Eternal Inspiration: The Royal Forest of Dean

Five Drawings From Claire Leach's 'Woodland Studies' Series Inspired By The Forest Of Dean 

In November last year my partner and I decided to mark 11 years together by taking a weekend trip to the Forest of Dean. Over two days we did three walks and took hundreds of photographs, the photographs and memories made in that short time have inspired a series of drawings that I am still in the process of making.

This wasn't my first trip to the forest however, it is a place that is so special to me that it is hard to describe. My mum and dad would take me to the Forest of Dean which sits close by the English/Welsh border when I was just a tot. On a visit when I was two we brought home a puppy springer spaniel named Valentine, my parents even looked at moving there permanently. When my parents separated when I was seven my dad continued to take me and my brother to the forest, alongside my step-family. We camped and took bike rides along the trails, my memories from visiting with my whole family became muddled with new memories with my step-family. Despite the emotional upheaval and the hurt I felt during a difficult time the forest remained the same. I could still remember the trees, solid and steadfast, magical and sometimes unnerving. The river still twisted through the land the same way, the rapids by Symonds Yat unchanged. The air smelled like coal smoke and leaf litter in decay, as it always did.

Ancient and Mystical Trees In The Forest Of Dean 

Ferns, Moss and Leaf Litter At The Forest Of Dean

In later years I visited the forest on my own. I'm not sure what it is about the place but whenever I return I feel like I'm home. It's quiet and inspirational, not just to me. J.K. Rowling grew up in a village just outside the Forest of Dean, it is said to have inspired the Forbidden Forest at Hogwarts, not only that but Harry and Hermione camp in the Forest of Dean in the seventh book; The Deathly Hallows. J.R.R. Tolkien is also said to have based Middle-earth on the area in The Lord of the Rings. The enchanting quality that the forest possesses has seduced me and I can only imagine that as long as the trees are still standing that I'll continue to draw them. 

Is there a particular place in the world that you find very inspiring? Perhaps you've used somewhere that you have visited several times in your work, or maybe the place that inspires you most is right on your doorstep? Let me know in the comments below and tell me of any places that you think I'd be inspired by too. 

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A Few Seconds Of Bravery

Woodland Study IV - The Drawing I Have Submitted For The RA Summer Exhibition 2018

Every year I try and visit the Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy in London. It's my favourite annual activity, one where I get to see a wide variety of contemporary art made by lesser known artists and Royal Academicians too. Drawings, prints and works in monochrome catch my attention first, I tend to gravitate towards smaller pieces. I pay special attention to my artistic heroes whose work is generally present; dainty monoprints by Tracey Emin, majestic monochromatic volcano inspired work by Emma Stibbon and swirling coastal landscapes by Norman Ackroyd. I scribble notes in pencil down the margins of the 'list of works' booklet each visitor is given, every time I see a work I enjoy particularly by an artist I don't know I doodle a little star to research later. 

While wandering around the galleries I can't help but covet a little space on the walls for my own. The idea of a tiny piece of my creativity occupying space in a gallery that has hundreds of years worth of history, where J.M.W Turner and John Constable themselves have exhibited fills me with a sense of joy. Every year I visit and every year I dream, however, I have never applied to be part of the exhibition, until now. Last Monday after just finishing a small drawing that I was pleased with and after much deliberation and internal dialogue I decided to submit. What has held me back in previous years? Well, a million voices in my head saying "submitting would be a waste of time, you'll never be selected" or "there are so many better artists out there, why on earth would they choose you". Those voices can be cruel, they can constantly tell you on repeat just why you aren't good enough and why you should not even bother. This year I decided not to listen, to at least not listen long enough to prepare my work for submission, take out my debit card to pay the fee and click the button. That was it, a few seconds of bravery was all that was needed. It was done. 

I decided to share that I'd submitted on social media. I did wonder if I was simply setting myself up for embarrassment. If I made a big fuss of submitting and then didn't get chosen I might look a fool. Or, I might encourage other artists in some self doubt to be brave and submit their work too. Telling people, in my view turned out to be the right thing to do, though it did give me nervous butterflies to do it. I tweeted my news during #HandmadeHour; a weekly twitter chat to a community that have become online friends and confidantes and the response I got was overwhelming. From well wishes to reassurance and most importantly artists telling me that they had been deliberating but were now going to have a go as well. It become my most engaged with tweet after over 5 years on the platform and encouraged me that by being brave I have given myself a chance and perhaps inspired others too. 

Submitting my work was a nervous ordeal and telling people about it was even more nerve-racking. In the week that has passed I've already forgotten about the £35 submission fee and how scary pressing 'submit' was. Now I can't believe I haven't had a go sooner. If my work isn't chosen then it's no big deal, I can try again another year. Of all the artists that were chosen last year for example, I wonder how many were accepted on their first try? Maybe they had been trying for years before being accepted. I found a quote in an article on the Royal Academy website which reassured me;

“I believe self belief and courage are very important aspects of realising your own work and taking it somewhere such as the Royal Academy. Never doubt yourself and take the risk to apply.”

— Emma Bass

So there it is, a moment of vulnerability that I hope will remind you to have a little bit of courage with your work. If you've made something that you're pleased with and have wanted to have a go at submitting to an open exhibition but self doubt has held you back then why not have a go? After all, you have to be in it to win it! Let me know in the comments if you've applied or if you are going to and wish me luck! 

Entry to the 2018 Royal Academy Summer Exhibition closes on 14th February, if you'd like to submit or read more then please click here.

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I’m An Artist

What Makes Someone An Artist? 

“I’m an artist.”

It took me a really long time to own that sentence. I'm nearly 30, I have a BA degree and an MA degree both in Fine Art and yet I still cringed when people asked what I did; 'I work as a temp in an office, oh and I make drawings'. I thought that if I said 'I'm an artist' then they'd have an assumption about me, maybe that I was a bit pretentious or snobby or that I was pretending to be better than I am. This frame of mind may have something to do with my working class background. On my maternal side my nanny is a school caretaker, my grandad is a retired scaffolder turned chicken farmer. On my paternal side, my grandfather was a dairy farmer and my grandmother who died a decade before I was born was a homemaker as far as I know. My aunties and uncles are lorry drivers, cleaners, warehouse workers and grass cutters for the council. My mum works as a packer and my dad as a mechanic and workshop manager. All are jobs that are vital and keep the world ticking over but don’t involve an element of creativity.  Put bluntly, as far as I know no-one in my family is or was artistic. I have no idea where my appreciation of art comes from; I had no one teaching me how to draw when I was younger, no one took me to an art exhibition or encouraged me to follow an artistic path. In my family and in many others; art is not a necessity, it’s a past time, a hobby and being an artist is not useful. 

When I was little I went through the usual phases of wanting to be a variety of different things when I grew up. I wanted to be a teacher so I could write on the white board whenever I wanted, I liked the idea of being a vet because I loved animals so much, my dad was in the army and I was outdoorsy so I wanted to be a soldier at one time too. When I reached the end of school I decided to take A-Levels including ceramics and photography, not for any career prospects but because I hadn't studied them before and they sounded fun. Whilst studying my A-Levels I went to New York City as part of an art college trip and fell head over heels in love with everything I saw that was art related. The galleries in Chelsea, the artefacts and abstract expressionist paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art and especially seeing Monet's Water Lily triptych in the MoMA. Hypnotised by the colours and scale of the painting I was entranced and suddenly knew that I wanted art to always be part of my life. After my A-Levels I did a year-long foundation degree at another local college where painting became my favoured medium of expression. Having relished the idea that with fine art you have free-reign to 'do whatever' I decided to do a BA in Fine Art. I wasn't the brightest in the group, nor the most talented. I didn't really know how to get the best grades either, I just experimented. I splattered paint and used charcoal, I focussed my efforts on the human form and then landscapes. I left university with a passion for drawing.

After a period of time working in non art related roles and travelling I returned to university to study an MA in Fine Art. I saved hard so that I could work on my art uninterrupted for a whole year with no uninspiring temp job getting in the way of my practice. My MA degree was an awakening, led by a tutor who believed that life will always trump art, I felt out of my depth intellectually but enjoyed being surrounded by difference. The course was made up of mostly Chinese students, with two Indian girls and a boy from Thailand who came to be my best friend on the course. I'd been to China and Thailand and I felt a sense of companionship with the international students. Artists visited and spoke to us; I realised that artists are just regular people who perhaps see the world in a different way and aren't afraid to put their way of seeing and thinking out into the world. My assumption that artists had to be a certain way was smashed. I'd thought that you had to be working on your art 24/7 to be a real artist or that you had to exhibit several times a year, or that by being an artist you were a serious sort of person. As time has gone on I've realised that all artists feel self doubt or anxiety at some stage or another about their work, all artists are human. I left the MA with more exhibiting experience and a little more confidence in myself. That was in 2014 and still despite the new qualification I was still a nervous artist, shrugging off my practice when anyone asked about it like it was no big deal. I didn't want to be made fun of, even though in reality my art was everything to me. I saved up and travelled again, for longer this time and had even more time to think about what art meant to me and what I wanted to do. I had to write my occupation on custom forms and I started writing 'artist'. It was the first time that I properly embraced it. I make drawings, I show people those drawings by posting them on social media and by exhibiting when I can even if it's not often. I think about my work all the time, every day. When I look up at a cloudy sky I see the work of Turner in my mind, when I write in my neat and precise way I think of Tracey Emin and how her handwriting in its scratchy and messy manner is so at odds with mine. 

I don't think that my BA or MA degrees in Fine Art are what gives me the right to call myself an artist, they are just qualifications I'm lucky to have because I was privileged enough to choose what I wanted to do at university. Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud to have studied Fine Art for four years but you don’t need a qualification to be an artist. I call myself an artist because it is what’s in my heart, I identify with it. I see the world in an interesting way sometimes and I have a fierce passion for it. Art is everywhere. A paint splash on a wall can sing to me much more than an exhibition of Damien Hirst sculptures. I can't name you all the artists of the renaissance but I have studied the surface of a Cy Twombly painting until my eyes went fuzzy. My work doesn't sell out as soon as it hits my online shop but the process of creating the work gives me enough satisfaction and happiness without the association of money. So, what I'm trying to say in another 'classic Claire' rambling piece of writing is this; calling yourself an artist is your prerogative. It is not up to someone else to define you. If you like to draw then perhaps you are an artist. If you write poetry, dribble paint on canvas, create music or study the details of the human form in weekly life drawing classes then perhaps you are an artist. 

If art in any form speaks to you and you yourself create then perhaps you are an artist. If you think you are then own the phrase, tell people proudly when they ask and don't let other peoples preconceptions about what an artist is or does limit you and your thinking. Only recently have I learned to embrace the title ‘artist’ and feel brave enough to say ‘I’m an artist’ when asked what I do, it’s an uplifting feeling to acknowledge it, I only hope my bravery stays around and that my confidence only ever grows. 

So, what do you think? I was nervous writing this one, because I feel completely unqualified to tell people what it means to be an artist, it is different to a lot of people. But, this piece of writing is here to explain my story and how I came to embrace the title and I want you to feel confident embracing it too if it speaks to you. Let me know in the comments below if you call yourself an artist and if you've always felt comfortable doing so, perhaps you're someone who thinks like an artist but isn't brave enough to own the title yet, thats ok, I'd like to hear from you.

If you enjoyed reading then please click the heart at the bottom, share or better still leave me a comment, I love reading them. ❤️