Free Art Shop (projArc)

Sticking Stuff Onto Stuff: Everything is a Collage Workshop

November 14th saw the lockdown-delayed Axe Head to Everything collage workshop come to life at last. Many thanks to Anja Stenina who facilitated the technical side, hosts, Axe Head’s Alina Skorohoda and Jeremy Gluck, had a great time working with our Zoom group. Below you can see the Zoom doings, plus work by Lisa Burkl (top), and Axe Head’s Melissa Rodrigues.

Advanced Copper Embossing

After initially attending a copper embossing workshop with Tomos Sparnon, it became clear that the participants wanted and deserved more! After the class, images of works completed were so inspiring that we sourced more materials and came up with another brief of Halloween. Ten participants joined us via Zoom. The hard work was palpable through the screen! At the end of this class, plans were being made for a Christmas inspired embossing class too. Here are the results of October 17th’s class!

Collage Workshop: Stick Things onto Things: Everything is a Collage!

Axe Head to Everthing’s Free Art Shop Workshop

UPDATE: Downloadable Everything Is A Collage PDF Step by Step Guide! Just click below:

Everything Is A Collage Workshop PDF

GS Artist’s continues its Free Art Shop, our festival of events some at the gallery, some via zoom and some both! GS Artists interns, artist collective Axe Head to Everything, presents “Stick Things onto Things: Everything is a Collage!“

Say Axe Head: An informal, accessible art workshop for all abilities. If you like being creative and enjoy making collage materials this is the workshop for you. We want to explore the history of collage as a process, its ability to inspire change and its continuing relevance.

Collage can incorporate a wide variety of everyday materials which is inclusive and cost effective for anyone because you can just collect the things around you that inspire and use them to create pictures.

This workshop is both via Zoom and at the gallery simultaneously. Three workstations are available to book at the gallery, each workstation is designed to accommodate two members of the same household/bubble.

AND four Zoom links are available. Book one of these tickets and you will be emailed a Zoom link and also an art pack with materials can be sent to your home.

Free Art Shop

NB – All aspects of visitor and tutor safety have been considered and we have attended a health and safety Coronavirus (COVID-19) awareness course. With this in mind, there are a very limited amount of spaces available for each workshop. The floor of the gallery is marked with social distance guidelines, with free masks, visors, and hand sanitizer.

This project is made possible through funding from The Arts Council of Wales and the National Lottery good causes fund, helping support artists and grass roots arts organizations during the COVID-19 pandemic. We are very grateful for their support.
@celfcymruarts @crisis_uk @nationallotterygoodcauses
@axeheadtoeverything

Free Art Shop presents an Artist’s Talk by Freya Dooley, on recent projects

GS Artists continues its Free Art Shop series of events and talks, with a talk by artist Freya Dooley via Zoom.

The artists have been selected with Tom Goddard, who has mentored the GS Artists Team on their Free Art Shop project. We have a long list of artists from all over the UK, Zoom has its issues but it’s a great chance to learn about our art community. More talks will follow over the coming months.

Dooley is based in Cardiff. She works across writing, moving image, sound, performance and publication. Freya is currently working on a project for Jerwood Solo Presentations at Jerwood Arts, London, which will open in January 2021. Her recent projects include ‘Between the Mountains and the Sea’, a residency and solo exhibition with Beppu Project, Japan (2020); ‘Ventriloquy for Radio’ a broadcast for ‘Interruptions’, Holden Gallery, Manchester (2020); the ‘New Writing with New Contemporaries’ programme, which included performances at Leeds Art Gallery (2019) and South London Gallery (2020); ‘The Song Settles Inside the Body It Borrows’, a solo exhibition at Chapter Gallery, Cardiff (2019); and ‘Somewhere in the Crowd There’s You’, a solo exhibition at Eastside Projects Birmingham (2019). A vinyl record edition of ‘Somewhere in the Crowd There’s You’ was published by Eastside Projects last month. Freya also has a collaborative practice with artist Cinzia Mutigli, and is a member of Yellow Back Books, an artist-run reading room and artist bookshop currently based at Arcade Campfa, Cardiff. Freya is currently undertaking the G39 Fellowship (2020-21) in Cardiff, supported by the Freelands Artist Programme. She was a member of Syllabus III (2017-18), an alternative peer-led learning programme jointly delivered by Wysing Arts Centre, Iniva, S1 Artspace, Eastside Projects, New Contemporaries and Spike Island.

A Talk by Tom Goddard

Thursday 17th 7.30pm

GS Artists continue their festival of events & talks. Zoom has opened up possibilities to learn more about our neighbours. Over the last few months Tom has been a very valued mentor for the GS Team on their Free Art Shop project. We have asked him to talk about his work and also to extend this invitation, to select artists he thought we should learn more about, from our art community neighbours. I’m sure that some of us have reached our ‘zoom’ limit over the last few months, but now I hope are also seeing it in a different way. It is actually a great way to connect with each other.

Tom Goddard is a contemporary visual artist living and working in Cardiff, Wales. He works in a range of media including video, performance, drawing, learning and social arts practice.

Recently Tom has explored the effect of digital technology on our lived experience. His work feeds off our political, social and technological evolution (or regression) through collaging historical narratives, making comments on the future, all the while considered within the modes of science fiction and horror. Thomas was recently selected for Survey – a major exhibition by Jerwood Space presenting works by 15 early-career UK artists in 2018/19.

Recent exhibitions and performances include Survey, Jerwood Space, London; Bluecoat, Liverpool and Baltic, Gateshead; Experimentica, Chapter, Cardiff (2017); Up-On Live Art Festival, Chengdu / Chongqing, China (2016); Testspace, Spike Island, Bristol (2016); Europa, Transition Gallery, London (2016); and Uprisings, MOSTYN, Llandudno (2015). Recent residencies include URRA, Buenos Aires, Argentina (2017); Standpoint Futures, Standpoint Gallery, London (2015).

GS Artist’s Free Art Shop Present’s “Copper Embossing with Tomos Sparnon”

UPDATE – Can’t make it to the workshop? Then have a look at this downloadable version. It contains step by step instructions, full material lists, and some inspirational images, enjoy!
Just click below:

Copper Embossing in English

Saturday September 12th, 10.30am-12.30pm, via Zoom and at the gallery.

Tomos Sparnon talks you through embossing Copper, in English & Welsh. All Materials supplied. This workshop is Via Zoom AND at the gallery.

Pleased to announce another event from our ” Free Art Shop”, a festival of workshops, talks, events, via Zoom, and in our gallery. Join artist Tomos Sparnon to create your own copper artwork! The theme will be Wales. This could include creating an image associated with Wales such as a daffodil, dragon, a Celtic symbol or sheep! If you live in the Swansea area, you might want to create something in response to Swansea’s copper industry, Dylan Thomas or the beautiful Gower scenery.

This workshop is truly 9 to 90, and can be enjoyed by all the family.

It will take place at GS Artists Swansea, 217 High Street, with a limited number of socially distanced workstations, which can host 2 family /household members.

If you are not able to join us then we can send you materials to your home, or arrange collection and send a zoom link, the workshop will happen online simultaneously with the in-gallery event.
All Materials will be supplied, any questions please email [email protected]

Celf Copor gyda Tomos Sparnon

Rydym yn falch o gyhoeddi digwyddiad arall o’n “Siop Gelf Ddi-dâl” – gŵyl o weithdai, sgyrsiau, a digwyddiadau trwy Zoom ac YB Ron horiel.

Abertawe, 217 Y Stryd Fyr, gyda nifer gyfyngedig o weithfannau a fydd yn cadw pellter cymdeithasol, ac yn addas i ddau aelod o’r un teulu/cartref.
Os na allwch ymuno â ni, gallwn anfon deunyddiau atoch i’ch cartref, neu drefnu ichi eu casglu, ac anfon cyswllt Zoom.

Cyflwynir y gweithdy cyntaf hwn yn Gymraeg, ond caiff ei ailadrodd yn Saesneg yn ddiweddarach yn yr haf. Bydd yr holl ddeunyddiau’n cael eu darparu. Os oes gennych unrhyw gwestiynau, anfonwch ebost i [email protected]

Mae tocynnau am ddim ar gael ar gyfer 3 gweithfan yn yr oriel, gyda lle i 2 aelod o’r un cartref ar bob gweithfan. Mae 4 tocyn ar gael ar gyfer cyswllt Zoom hefyd, er mwyn ymuno yn y gweithdy o bell.
Bydd Abigail Fraser, cyd-gyfarwyddwr GS, yn cynorthwyo Tomos gyda’r gweithdy hwn.

Free Art Shop presents an online talk by Natasha MacVoy-“Let me be your Host”

Thu, 10 Sep 2020 19:30, via Zoom

GS Artists continues its Free Art Shop season, with a series of talks by artists and curators from not so far away. Zoom has opened up a myriad of possibilities in our ability to share and learn about each others practice and where better to start with, than our sort of neighbours. Neighbours and more specifically our art community being pretty vital over these last months, and even more so moving forward.

The artists have been kindly selected at our invitation by Tom Goddard, who has mentored the GS Team on their Free Art Shop project. He will talk to us on the 17th September about his practice, followed by Freya Dooley on the 24th September. More talks will follow, first up we have Bristol Based artist- Natasha MacVoy.

MacVoy makes work about the activity of looking and alternative – non-visual – ways with which our bodies perceive. Drawing on personal experiences and observations her work explores the limits of sight and site through a range of approaches including sculpture, installation and performance.
Natasha graduated with her BA (Hons) Fine Art from Cardiff in 2001 before moving to the French Alps to work as a freelance sports photographer for five years. She co

mpleted a Masters in Fine Art at UWE, Bristol in 2009. Recent exhibitions include UNITE Residency Exhibition, G39, Cardiff, Groping In The Dark, solo show at Test Space, Spike Island, Bristol, Reading (silently) in Public, a performance for Spike Island Associates’ PRODUCTIONPRODUCTIONPRODUCTION at Tate Modern, London, The audience seeped in, a collaboration with Chinonyerem Odimba, Arnolfini, Bristol, and [The] Strange Case, a two person show with Chloe Brooks, Ickburgh Studio, London. She has also received an a-n bursary in 2019 and was an artist in residence at The Mothership, Bridport, 2018.

‘’Pressing Stories’’ pressed plant collage with Anja Stenina

Download the Pressing Stories workshop pamphlet created by Anja Stenina!

Can’t make it to the workshop? Then have a look at this downloadable version. It contains step by step instructions, full material lists, videos of Anja at work at the process and some inspirational images, enjoy!

Saturday 29th of August 10:30 -12.30am

In this workshop you will learn how to create earthly compositions using paint, glue, pressed plants and tea.

All materials will be provided or sent out to your home if you arent able to join us.

Three workstations are available to book at the gallery, each station provides safe socially distanced space for 2 members of the same household.

Four places are available via zoom and if you book one of these tickets, you will be emailed a zoom link and also an art pack with materials can be sent to your home.

See images below for more inspiration and some guidance on how to prepare for the workshop, by collecting and drying out your own plants.

Above: The first GS Artists Pressing Stories workshop

Any questions please email [email protected]

Above: The first GS Artists Celf Copor workshop

Book onto this event here.

Celf Copor gyda Tomos Sparnon

Rydym yn falch o gyhoeddi digwyddiad arall o’n “Siop Gelf Ddi-dâl” – gŵyl o weithdai, sgyrsiau, a digwyddiadau trwy Zoom ac YB Ron horiel. Abertawe, 217 Y Stryd Fyr, gyda nifer gyfyngedig o weithfannau a fydd yn cadw pellter cymdeithasol, ac yn addas i ddau aelod o’r un teulu/cartref.

Os na allwch ymuno â ni, gallwn anfon deunyddiau atoch i’ch cartref, neu drefnu ichi eu casglu, ac anfon cyswllt Zoom.

Bydd Abigail Fraser, cyd-gyfarwyddwr GS, yn cynorthwyo Tomos gyda’r gweithdy hwn.

**Tomos Sparnon Free Art Shop Event** **with Abigail Fraser**

Pleased to announce another event from our ” Free Art Shop”, a festival of workshops, talks, events, via Zoom, and in our gallery.

Join artist Tomos Sparnon to create your own copper artwork! The theme will be Wales. This could include creating an image associated with Wales such as a daffodil, dragon, a Celtic symbol or sheep! If you live in the Swansea area, you might want to create something in response to Swansea’s copper industry, Dylan Thomas or the beautiful Gower scenery.

Your copper artwork could then be adapted to an item of jewellery, a greeting card, mobile hanging or a framed picture.

This workshop is truly 9 to 90, and can be enjoyed by all the family.

It will take place at GS Artists Swansea, 217 High Street, with a limited number of socially distanced workstations, which can host 2 family /household members.

If you are not able to join us then we can send you materials to your home, or arrange collection and send a zoom link.

My practice is an exploration of what it is to be human. Through painting, drawing, sculpture and different media, I explore man’s relationship with his fellow man, with the world, with objects, with myself and with God. My aim is to capture the conflict between the visible and the invisible, between reality and what is not real. I work with a variety of mediums and surfaces including oil paint, charcoal and clay.

This first workshop will be delivered in Welsh, but it will be repeated in English later in the summer. All Materials will be supplied, any questions please email [email protected]

Free tickets are available for 3 workstations at the gallery, each one can accommodate 2 members of the same household, plus 4 tickets availble for a zoom link, to join in the workshop remotely at the same time.

Tomos will be assisted in delivering this workshop by fellow GS Director Abigail Fraser

Tomos Sparnon

Rwy’n 23 oed ac yn dod o Gastell-nedd. Rwy’n un gyfarwyddwyr GS Artists ac wedi bod yn rhan o’r sefydliad er 2016. Rwyf wedi cael profiadau gwych trwy’r oriel. Graddiais â Gradd Dosbarth Cyntaf mewn Celfyddyd Gain o Goleg Celf Abertawe yn 2018.

Mae fy ngwaith yn archwilio’r hyn ydyw i fod yn ddynol. Trwy baentio, arlunio, cerflunio a dulliau eraill, rwy’n archwilio perthynas dyn â’i gyd-ddyn, â’r byd, â gwrthrychau, â fy hunan ac â Duw. Fy nod yw dal y gwrthdrawiad rhwng y gweladwy a’r anweladwy, rhwng realiti a’r hyn nad yw’n real. Rwy’n gweithio gydag amrywiaeth o gyfryngau ac arwynebau gan gynnwys paent olew, siarcol a chlai.

I’m 23 years old and come from Neath, South Wales. I am one of the directors at GS Artists and have been part of the organisation since 2016. I have had excellent experiences through the gallery. I graduated with a First Class Honours Degree in Fine Art from Swansea College of Art in 2018.

Abigail Fraser is a Welsh artist and recent graduate of Fine Art at UWTSD Swansea. Fraser’s artwork is an unreliable, dreamy, psychedelic exploration of memories appertaining to previous events. Her mixed media sculptures and installations evoke a response to light on the senses, projecting a sense of self and an inquisition of reality. Frasers’ work often contains simple LED drawings of universal forms, exploring how the energy of light permanently surrounds us all in a very personal manner. Endeavoring to harness this energy and penetrate our mass consciousness through her artwork, Fraser portrays a seemingly infinite space within the gallery interpreting the inherent attraction to light and being human.

Mae Abigail Fraser yn arlunydd o Gymru oedd wedi graddio mewn Celf Gain yn ddiweddar o UWTSD Abertawe. Mae gwaith celf Fraser yn archwiliad seicedelig annibynadwy, a breuddwydiol, o atgofion sy’n ymwneud â digwyddiadau blaenorol. Mae ei cherfluniau a’i gosodiadau cyfryngau cymysg yn ennyn ymateb i olau ar y synhwyrau, gan cynnig ymdeimlad o’i hunan a ymchwiliad o realiti. Mae gwaith ‘Frasers’ yn aml yn cynnwys lluniadau LED syml o ffurfiau cyffredinol, gan archwilio sut mae egni golau yn ein hamgylchynu’n barhaol mewn modd personol iawn. Gan geisio harneisio’r egni hwn a threiddio i’n hymwybyddiaeth dorfol trwy ei gwaith celf, mae Fraser yn portreadu gofod sy’n ymddangos yn anfeidrol yn yr oriel gan ddehongli’r atyniad cynhenid i olau a bod yn ddynol.

NB–
All aspects of visitor and tutor safety have been considered and we have attended a Health and Safety Coronavirus (COVID-19) Awareness course. With this in mind, there are a very limited amount of spaces available for each workshop. The floor of the gallery is marked with social distance guidelines, with free masks, visors, and hand sanitiser.
This project is made possible through funding from The Arts Council of Wales and the National Lottery good causes fund, helping support artists and grass roots arts organizations during the COVID-19 pandemic. We are very grateful for their support.

Gustav Metzger “The Man Who Ensouled the World”

Tuesday, 4 August 2020 from 18:30-19:45 – Eventbrite Booking

Celebrate the opening of the GS Artists FREE ART SHOP with that foremost godfather of free art, Gustav Metzger,- “The Man Who Ensouled the World” This talk on Metzger is delivered by GS artist Jeremy Gluck, and is an opportunity to explore the life and practice of an art visionary and revolutionary.

NB–
NB– All aspects of visitor and tutor safety have been considered and we have attended a Health and Safety Coronavirus (COVID-19) Awareness course. With this in mind, there are a very limited amount of spaces available for each workshop. The floor of the gallery is marked with social distance guidelines, with free masks, visors, and hand sanitiser.
This project is made possible through funding from The Arts Council of Wales and the National
Lottery good causes fund, helping support artists and grass roots arts organizations during the
COVID-19 pandemic. We are very grateful for their support.

Here at GS Artists we have taken a microscope to all the things we love about festivals and concluded that smaller is better! It is an unexpected benefit of the new normal, that social distancing provides us the opportunity to work on a more personal level with our community, whom we love so much. This means smaller groups and more one on one time which everyone deserves.

The amazing GS team have put their heads together with their 9to90 Creative Community and in consultation with Esther Ley, Arts Coordinator at Crisis to create the FREE ART SHOP, where we have developed our own style of workshops. Using all the tools we have to our advantage, so there truly is something for everybody from 9 to 90; bringing a bit of joy to these strange, often strained, times.

This series of workshops will run from August to October, and they take many forms making sure they are accessible to all, from Zoom classes to pre-recorded sessions, and for those who do not have access to the internet, we have created safe, socially distanced workspaces for up to 6 participants to work with our professional artists in a wide range of mediums; including collage, lino cutting, collage, movement, and portraiture to name but a few! All this content will be free and available on both our website and YouTube channel. Also included, to those booked in, are art packs which are available in the post and can be picked up directly from GS Artists on High Street. We are very proud to be presenting some of these workshops in Welsh.

We are celebrating the opening of the FREE ART SHOP with that foremost godfather of free art, Gustav Metzger, the subject of our first talk – “The Man Who Ensouled the World”. This talk on Metzger is delivered by GS artist Jeremy Gluck, and is an opportunity to explore the life and practice of an art visionary and revolutionary, whose embrace of art as freedom and art for free plugs right into our new season of workshops. After the very informative talk Andrew Wilson, curator from the Tate, and Jane Simpson artist & GS Artists Director, will join for an in conversation when they share with Jeremy anecdotes and experiences of working with Gustav. To reserve a place please click here.

Anja Stenina brings her Eastern European roots to the mix with her dark, organic pressed leaf workshop, in which she will introduce many exciting techniques! Tess Wood and Claire Francis are working with small sets of movement, based around the idea of being in a space with people again, as we are all slowly emerging from the darkness and re-experiencing intimacy.

GS’s own art collective Axe Head, featuring the minds of Jeremy Gluck, Demian Johnston, Melissa Rodrigues and Alina Skorohoda, are poised to hit us with their workshop “Sticking stuff on stuff: Everything’s a collage”, that does exactly what it says on the tin and more, by providing a creative outlet as we live through history, where you can literally glue your face to the wall – as long as it is in line with our social distancing policy of two metres! Finally, we have Abigail Fraser and Tomos Sparnon working with readily available materials to make fluid 3D lines and animations. As well as practicing artists, Abigail and Tomos are also our Welsh speaking duo who will be providing their sessions in both English and Welsh.

*DISCLAIMER Please do not actually glue your face or any other body parts to the wall unless absolutely necessary.

This project is made possible by funding from the Arts Council of Wales, National Lottery Stabilisation Fund. From everyone at GS we would like to personally thank them for their help supporting artists and arts organisations during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our passion is bringing art to our community, we are thrilled that this can continue. We have also been blessed with the support of two fantastic mentors, artists Tom Goddard and Rosie Scribblah, who have helped us build something truly meaningful and inclusive. Onwards!

NB–
All aspects of visitor and tutor safety have been considered and we have attended a Health and Safety Coronavirus (COVID-19) Awareness course. With this in mind, there are a very limited amount of spaces available for each workshop. The floor of the gallery is marked with social distance guidelines, with free masks, visors, and hand sanitiser.
This project is made possible through funding from The Arts Council of Wales and the National
Lottery good causes fund, helping support artists and grass roots arts organizations during the
COVID-19 pandemic. We are very grateful for their support.