Art in Action, Waterperry House and

Gardens, Oxfordshire, July 2012

Wow, what a day ! My first visit to the Arts and Craft Festival and how I wish I had been for all the other 6 years that I have been living close by enough to visit. The show is held in the grounds of Waterperry House in Oxfordshire for 4 days each summer and has been for the past 30 years. Artists and designer-makers demonstrate their work alongside selling their work hence the name “Art in Action”. I was slightly overwhelmed by the volume of huge white marquees each hosting a different art or craft discipline ranging from Textiles, Printmaking, Sculpture and glass and Ceramics plus many many more. Plenty of opportunities to buy goodies to use in my work too so I’ve failed on point number 2 in my AIMS !!! They also run some practical courses which are a great chance to sample something new. I had intended to do a Digital Print on fabric class with Ruth Brown but the tickets could have been sold 10 times over it was that popular so I opted for my second choice, Intaglio Printmaking with Annabel Boltsa for 2 hours and only£8 – can’t beat that for value !

One of my favorite textiles designers was at the show, Dionne Swift and I was lucky enough to attend one of her devore workshops in May. Devore has very much been her signature technique for many years and more recently she has developed new techniques and ways of working – such a talented lady and a true inspiration to me. I indulged in a little something to display proudly on one of my walls too!

Below are some pictures of the print I made – we worked very quickly and had only 30 mins to do our design so I made an abstract pattern just to see how the process and technique worked. Right now these prints aren't relevant to the textile work I am doing and therefore not even this blog but I wanted to include them as everything is a creative learning process and Its my intention to go back and do some hand stitching and machine stitching on these when they are fully dry and see what more I can do with them….. Watch this space for updates!!





Making the plate



The fine lines were made with a “needle” – a fine tipped pointed pen really. The more textured areas were made using a cotton bud and methylated spirits to remove the black ground on the plate. 30 mins isn’t long when you have to think quickly what to do so I was happy with what I managed.



The big reveal of the first print.