Jane Barwood Art

Author: paintaspaint

  • Exhibition: Last Few Days!

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    My solo exhibition finishes this Friday, 9th March.

    Many of the works in this exhibition were inspired by my recent walks in Anglesey, North Wales and the North-West coast of England. The paintings often feature lonely buildings in the landscape. The buildings represent the ephemeral place of people within the eternal natural world. The paintings explore ideas of loneliness and connection, communication and isolation, alienation and belonging. The settings are based on reality but are not realistic. Instead I use colour, texture and form to evoke atmosphere and emotion rather than photographic realism.

    Entry to the exhibition is free. Directions to The World of Glass can be found here. There is free parking on site and full disabled access.

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  • Telegraph to No One

    Literally just put my brush down on this one. “Telegraph to No One” I’m not 100% happy with the foreground but I’m leaving it for now. Oil on canvas. Features the disused telegraph station on Hilbre Island on the Wirral Coast, where I visited this summer. Continuing my themes of communication and isolation, belonging and alienation.

  • New paintings and other things


    A proper update is long overdue I know. I’ve had a busy summer with painting, exhibiting, teaching classes and trying to have a life but things are getting back to normal now hopefully.

    This is the first of a series of three I’m working on based on my walk to Hilbre Island a few weeks ago. They are all 60 cm2 and oil on canvas. The second one will be finished next week and No3 is in progress. If you’d like to see more of my work please like and follow my art page on Facebook or follow me on Instagram. I tend to post more on there just because it’s convenient. But I will do an update on here soon. I need to add to my gallery pages and update my cv too! 

  • Exhibiting Now! Reality Removed

    Exhibiting Now! Reality Removed

    My painting “The Old Ice Cream Factory” has been selected for the “Reality Removed” exhibition  at The World of Glass in St Helens.

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    This painting is quite large for me at 82 cm x 82 cm. I painted it during my residency at Liverpool Hope University in 2014. At the time I was making paintings of Liverpool buildings that have a special significance for me and, like the other paintings in this series, “The Old Ice Cream Factory” has a story.

    When I was a very little girl my mum would sometimes tell us that if we behaved on our shopping trip she’d take us for a treat. On the rare occasions that we went into Liverpool that could mean a visit to Reece’s Café for a Knickerbocker Glory. The building in my painting was known locally as The Dairy and belonged to Reece’s. It was demolished years ago but still sometimes surfaces in my dreams. It’s one of those places that I’ll always connect with in my memories – not just of childhood but years later when I would pass by as an adult on my way to work when the building was derelict.

    The cafe was where the Superdrug store is now in Liverpool (see below) and the dairy was on Brownlow Hill behind The Adelphi Hotel and Lime Street train station.

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    I found a few images of the old dairy online here. I have my own photos too somewhere. I need to dig them out. In the meantime, here’s a photo of how it looked, taken from the myspace account linked above.

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    Reece’s Cafe was made famous as the place that John Lennon and Cynthia held their wedding reception in 1962. You can read more about Reece’s on this blog. There is also a discussion about it here.

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    About the Exhibition

    What we see, we understand because it is real or realistic; but what happens when we remove the reality in art?  Space, time and structure take on a limitless entity that require you the viewer to interpret art when reality is removed.  Figures become shapes become colour become monochrome, sky merges into horizons slipping into shorelines that leave no boundaries.  Like the borders of great countries and empires only the canvas edge or form surface can dictate the parameters of what is defined.

    The exhibition will open to the public on Saturday 11th March, run until Friday  28th April 2017.

     

  • New paintings for 2016

    New paintings for 2016

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    At last I’m getting back to extended painting sessions. For the past eighteen months I’ve been working on installations and commissioned work. Although it was an exciting time for me I have really missed painting to my own agenda, at my own speed, with no-one to please but myself.

    The painting above is very recent, completed a week or two ago. It really reminds me of one of my second year degree show paintings. But if you compare the two it’s easy to see how much I’ve progressed. The theme is similar but the process is more refined and the use of colour and texture is more complex.

    I will talk more about my themes, techniques and inspirations in later posts. I intend to post more frequently and regularly.

    "Alone"Lonely House Painting From 2011.

  • “HEART OF GLASS” Family Art Club – Saturday 7th November 2015

    “HEART OF GLASS” Family Art Club – Saturday 7th November 2015

    Photo 13-11-2015, 13 39 49This week I was invited to assist light and colour artist Liz West. The aim of the workshop was to use different coloured papers to create a giant spectrum of colour. I really enjoyed working and chatting with Liz. Light and colour are recurring themes in my work too and I was able to discuss my current commission with her.

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    Participants of all ages enjoyed taking part in the activity, using the coloured papers in their own unique ways to create a variety of different pieces that contributed to the finished spectrum display. Some children took pieces home with them, as well as adding to the wall display.

    The pictures below are both mine and Liz’s. As you can see, I actually managed to get in some of the photos for a change.

  • “HEART OF GLASS” Family Art Club – Saturday 3rd October 2015

    “HEART OF GLASS” Family Art Club – Saturday 3rd October 2015

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    Having worked as Assistant Artist with Family Art Club on several occasions, this was the first session that I directed as Lead Artist. The activities I designed were linked to my recent and current projects, using St Helens’s landmark buildings, silhouettes and light. I took along my rotating shadow lantern from the “Art in Libraries” installation as an example of my work.

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    There were two main activities. The first was to create a large shadow picture featuring recognisable buildings of St Helens along with silhouettes of people. I used large-scale heavy weight tracing paper fixed to wooden frames to create a translucent base for the picture. I hand drew the buildings prior to the session. I looked at several ways for the participants to make silhouettes. Initially I had hoped that they could somehow project and trace their own silhouettes that could then be reduced in size to add to the picture. However after several experiments, I realised this wouldn’t be feasible given the limited time, space and equipment available for the session. Instead I created a selection of generic people shapes that I had laser-cut from board to make templates. The participants were encouraged to draw around the templates then change the silhouettes to make them look more like themselves.

    Children love to make something that they can take home. So for the second activity we made paper bag lanterns using cut-outs and coloured acetate. As I had a materials budget I was able to give each participant an LED candle to illuminate their lantern.
    I think the session was a great success and participants enjoyed both activities. Most of them stayed for at least an hour and took great care in making their lanterns.

    Thanks to Claire Weetman, Family Art Club Co-ordinator, and Hannah Bold, Assistant Artist.

  • Additional Website for Commissioned Project

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    I’ve created another website for the commissioned project I’m working on. I’ve had to do a lot of research for this commission, some of which you can see on the site. The project is ongoing at this time and comprises of a series of paintings incorporating prints and a 3D installation. There is also an associated art-in-libraries installation and a Family Art Club Session that you can read about. The new website is https://shadowsandlightsthelens.wordpress.com/

  • “Illuminated by Shadows” Library Installation

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    (Click on images to view larger)

    Last Saturday, 20th June 2015, I installed my work “Illuminated by Shadows” in the Central Library in St Helens.

    The panel explains my motivation and ideas for the work.

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    The themes come from my research for a larger commission that I am currently working on, funded by Heart of Glass, St Helens. I always knew that St Helens was important to the industrial development of the UK but I didn’t realise how important. I would like others to recognise the innovation, creativity, community and sheer hard work that is evident in the town’s history. I feel that many people have been ground down and lost their pride in the town and the belief in their ability to facilitate change.

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    The installation features two illuminated picture boxes with back projections. One box depicts miners leaving Sutton Manor Colliery, the painted shapes and illuminated side-panels represent coal. The image of the colliery is projected from the back of the box onto the wall behind.

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    The other box depicts glass workers in their woollen safety suits outside Pilkington Glass Works. The painted shapes and illuminated side-panels represent cullet (waste glass chippings). The image of the glassworks is also projected from the back of the box onto the wall behind.

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    The other installation piece is a revolving shadow lantern. The four sides depict well-known St Helens buildings grouped by theme – town centre, leisure, glass and coal.

    The ghosts of the past drift across these scenes, in the form of silhouettes. The silhouettes are inspired by a film I discovered on the British Film Institute’s website of workers leaving the St Helens Pilkington glass factory in 1900. The film clearly shows many children amongst the workers, the great-grandparents of St Helens’s present-day population.

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    The installation of my artwork was designed to coincide with the Cultural Hubs pARTSticipate event involving many local arts groups and performers. Senior Arts in Libraries Officer, Owen Hutchings, kindly introduced my work to the attendees.

    While I was setting up the work an ex-miner recognised his old place of work in my colliery picture box. He told me some interesting stories about the dangerous and often scary working conditions down the mines.

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    Thanks to Owen Hutchings and Jess Bowstead from St Helens Libraries for giving me the opportunity to make this, to Stephen Wainwright for allowing me to use information and images from his brilliant website http://www.suttonbeauty.org.uk/ to Liverpool John Moores University staff Lol Baker (FabLab Liverpool) for laser-cutting the panels and Martin Gee for helping with construction of the plinths/boxes and most of all to AJ Malone for helping with construction, technicalities and installation.

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  • Liverpool Art Fair 2015

    i have four paintings in Liverpool Art Fair this year, including the Futurist Picture House that is featured on the flyer below. It’s this weekend only. Lots of affordable art for sale.