Runnymede Gallery sells my painting 'Fireworks'

Thank you to Runnymede Gallery and Gary Rogers who sold my painting 'Fireworks' this week.

The vibrant abstract painting was bought by a couple from Windsor. These first-time visitors to the gallery loved the painting as soon as they saw it. Many thanks to them and I hope that they get a lot of pleasure from it.

I am exhibiting at Runnymede Gallery until 28 February 2010.
Runnymede Gallery exhibition times and other information.

2010 - an exciting art year ahead!

I hope you all had a great break over the festive season, and I wish you a very happy, healthy and successful 2010.

I am so excited about this new year! Are you? What have you got planned?

Personally, I have a lot of plans to develop my art. I am full of ideas for new work and I have several exhibitions coming up, two of which will be in London. So I have a lot of painting to do.

I will be sharing my news and exhibition dates with you here, on this page, over the coming months, so if you haven't already done so please sign-up to receive updates.

And I love getting your comments and feedback, so keep those coming please. :-)

For those of you not in the UK, you may have heard that we have a lot of snow at present (to put it mildly)! I love the snow, but I am also making the most of the opportunity to stay cosy in my studio and paint. ;-) Happy days!

Speak soon x

Community Arts Training Program

I recently attended a four-day Community Arts Training Scheme (CATS) run by Slough Borough Council for Berkshire artists. This practical course helps artists or organisations who are interested in running arts projects in the community. CATS covers a variety of topics from idea generation and planning, through to funding and facilitating.

I would like to say a very big thank you to Christine Wilkinson and the Slough Arts Development team, in particular Louise O’Dwyer Barnard and Gurjeet Kaur. These ladies put on an excellent program packed full of information, guidance, and motivating speakers. As I said to them in my verbal evaluation on the last day, this program "opened my eyes to a world of new opportunites, inspiration and ideas".

Hearing from artists who are experienced in running community arts projects, and seeing images of their programs and the amazing results, really brought to life what would be involved.

One speaker in particular stands out in my memory: Rowan Jade. Rowan, who has spinal muscular distrophy, helped us to think about how we could work with people who have disabilities. She is an incredibly inspiring and thought-provoking woman who has a unique way of helping and encouraging you to consider disability (and people in general) from different angles.

So what am I going to do with all that I learned?

Well, firstly, I am just about to get involved with setting up an independent arts forum which will support and bring together local artists in a variety of ways. It will hopefully integrate artists and the wider community to share creativity and the arts. More on this soon.

I also plan to research how I can become involved in helping women in particular to discover and express creativity where they have not previously had opportunity or the courage to.

If you would like more information about CATS or Arts Development in Slough contact artsinfo@slough.gov.uk or visit www.artsinslough.org.uk.

Find out more about me as a visual artist and my original paintings at www.art-chez-vous.co.uk

Best wishes
Jayne

My new YouTube Channel

I had been meaning to do it for ages, and at the end of last year I finally got around to setting up a YouTube Channel! Now I just need to spend some time building up content and promoting it!

This is the first video that I added, entitled: The Art of Water!
It is a collection of some original, water-themed paintings and digital artwork by me.

The original video quality is much better than it appears once uploaded on YouTube. Guess I will have to see if there is anything I can do about that...



Take a look at my YouTube channel and if you like my work feel free to rate my videos and leave feedback. :-)

New look online art galleries

My new website and online art galleries are now live at: www.art-chez-vous.co.uk

Vivid and fabulous art and design:
original paintings on canvas
paintings in cool chunky mounts
paintings framed behind glass
digital artwork
Wall Stones

Come and take a look. :-)