigel's canvases - they were my favourite bit! These quirky features and the sheer size of the space provide an exciting and inspirational backdrop for the artwork.

On show is 'Garden of Signs' by Nigel Folds and 'Sea Cloths and other pieces' by textile artist, Vivien Stamford, until the 14th March. A wonderful venture for the artists and community, it is well worth a visit for the curious, as well as art lovers. Plus, you can have lots of seaside fun while you're there, like I did... 2p machines, donuts, fish and chips, a haunted house, I crammed in all the novelty coastal delights and couldn't have wished for more!

Find out more about the gallery here, where you can view photos of the transformation progress, from it's original state as an supermarket to a contemporary and inspirational space.

Painted canvases propped up on checkouts

The big open space exciting lots of people

Artwork and supermarket fridges living joyfully beside eachother

The old stock room provides a separate space (and more to explore)

Nigel's materials and work in progress to be seen alongside finished artwork.

Etsy Made Local, Sheffield - December 2016

So my January has been a little less crazy than December, which means I am working through a few things I needed to catch up on, blogging being one of them! I've been mega busy lately and feel like I've got a really good momentum going now - having a day job plus running a double-sided business (being a freelance illustrator and having an online shop) does take some getting used to, but I now feel like I get enough chill time to savour as well as working like a beaver!

Etsy Made Local in December was my first full weekend fair and I felt so privileged to be there. Not only was Sheffield Town Hall a beautiful, festive and atmospheric venue, but the people were absolutely wonderful. The Etsy Sheffield team were brilliantly organised and the city centre location meant lots of footfall, feedback and sales too - hooray!

Visit my etsy shop here to see what you missed or what I've added to my shop since.

Here are some photos of my stall and the venue...

Though I spotted lots of gorgeous things to ask Santa for, I had to be strict not to buy for myself, for all my pennies and more had gone on expenses recently. But I instantly fell in love with this little guy and HAD to call him mine!

This gorgeous little bear is made by Holly Balfour of Holly Heartfelt. Since seeing her lovely characters at Etsy Made Local, I have followed her on instagram and love seeing her adorable quirky creations, many with endearing, smiling faces like my bear! 

I was also delighted when I found a basket of felted acorns (oh, I did buy more than one thing then) - they felt so delicate and all different from each other. I love saving real acorns when I find them on a walk, but unfortunately they do perish, so Holly's felt acorns had Josephine written allover them. I decided they made fabulous earrings for my Christmas reindeer:

One of the amazing organisers of Etsy Made Local was Sophie Cooke, a milliner and owner of Imogen's Imagination. Sophie makes beautifully vintage inspired hats and accessories, I loved her headbands with big bows on and most of all, gorgeous felt berets. Her lovely website is very inspirational to look at for style ideas for yourself as well as great gifts.

I have always been a beret fan (though I haven't had one I've been attached to for a while) and I saw a particular one I fancied on the website before the christmas market. When I saw that the navy beret with navy velvet ribbon wasn't at the market, but tried lots of other lovely ones on, I casually mentioned this to Santa (my boyfriend) and what a gem, he remembered! So this is me modelling my very special christmas present...

You can visit the Sheffield Etsy sellers website to see more local artists and makers.

Happy New Year! A new work round up.

Hello and happy new year!

I hope you have all had a wonderful start to the year so far. I got so busy towards the end of the year, so I thought I'd do a quick round up and share some snaps of new work I've recently listed on my etsy shop. 

Regular blogging is not my strongest point, so do please follow me on twitter, instagram or Facebook for updates in between my more detailed blog posts :)

A Colouring Book of Houses and Shops, £6

A 24 page colouring book full of busy streets, detailed houses,

quirky shops and lots of bricks to colour!

Sheffield Town Hall mug, £10

Printed in Leeds, Yorkshire. Dishwasher & microwave safe.

Shops mug based on Sharrow Vale Road, Sheffeld, £10

Printed in Leeds, Yorkshire. Dishwasher & microwave safe.

Sheffield Town Hall Screen Prints, £48-£50

Available in blue and pink, pink/purple tonal and single colours coming soon.

Limited edition, numbered and signed

Printed by myself in Mirfield, Yorkshire, using archival inks and acid free paper.

Sheffield Town Hall Screen Prints, £48-£50

Available in blue, pink and yellow.

Limited edition, numbered and signed

Printed by myself in Mirfield, Yorkshire, using archival inks and acid free paper.

Screenprinting Sheffield Town Hall - experiments!

After returning to screen printing at West Yorkshire Print Workshop, the next piece I screen printed was another experimental run, using a drawing I showed recently of Sheffield Town Hall. I printed some block colours digitally and then screen printed the linework over, to see what colours and options worked best. I had also experimented at some hand coloured techniques again and chine colle (tissue paper collage). 

In the end, the prints with coloured sky were my favourite. Because the town hall is such a finely detailed building and the drawing is so delicate, I found it worked best staying in black and white, with a block colour in the sky behind to frame it and contrast against the detailed line drawing. 

My next plans are to make more prints of Sheffield Town Hall, this time with the colour also being screen printed, now that I’ve found what works best. I’m also working on some other new drawings of places in Sheffield that I’ll be making into screen prints in time to sell at the Etsy Sheffield fair in December. 

I haven't put these prints on my etsy shop yet, but please email me at jd@josephinedellow.com or message on etsy, if you would like one.

Drawing Sheffield Town Hall

I recently set myself the challenge of drawing Sheffield Town Hall. It turned out to be quite a big project with it being such a detailed building with so many ornate features. I worked out it took me about twelve hours to draw. It was a big project but I’m very happy with the result, I hope other people will like it too! I’ll be making it into an edition of screen prints soon.

I've had some exciting news that I've been accepted to have a stall at Etsy Made Local Christmas Market in Sheffield on the 3rd & 4th December! So it has fuelled me to make more pieces that are Sheffield based, in time for the market.

Here are some progress shots from me drawing Sheffield Town Hall...

Screenprinting Houses

I am very happy to write that I’ve started screenprinting again after being slowed down earlier in the year by handgate! It had been in my plans since last year and after having a few months of being out of action, I’ve felt driven ever since to make up for it. You can see progress updates of my drawings and printmaking on my instagram, @josephinedellow and Facebook.

I started back by printing the linework of my 'Houses' illustration over colour experiments I had prepared previously, using my lightbox and different media such as coloured pencil, felt tip, markers and chalk pens. I found the chalk pens did not work well to screen print over – the chalk pressed back onto the screen and clogged some of the linework.

These house illustration screen prints can now be bought here!