Buried Treasure

The Altered Page is one of my favourite blogs written by the very talented Seth.
He has invited his readers to re-post one of their favourite posts about their work.

Rather than mine being about my work I have decided to re-post about my great, great grandfather, the marine landscape painter, Edwin Ellis.

Family History Unravelled, 7th October 2010.


Where to begin?

Have you ever watched "Who Do You Think You Are" on BBC One?
I watched the first series a couple of years ago now and I LOVED it. I found it really fascinating to hear about people's ancestors, and loved the journey they went on.

So I started to trace my family tree. It is strangely addictive and many nights I would still be trawling through the census till after midnight. My Dad's side was quite straight forward, but my mum's side is way more complicated, but it was my mum's side that I was particularly fascinated by. She hasn't really any memorabilia from her family, the odd photograph of her as girl but that's about it. She had been told that her Grandfather ( who she never met) was an artist, and that it was rumoured that his Father was an artist and had exhibited at the Royal Academy.

 I sent for my Nanna's birth certificate and tried to trace back.

I am so excited to say that I found my Great, Great grandfather.
 He was called Edwin Ellis (1842-1895). On the census it says that he was an Artist/Painter in oil. My husband "Googled" him, and we found some more information about him.

by courtesy of Nottingham City art Gallery

He was a marine and landscape painter. He was born in Nottingham to Thomas (a lace manufacturer) and Anne, and worked for a brief period in a lace factory.
He studied art under Henry Dawson.

I contacted the Royal Academy library and a lovely lady there has given me loads of information about his paintings, which galleries house collections of his work, and the societies he was a member of. He is listed in the dictionary of Victorian painters, British marine painters and also the dictionary of Sea painters.
He was an elected member of the Society of British Artists in 1875.

The BBC have a new site called 'Your Paintings' and some of his work is listed there.

I have found out that Manchester city art gallery have one of his paintings, so I am going to take my mum so she can have a look at it. I also found out today that the V and A have one of his watercolours in the prints and drawings study room.

I am giddy beyond belief. I am humbled, and I am very probably rambling.

How cool is that?

(a few months after writing this post I also got another surprise - amaaazing!)

Beautiful Wednesday (not)

I had no patience. It wasn't a beautiful Wednesday.

I did take a breath, eventually, and made this.

Not quite sure what I'm going to do with it.

Vintage Inspired Hairslides

I like doing different things with my hair.

Down, up, french plait, pony tail ...you get the picture.

I am essentially quite lazy with my hair though, can't blow dry it for toffee, so will often put it up.

I have a beautiful pair of vintage hair clips which I often wear as mentioned in this post, and I have been on the lookout for something similar. I just can't seem to find exactly what I want. Nothing too blingy, just a bit of interest to add to my brown locks.

Yesterday I decided to try making my own. Result!

 

Urban Walls

Really love the idea of text on the wall by Urban Walls.

In this house over the weekend we also did Harry Potter and the deathly hallows (Part two).

It was awesome!

Change (for the better).

Slightly confused (no change there then), went to pick up the work that didn't get in to the West Lancashire Open Art Exhibition, and it's the one I thought that did!

Happy though because 'P.O.Tel' is based around my dad.

Looking forward to the private view on Friday.

Beautiful Beet Cake

beet cake from tiger in a jar on Vimeo.

Found this via the beautiful Unstitched FB page.
 I willl definitely try and make it.
I also love to make borsch (beetroot soup). I'm sure I have a recipe somewhere that actually uses vodka in the cooking.

And thanks to Julie from Tiger in a Jar for letting me share her video which she created with her husband Matt. How talented are they?

Eat your heart out Nigella!

Win some, lose some.

'Traces One'

Just found out today that my work wasn't selected for the drawing competition but...
 my piece 'Traces One' was selected for the West Lancashire Open Art Exhibition at the beautiful Chapel Gallery in Ormskirk.
Next Friday is the private view, and I'll be able to see my work gracing the walls of the gallery.
The exhibition runs from 16th July to the 14th August.

Happy bunny today :)

Have a lovely weekend everyone.

Art, History or Geography?

How about all three, with some D.T and literacy thrown in just for good measure!

Below is a project I did a few weeks ago with a Year 5 class (9 and 10 year olds).

They were looking at Viking settlements, but also in relation to Geography and the water cycle.

I was asked to do natural dyeing with them and also felt-making.

The children did lots of little sketches and then choose a few to make a big design.



 When they had sketched out their design we pinned it up on the wall to refer to as they translated it with the wool tops. We used a pre-felt as a background.

 The children used some felt which they had already made, to cut out the trees and the long boat.

 The whole thing was then covered with net and hot soapy water applied. This was then rubbed and patted until the fibres started to fuse together. It was then rolled...a lot!

 When the felt had dried the children stitched into it to add some interest, and they also made embroidered labels which could be attached with velcro, to make the wall hanging interactive (alas I forgot to photograph these).

I think the finished piece looked amazing. The children had learnt lots of new processes and had really been given the chance to experiment beforehand, and the teachers feel confident to replicate the project next year.

All felting materials from the wonderful Fibrecrafts.

What do you think? Click to enlarge.