Grow! by Pop Up! Edinburgh at the Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh

Grow! is the first exhibition by Pop Up! Edinburgh, an organisation created to bring art to unique and unexpected places within the city. This show is about recognizing the spirit of Edinburgh during the August festival season, and uniting artists glass artists with a connection to Edinburgh.

I’ll be exhibiting a series of site-specific glass works inspired by the plant life in the glass houses: Temperate Lands; Rainforest Riches; Arid Lands; Montane Tropics and Wet Tropics and travelling up to Edinburgh next week to make some research. The exhibition dates are:  3rd August – 25th August 2013 and it should be very exciting!!

Grow! by Pop Up! Edinburgh

Grow! by Pop Up! Edinburgh Images

YouTube film of 2010 British Glass Biennale

I’ve just found this short film of The 2010 British Glass Biennale, which has a very brief shot of ‘Charlotte’s Dress’.

The 2010 British Glass Biennale on YouTube

Black Swan Arts Open Competition 2013

‘Lost Pockets’ has been selected for the Black Swan Arts Open Competition and I travelled to Frome in Somerset yesterday to install it. Having never been to the gallery I was really impressed with the space and the diversity and quality of the work selected for the show. As I left the gallery the space was just filled with the exhibits ready to be hung and installed and I will be  excited to see the final hanging when the show opens.

Black Swan Arts Open Competition 2013

Black Swan Arts Open Competition 2013

Glass Wedding Anniversary commission

I’ve just completed this commission  for a Golden Wedding Anniversary. I was provided with a beautiful black and white wedding photograph from 1963 and asked to create a piece from this. I used opaque and white lacy bullseye glass with gold leaf and digital and enamel transfer print. I mounted the glass piece on a frame containing glass in which I laminated silk organza. This referenced the wedding veil and dress and provided an effective background to the piece.

New membership profile on Axis

I’ve just found out that my application to Axis has been successful! I’m really excited about being part of a lively professional artist community and showcase my work to a wider audience.

Lisa Sheppy Axis Profile

‘Re-Visioning the Brontës’: Conference 29th January, The Brotherton Room, University of Leeds

‘Re-Visioning the Brontës’ conference was an inspiring day with a rich diverse range of speakers who have sited the Brontës and their legacy as an influence on their work. The day began with a deeply moving, evocative music and film piece, ‘Air on Brontë Moor’ by David Wilson and Simon Warner. It was great to meet up with Teresa Whitfield whose work is exhibited with ‘Charlotte’s Dress’ in ‘Wildness Between Lines’ at Leeds College of Art, and also Jenna Holmes, the contemporary art officer at the Parsonage, who initially made my project possible. After delivering my paper I felt so thrilled with the positive comments and dialogue it generated between the other speakers and attendees.

Parkinson Building, University of Leeds

Professor Ann Sumner, the new Executive Director of the Brontë Parsonage Museum and the Brontë Society, made an illuminating closing speech summarising all the speakers papers and said of my piece:

“The contemporary artist Lisa Sheppy gave an account of what had inspired her piece ‘Charlotte’s Dress’, currently on display in the ‘Wilderness Between the Lines’ exhibition at the Leeds College of Art. It was an early childhood visit to the Parsonage and memories of her mother’s professional dressmaking days that had given her the initial idea for the piece. To hear directly from an artist about her creative process was inspiring, and seeing her sketches from her study visit to Haworth and learn about the makers who had added to that vision and enabled her to produce this striking work was illuminating, but also caused one to reflect on the strong influence of her mother on the piece, while Charlotte Bronte had lost her own mother young.”

The summary of all the papers is available to view on the Brontë Parsonage Blog:

http://bronteparsonage.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/re-visioning-brontes-conference.html

Thank you to Nick Cass, Liz Stainforth and Rachel Cunningham Clark for selecting my paper to be included in the conference and their excellent organization of a such an enriching day.

‘Re-Visioning the Brontës’ Conference 29th January 2013

I will be delivering a paper based on ‘Charlotte’s Dress’ at the conference next week. Looking forward to hearing the other speakers’ papers and being part of this fascinating Brontë project.

Re-visioning the Brontës Conference Programme

9:30-10:00 – Registration, coffee (Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, University of Leeds)

9:50-10:00 – ‘Air on Brontë Moor’ (Wilson & Warner)

10:00-10:10 – Welcome and Introduction, Nick Cass, Conference Organiser, School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies

10:10-10:25 – ‘Keynote’ Welcome, Jane Sellars, Curator of Art, Mercer Art Gallery, Harrogate

10:25-10:50 – ‘Southern Flight: Brontëan Migrations in Kate Chopin’s At Fault’, Dr Carl Plasa, Cardiff University

10:50-11:15 – ‘Righting the Life of the Mind: The Significance of Psychological Discourse in the Brontës’ Interwar Afterlives’, Amber Pouliot, University of Leeds

11:15-11:35 – ‘The Brontës, Materiality, and Resonance: Three Ways of Looking’, Aislinn Hunter, University of Edinburgh

11:35-11.50 – Introduction to the Brontë manuscripts in Special Collections (University of Leeds), Sarah Prescott, Literary Archivist

11:50-12:10 – Discussion

12:10-12:15 – ‘Air on Brontë Moor’ (Wilson & Warner)

12:15-13:15 – Lunch break

13:15-13:20 – ‘Air on Brontë Moor’ (Wilson & Warner)

13:20-13:45 – ‘”…like a new picture introduced to the gallery of memory”: Re-Visioning Jane Eyre through Paula Rego’, Dr Sarah Wootton, Durham University

13:45-14:10 – ‘Charlotte’s Dress’, Lisa Sheppy, Contemporary Artist

14:10-14:45 – Dr Richard Brown (University of Leeds) in conversation with Professor Blake Morrison (Goldsmiths, University of London) on Morrison’s play We Are Three Sisters

14:45-15:05 – Coffee

15:05-15:30 – ‘Listening Out: the Soundtracks and Film Scores of Wuthering Heights’, Dr Jenny Bavidge, University of Cambridge

15:30-15:55 – ‘Wuthering Heights in Japan: the film Arashi ga Oka (1988, dir. Yoshishige Yoshida)’, María Seijo-Richart, University of A Coruña

15:55-16:40 – Roundtable discussion chaired by Adam Strickson (Teaching Fellow in Creative Writing, University of Leeds), Sarah Fermi (Writer and Trustee, Brontë Society), Tiffany Murray (Writer and Senior Lecturer, University of Glamorgan), Simon Warner (Artist and Photographer) and Jenna Holmes (Arts Officer, Brontë Parsonage Museum)

16:40-16:50 – Discussion

16:50-17:00 – Closing Remarks, Ann Sumner (Director, Brontë Society)

‘Wildness Between Lines’ Private View

I travelled over the moors, through Haworth, to attend the private view of ‘Wildness Between Lines’ at Leeds College of Art in December. It was great to meet Nick Cass who selected and curated the exhibition and meet some of the artists in the show. I met Teresa Whitfield whose drawing of Charlotte Brontë’s black lace shawl I greatly admired. I thought the diverse selection of work was put together and hung beautifully and was really pleased that Charlotte’s Dress could be seen again in a new context for a fresh audience.

Charlotte's Dress with work by Su Blackwell, Marci Washington and Teresa Whitfield

Work by Paula Chambers with a digital video piece by Simon Warner

Teresa Whitfield Charlotte Brontë's Shawl

reVisioning the Brontës : Conference Tuesday 29 January 2013

I am delighted to have been asked to speak at this conference in January 2013. My paper will be on ‘Charlotte’s Dress’ and will discuss the progress of my project from initial observational drawings made at the Bronte Parsonage Museum through contextual research and process development culminating in the exhibition I had at the museum in 2010. Details, information and the itinerary of the conference are available on the blogspot:

http://revisioningthebrontes.blogspot.co.uk/

http://blog.nickcass.com/

Overview of the conference from the Contemporary Arts Programme, Bronte Parsonage Museum

reVisioning the Brontës

TUESDAY 29 JANUARY 2013

UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS

Recent adaptations and interpretations of the Brontës’ lives and works through film, art, literature and theatre highlight the continuing fascination with these literary figures, and their significant influence across the creative arts. This one day cross-disciplinary conference at the University of Leeds will explore the ‘re-visioning’ of the Brontës through artistic responses and interpretations of their work. Confirmed speakers include novelist and playwright Blake Morrison, and Jane Sellars, Curator of Art at the Mercer Art Gallery, Harrogate as well as a varied programme of artists, practitioners and curators.The conference is a collaboration between the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery and the Leeds School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies, to accompany their Brontë themed exhibitions:

http://revisioningthebrontes.blogspot.co.uk/

Charlotte’s Dress at Leeds College of Art : Wildness Between Lines : December 14th 2012- February 2nd 2013

Charlotte’s Dress is on exhibition at the Leeds College of Art in December. The exhibition has been organised by Nick Cass, who is an artist and lecturer at the University. The work in the exhibition will feature contemporary artists who have been influenced by the Bronte legacy many of whom have exhibited at The Bronte Parsonage Museum. I am delighted and excited to be part of this fascinating project and looking forward to seeing the work of all the artists in the exhibition

http://www.leeds-artexhibitions.co.uk/?p=999

http://blog.nickcass.com/

Wildness Between Lines

Wildness Between Lines

Date: December 14th, 2012 — February 2nd, 2013

‘Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall; these are just some of the works produced by the Brontës which have an enduring and universal appeal. The inspirational legacy of the Brontë family can be seen in a wide variety of contemporary creativity. This exhibition is a unique opportunity to see, in one place, the work of a number of emerging and established artists, all of whom cite the Brontës as a source of continuing inspiration for their own creative practice.’