A close sense of perspective
Now in its 23rd year, York Open Studios gives residents and visitors to the city the chance to get up close to the work of more than 150 artists. Grace Hammond reports.
ACROSS two weekends in April, visitors to York can meet more than 150 artists and find out more about their inspirations and processes, often seeing them in their workplace, at their easel, wheel, bench and in some cases shared artist space. From ceramists, jewellers, furniture makers, glass and textile artists, painters and photographers to printmakers, sculptors, woodcarvers, paper artists and multi-media artists, they are all happy to open their doors to welcome the curious, collectors and passers-by.
These artists, who all live or work within a 10-mile radius of the city, will open themselves up to visitor scrutiny as well as hopefully some buyers.
York Open Studios is run by a team of volunteers, many of whom are artists themselves. Charmian Ottaway, committee member and a contemporary jewellery designer, says: “What
I love about the York Open Studios concept, as an artist myself and as a long-term visitor too, whether you’re a collector, someone who just takes a liking to a piece of work or is interested in the process, everyone is really happy to welcome visitors to their workspaces.
“It’s a lovely way to find the type of work and medium that appeals, find an artist with whom you already have an interest or check out new artists and their work to inspire you.”
When Naomi Wells Smith was made redundant during her maternity leave ten years ago, it led her to embark on building a business doing what she loved – working with leather. Fulford-based Morgan + Wells offers leather items such as bags, belts and wallets with prices starting at £5 for a keyring and climbing to £1,200 for a bespoke piece. Naomi was already used to using her hands and hand tools, inspired and encouraged by her grandfather who built parts for Spitfires in the Second World War.
‘As a child, my family couldn’t afford expensive craft sets or artist materials, so I made do with what was around me.’
“He taught me to understand the value of working by hand and to avoid machinery in the process, a mantra that I continue to adhere to today,” says Naomi who has just been shortlisted in the Biz Bubble Small Businesses Award as a finalist in the traditional skills category.
Her initial leatherwork included commissions with major theatre companies and their stars for whom she made unique items for costumes – including the leather Pharaoh’s collar and cuffs for Jason Donovan in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at the London Palladium.
Naomi is also passionate about being sustainable, her leather is dyed with vegetable and plant dyes and she specialises in restorations of beloved pieces, and has a good line in repairing vintage Hickory golf club bags. She also creates bespoke pieces and takes commissions.
This is Naomi’s first time at York Open Studios and she will be showing her pieces and demonstrating saddlestitch at a shared artist space at Fulford School, on Heslington Lane, just off the A64.
An eye for detail is a definite prerequisite for Martina Teplárková’s intricate beadwork, which manifests itself across a variety of work including embroidery and pictures, as well as worn pieces. Her work is a celebration of intricacy, form and colour, creating items to covet.
“Thirteen years ago, I moved to the UK from the Czech Republic and made York my home,” she says.
Having studied textile and fashion design at the People’s Conservatory in Ostrava, Martina’s love of working with glass beads, some new, some reclaimed, some Japanese, some Czech, was stimulated when she saw some pictures in a book.
Self-trained using YouTube videos combined with her initial fashion training, she fell in love with the process as well as the end results. With a young family, Martina uses her time making these pieces to reflect and meditate. “It’s a quiet time I continue to cherish,” she says.
Maker and artist George Willmore is new to both York and York Open Studios. Brought up in a working-class household on the edge of east London, George now relishes working with recycled materials.
“As a child, my family couldn’t afford expensive craft sets or artist materials, so I made do with what was around me,” he says. Following a degree in film theatre studies and the completion of an MA in fine art from Metropolitan London University, he worked in London creating mascot costumes,
storyboards and eventually in-store sets for retailers.
Following furlough during the Covid lockdown, George was given a chance to reassess his career and started working with paper, creating punk-style, colourful abstract collages using recycled and salvaged materials inspired by artists such as Hannah Hock and Eileen Agar, and comic creator Jack Herby.
With his partner already in York, George decided that if changes were already in the pipeline, why not make a move to Yorkshire? “When I first moved here, it happened to be during York Open Studios and I knew then for sure that I had made the right decision choosing York to be my new home.”
Based in Holgate, George combines his art with a part-time job in retail. Dovetailed with his love of working with sustainable collage art, he has also produced some delightfully detailed dioramas. Little landscapes homed in everyday receptacles such as tobacco tins are a fairytale digression that make a change from producing his bold collages. Prices start at £5 for card and postcard sizes, rising to up to £1,000 for bespoke large complex pieces of collage work. Dioramas cost between £25 and £75.
Caroline Munro, from Elvington, a painter in oils and lover of the landscapes of the NorthEast, enjoyed a career as a scientist researching the healing of the body for a major firm, working for more than 35 years at the cutting edge of scientific research.
Then retirement beckoned and she remembered that her husband, who had bought her oil paints and an easel some years ago, had had a good idea. Remembering the stories of her love of painting with her father, a keen amateur artist, her husband may well have recognised that a high-octane science career would work well giving way to a second career in the arts.
Creativity comes in all forms. The children were older, Caroline’s last role was part time and only last year she embraced her new life full time in art and never looked back.
“Attention to detail never leaves you and I decided to take on some formal training joining an oil painting class with York Learning,” she says. Initially only available to friends and family, her work was now open to a wider audience, and Caroline soon realised that perhaps there was something in her art that meant she could take it further.
She submitted a painting for Hull’s Ferens Art Gallery exhibition and it was accepted. Her tutor at her oil painting class always encouraged her and recommended York Open Studios as a platform to showcase her work.
“I am excited to be part of York Open Studios for the first time and to have the opportunity to showcase my paintings to members of the public or face to face with people,” she says.
“I’m really pleased to show how artists can work from home and produce work of which they can be proud. It’s a new concept for me showing my work to visitors but I can’t wait to gauge their response.”
Her oil paintings are predominantly of landscapes and seascapes spied while out with her two dogs. Original oils sell for around
£500 with prints from £75. Caroline also does a lovely line of cards and produces works on “plaques”, which she sells for £19.50.
York Open Studios takes place within a 10-mile radius of York on April 13-14 and April 20-21, with studios open from 10am to 5pm on all four days. www.yorkopenstudios.co.uk