Re:action

The first opening of second year's exhibitions, and one of the ones i looked forward to seeing as it consisted of three different performances by Catherine Rockwood, Anna Mulhern and Dave Whiteley. Catherine performed her own modernised version of the Cock and Cunt play alongside her boyfriend, the piece explored re-enacting the same pattern over and over with Catherine reapplying make up to her face, then taking it off, outcome of this being a pile of used face wipes building up. Dave's piece consisted of him chewing gum continuously, practicing the saying 'too much of a good thing' to the extreme. And Anna's piece a visual background alongside a photo album in which she had edited herself into a random family, whilst she was forging documents as the main part of her performance. All of the pieces were equally as interesting, but the thing that captured me the most was how successful they used the space as well as how interesting the space was as Wolstenholme. There was so much space, and a intriguing, mysterious and quirky atmosphere.

'Roots' opening.

The opening night was on a Tuesday. We were all pretty tired after a long couple of days of hard grafting to get everything ready, but we did get quite a good turn out and Reuben's £2 a piece envelopes extravaganza went down well. As we were one of the first groups to have our exhibition opening, it was a bit unpredictable how successful it would be, being a bit awkward to reach (Aebgurth) but we received positive feedback and it was also refreshing to get to relax with each other and our friends and family. I think the space worked well, separating mine and Lois pieces in the back room - giving it a welsh feeling. And Will and Reub's work in the front room mainly monotone coloured pieces.

We also tried to promote on different websites, alongside dispatching posters. It was pretty exiting seeing our names (although mine was often spelt wrong..) up on art websites and gallery walls.

As far as i know, i did not manage to sell any of my work. I think this is mainly down to the fact that people seemed to struggle to understand what it was about as well as notice how much work i had put into hand stitching the poems into the pieces. I didn't expect anyone to fall in love with my work as i knew the welsh poems could swing it both ways. People could either find the language barrier intriguing, or be completely lost. But on the other hand, I'm planning to exhibit the pieces in wales over the summer, hoping that a welsh audience may be able to connect easier with my work.

Exhibition.

Me and Lois ended up joining forces with Reuben and Will, and held the exhibition in Nic Corke's gallery, Aibrurth. All of our works were completely different. Will's being digital images, very cleaned and modern. Lois's being very family orientated, Reub's consisting of a series of detailed pen drawings, and mine just a bit fluffy and containing some welsh poetry..!

The whole process of sorting out where the work would go went quite smoothly, frustrating at times when trying to place works next to something that would compliment the other piece. We all, except Reuben opted for white frames too, witch worked well. The combination of all the different variations of work did work well, and had a strong flow of colour as well as structure.

Working in a group was no problem, we got on very well, and there was a good balance of organization skills, professional attitude and humor, and we were constantly discussing ideas and visions about what or how we wanted the exhibition to come over.

Nic was very helpful and friendly, it made the whole experience better being able to relax and feel comfortable to express and be honest with him about what we wanted. He was very flexible with time and took interest in our work. He also helped us along with promoting the exhibition and even got our names printed on the window of the gallery in PLASTIC!!!