Wentworth Woodhouse Easter Bank Holiday Market

Posted on March 19, 2013 by Karen

***** EVENT POSTPONED UNITL 4th & 5th MAY 2013 *****

Karen Loughridge Fine Art – KLArt will be exhibiting at the Wentworth Woodhouse Easter Bank Holiday Market.

A wide selection of KLArt products will be available to buy on the day:

Framed Originals, including new KLArt Wildlife and Orchestral paintings
Fine art prints of a variety of KLArt works
Fine art Greetings cards (singles, series and variety packs)

I look forward to meeting up with my many customers old and new – hope you can make it!!

Why not make a day of it…

Wentworth Woodhouse was built in the 18th Century by the Fitzwilliam family and is one of the largest privately owned homes in Europe, with an interesting history to match.

It provides a most spectacular backdrop for this event and the opportunity to make a day of it, with a nice walk before or after visiting the market as the Mansion house sits in its own deer park.

The house only opened to the public for the first time in September 2012 – check out the news at the time of the Mysterious Wentworth Woodhouse.

It also happens to be my former home – this is where I did my four years teacher training (I had a bedroom on the Bedlam wing) and as you can imagine, I am very excited to be going back home for this event!

Want to spread the news? Please help yourself: Wentworth EasterEvent Flyer (PDF)

February Challenge (2012 revisited)

Posted on February 23, 2013 by Karen

So 12 months on, we’re nearing the end of February 2013 and I can’t help but reflect on what I was doing this time last year….approaching the end of my “picture per day in February challenge”.

At the time I kept a small diary (in words as well as pictures) and note this particular entry:

It’s funny, but despite the fact I feel so energised when I am being creative, I seem to find so many reasons not to do it, or to put a lower priority on it than other things in my life. Despite my hope that I could generate a regular income stream I guess I am still persuaded by the notion of my art as a hobby, which pushes it behind housework, shopping and a whole myriad of other things on my “To do” list. I really do need to kick that one into touch!!

That in mind I challenged myself to produce an art work per day throughout February (2012). This would be a daily attempt to either create a new piece or complete one of the bits and pieces hanging around that had been started and never quite finished…I did manage to polish some of those off too!!

End result an assortment of images/items in a variety of media:

12 months later and I have adjusted my priorities to focus daily on my artwork in one form or another. Some days it’s a focus on the administrative stuff and tweaks to my website, others it’s researching opportunities and competitions and on the best days of all I listen to my music and paint or draw to my heart’s content on my latest commission or my next “big idea”. Whatever the day brings, though, I relish every opportunity to explore, learn and be creative and can’t help but think my February Challenge helped my focus and kicked some of the old doubts into touch!!

Some of these items (and lots of others) are still available to buy from the KL Art Shop if you’re looking for something a little bit different for Mothers Day (March 10th 2013).

KL Art on TV

Posted on January 30, 2013 by Karen

Who’d have thought it…KL Art on TV, well I never!!!

OK, so maybe I’m making slightly exaggerated claims, but it felt like being on TV and I’m sure I felt the same wonder as Frenchman Louis Lumiere when he produced his first motion pictures in 1895 using his newly invented Cinematographe. Louis of course is credited as being the inventor of the first movie camera (there were others around at the time who invented similar things). Louis (with his brothers) was the first person to present moving pictures to a paying audience of more than one person (of course people had been able to watch moving images one at a time before this). Anyway, the National Media Museum, Bradford, tells the ongoing story with some interest if you fancy learning more, but back to my story…..

My TV appearance…..so, I got up ready to start my latest painting and set the beautiful, pristine, brilliant white, blank canvas carefully on my easel. I don’t know quite how it happened next, but somewhere in those hesitant moments before unwrapping the canvas I stopped briefly and admired the beauty of that simple blank page before me, thoughts running round my head saying “this canvas feels quite big….hope I’ve got enough paint…..what if various unimaginable things should happen…..”. Somewhere in that pensive moment before smooth shiny cellophane became the supporting actor in my latest bin load of rubbish, a little voice in my head said:

“why don’t you film it?”

“what?…nah!”

“Yeah go on, film it!”

“Really? D’ya think I should or could?”

“Yeah, film it!”

“That’s an interesting idea…”

I’m wondering on reflection at the depth of these conversations with (I’m sure you already spotted it) myself, but nevertheless I found myself reaching not for the scissors or craft knife, but for my one-eyed pixelating bat.

What’s a one-eyed pixelating bat?

Well you may ask! In making the decision to film my latest artistic project (and agreeing with my esteemed customer that I would do so and share it) little did I know that I would find myself on an epic journey of Attenborough-like discovery of a species previously unknown to man…the one-eyed pixelating bat, nickname Ixus!

This beautiful creature is champagne in colour, eats usually during the hours of darkness and only when no-one is looking, and unlike other bats does not have wings (this may be an evolutionary development, however I am unable to categorically confirm this). He appeared very early in my film-making venture and completely without warning, one minute my Canon Ixus is firmly perched and filming every step as my painting unfolds and the next…..

One-eyed pixelating bat

My camera is replaced by the roosting one-eyed pixelating bat, a previously unknown member of the bat family, hanging upside down where once my camera used to be.

Now, I’ve done a bit of research on the matter and according to a variety of internet resources these creatures sleep upside down for two reasons:

They are ideally placed to take off – bats fall into flight
To hide from predators

I can only assume this little fella felt threatened by me and thought I was a predator!

According to animals.howstuffworks.com a bat that dies whilst roosting will continue to hang upside down until another bat (or something else) jostles it loose. This little fella didn’t move in 24 hours so had clearly developed the same symptoms as Monty Pythons Norwegian Blue Parrot and was pining for the Fjords. Needless to say, this old bat swiftly removed the little fella from his roost and promptly replaced him with a more robust arrangement for film capture!!!

A little later….only slightly hampered by the interference of the bat, my series of photographs are converted, using the wonders of modern technology, into a time lapse movie and I swear I must be feeling the same excitement as louis when he viewed his first ever film! I’m also certain mine is equally as shaky!

So now, appearing on a “TV” near you courtesy of the KLArtchannel on You Tube I (proudly) present:

Zebras – A Time Lapse Acrylic Painting

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