The First Gallery here in Southampton has to be the most unusual art gallery I’ve ever visited, and certainly the most unusual I’ve exhibited in. Run by mother and son team, Margery and Paul Clarke, the gallery was set up in their home in the late 60s with the remit of providing a small, personal space in which professional artists can sell their work, and those with an interest in art can view and buy the work, having seen what it might look like in a domestic setting. The gallery has grown in reputation over the years whilst remaining small and personal. I was pleased to have a print selected for the gallery’s exhibition entitled The Green Man. The show centred on a series of prints and paintings by Elizabeth Nash based on the subject of the green man (more information here). This was complimented by work on the same theme from other local artists including fellow Red Hot Press members Sue Anderson and Tamsin Loveday. As well as print, there were works in a variety of media; drawing, painting, bas-relief & wicker, sculpture, book-works, digital photography and textiles. My own piece was an aquatint of a Woodwose or wild man, a sort of distant relation of the green man, explained here in my blog post about the print.
There. Not everything's about the royal wedding today.
Image: Elizabeth Nash, Green Man
