I returned from my week-long visit to London last night, so today is a day of catching up on all of the things I wasn't able to do while I was away (or before I went away, because I was in such a rush trying to get certain things finished before I left!).
London
Anyway, the London trip with Leon was brilliant: we worked and relaxed, discussed ideas for the London Project we're working on as well as plans for the future, met various different people - Leon's brother Harvey, who lives in San Francisco but was visiting London with his partner Sonia King, who is a successful mosaic artist. They took us out to dinner at a gorgeous restaurant called Shanghai Blues in Holborn and it was wonderful to meet them - such lovely people! Sonia is currently working with Emma Biggs, who we also met briefly - Emma is a mosaic artist and the wife of the art critic, TV presenter, and artist Matthew Collings. Emma and Matthew also collaborate on paintings and installations; if you'd like to see more of their work, you can find it here: www.emmabiggsandmatthewcollings.net
We also met up with the composer and sound recordist Jason Creasey, a friend I've known online for more than three years. It was wonderful to meet up with him properly at last, and we spent a great evening chatting over drinks in a cosy pub called The Morpeth Arms in Pimlico. Jason and I also discussed a possible project we hope to work on together - it could be a very exciting collaboration, so watch this space for news on that!
Natasha drawing in The Marlborough Arms pub, London.
Sunday 25th October 2009
Photo: Leon Milo
Other than that, we went to a book launch at The Chelsea Arts Club one evening - Leon's friend Simon Lane is the author of The Real Illusion, a collection of 21 short stories...and the most exciting part of all this (to me anyway) is that Leon is mentioned as a character in the book! We stayed for drinks and a reading by Simon, and it was a very interesting evening - certainly unlike anything I've experienced before!
We also met up with Dr Robin Laney, a senior lecturer at the Open University, who Leon is hoping to work with on some upcoming projects. All in all, it was a wonderful trip - I could ramble on forever about the other things we did, but I want to tell you about something else that has happened recently without this blog becoming too long.
Other happenings...
As most of you know, I was supposed to be taking part in a large joint exhibition in Aldeburgh in December called Enchanted Earth, with the artist Deborah Burrow. Without going into too many details here, I have sadly decided to pull out of the exhibition. What is the term people always use? "Creative differences".
I am disappointed that this has had to happen because I had so many ideas for this show, but the disappointment is outweighed enormously by a sense of relief. This was going to be a major show for me and would have taken up virtually all of my time from now until Christmas, leaving little time for anything else. I am now free to pursue commissions, make new work for the gallery and for Etsy (I'm so happy about that!), and finally concentrate on the wonderful collaborations and opportunities that have come my way in recent months and which I've had to neglect somewhat due to a ridiculously intense workload. I have pages and pages of notes and drawings in my sketchbook and I've just been waiting for the opportunity and time to put these new ideas into action. So over the next couple of months I'll be working at my own pace once more and hopefully coming up with lots of exciting new artwork to show you!
One last small piece of news is that I started working on some new illustrations while I was in London. A couple of these are finished and ready to go in to the Etsy shop, and I hope to finish more over the next few days. That's it for now, and I'll be back soon with the new work!
