Cathy's Art Diary

Delightful book talk at Charleston Farmhouse as part of the Charleston Festival with Adam Nicolson talking about his book on when Coleridge and Wordsworth lived together in Somerset and Tom Hammick, the artists he asked to illustrate it. The discussion was held in front of a wonderful, brightly coloured screen decorated with one of the pictures based on his idea of Xanadu. Nicolson talked about why he wrote the book and how he went to the Quantock Hills where they stayed to experience the landscape. He said by doing this he experienced the rhythm of walking in the poetry they wrote at this time. Hammick got involved when Nicolson invited him to join him in the area and go walking together. The original idea was to have eight black and white woodcuts but this ended up as 50 coloured ones. They are not just about Coleridge and Wordsworth but brought in modern themes such as replacing a manor house with a Barrett Home. He talked about how the wood used for the woodcuts was pic...

Colourful exhibition at Flowers Gallery, Hoxton, of new work by Tom Hammick who has recently been artist in residence at the English National Opera (ENO). There was a mix of oil paintings and prints based on them. The blurb says they were “dreamlike landscapes” and they did have an other worldly dream like feel. They often felt very real and familiar and yet with a different spin. My favourite was called “Riding West” and showed the silhouettes of a man and a woman on horses facing a sunset. The reds, turquoise and yellow of the sky were stunning and it’s only now I realise turquoise is an odd colour for a sunset but it works. I also liked a print called “Early Morning Above a City” which was a view of people at the windows of a block of flats in pale blues. It was really interesting to see the oil pictures and prints together and to think about what works in each medium. Review Times