What’s On

Valerie Dugan

GSBI Annual Exhibition

Founded in 1993, the Gloucestershire Society for Botanical Illustration (GSBI) grew out of botanical art classes held in Cheltenham and Stroud with Michael Hickey, botanist, writer and illustrator for The Cambridge University Press.

For many years the GSBI has held its annual show at Nature in Art.  As usual, exhibits this year are varied in style and mediums. All members, whether new or experienced, are exhibiting up to three pieces of their work.

Originals, prints and cards are for sale and visitors are encouraged to vote for a ‘People’s Favourite’.

A number of the Society’s more experienced members have won The Royal Horticultural Society’s Gold, Silver Gilt and Silver Medals or have gained distinctions with the Society of Botanical Artists.

Free to enter, in the Education Centre

Come join us at Nature in Art for some amazing Children’s Easter Holiday Activities! Either outside in our beautiful blooming garden or in our Education Centre, we have loads of great activities to look forward to!

There will also be a FREE Easter hunt which anyone can take part in.

Activities: Easter Crowns, Batik, Friendship Bracelets, Jellyfish Friends and so much more!

Morning Session: 10am – 11:30am

Afternoon Session: 1pm – 2:30pm

£8.00 per child and that will get 1 child activity and 1 child and 1 adult entry to the gallery

Use the link to find more details and book on: Children’s Activity Days – Nature In Art

This is the first time that we have shown a collection of work drawn and painted with raw earth and rock pigments prepared and transformed into paint and inks by the artist.
They are the latest pictures by Fiona McIntyre, whose work has been deeply influenced by living in Scotland, Scandinavia and Spain. She is a founding member of the Arborealists art movement and an elected associate member of the Royal Society of Painter-printmakers (ARE) and an RE councillor.
Recent years have been a revelation for Fiona who has changed her way of working, largely through research and experimentation. So, before committing ideas to paper or canvas Fiona says, ‘I now make my own paints from mineral pigments, some of which I forage, and I gather plants to make natural inks. Having largely rejected synthetically made media, my eyes have been opened to the extraordinary beauty and resonance of nature’s bounty when transformed into media for the artist’.

The project Sacred Earth: Water, Tree, Stone has been a labour of love. The wild landscapes of Iceland, Scotland and Galicia are the inspiration for this exhibition. These locations continue to need protection from glacial melting and erosion, so this exhibition has three themes running through it, based on basic building blocks of life – water (Iceland), tree (Scotland) and stone (Galicia).

She says ‘I spent time walking sketching and drawing in all of these wild locations, witnessing glaciers, pine forests and petroglyphs. These places were at times difficult to get to and weather was unpredictable. However, this is what inspires me to feel alive and excited. I hope that the experiences of being immersed like this in rain, snow, winds and sunshine will be transmitted to the viewers of my art’.

As well as paintings and drawings, visitors will be able to learn about natural pigments and the process of making paints. Fiona says ‘Mineral pigments have a translucent quality, as if capturing the light and memory of the landscapes from which they were sourced’.

The exhibition coincides with the launch evening (April 18th)  of a new book of the same name with contributions from Christiana Payne, Professor Emerita of History of Art at Oxford Brookes University and Nicola Moorby, Curator of Historic British Art, 1790 – 1850 at Tate Britain. Copies will be available in Nature in Art’s shop.

See also: Natural Materials Into Paints & Inks with Fiona McIntyre on May 2nd-3rd