One of the really fabulous things to come out of doing the ‘Wavelengths’ Exhibition was meeting and getting to know Jan Simon!
I am so grateful to our mutual friend Suzie, for introducing us earlier in the year. We clicked straight away and quickly saw the opportunity of doing something together, too good to miss. It came as a suprise to both of us when we discovered December could be scheduled at Chapel off Chapel! We hadn’t gone into the idea thinking we would be showing together inside of 6 months. We had figured it could be at least 12 months away but, it only took a minute and a phone call to book it once we knew!
I had a wonderful experience exhibiting ‘Messages from the Soul’ in February at Chapel off Chapel and knew that if I worked solidly until then, I could bring together a body of work to exhibit with the work Jan wanted to show and she would have enought time to work out what she wanted to show, finish any additions and all the other things that go into naming and cataloging pieces for the exhibition.. She had a collection of paintings from the last four years of discovering her love of painting, and wanted to show them. I had some work that resonated with hers very easily and decided to take it from there.Two of the three triptych’s from the Wavelengths series, were born just prior to meting Jan. They were similar in terms of horizontal banding and feel. I finished off what became titled ‘Spectrum of Red’ and ‘Spectrum of Blue’ as initially intended, but the third Tripych was in the new color palette, and a freedom of movement, became that which was to birth the last 5 paintings (without a series title) in the exhibition. Interestingly enough, this new palette and energy came in at the time we had bought our new home. It was the begining of Spring and color abounded everywhere in this new garden! It definately fed a change.
The begining of a new friendship at this time of change was so perfect. Inspiring as the moments of getting to know a person, doing so through a mutual love it is rewarding on many levels. It became that I had someone to work towards this goal with and I was finding out I really liked her along the way! It was great! No ordinary initiation.There are a lot of descisions to make when putting an exhibition of this sort together. Naming the show, working out what we wanted to say about it to others and committing. Chosing of paintings to represent what we wanted to do, out of what we had to that point. These things can often take time and occur along the way of making a series…they self document and make sense but bringing together two people’s journeys, on different time lines and seeing where the paths crossed was more immediate. Both Jan and I made works after our involvement together, that sold on opening night. We didn’t make our work together in the same space literally but we worked individualy, on something we were defining and creating together! It was exciting to share that moment when the box of invites arrives at the door and you open to see it all in print. The day the post goes up on the Gallery web site and the invites go out, we got to share that excitement and affirmation. It was fun. Getting to know another person when things don’t go as according to plan, and seeing how they chose to deal with it can be jumping in the deep end, but Jan seemed to take any disapointment in her stride and remained optimistic, supportive! So the ‘Wavelength’ Exhibition has given me not onlya new color palette but a new friend! I look forward to sharing more in inspiration and friendship with her. I know she had a ball too and sold many of her works, which is great! Now she’ll have to start again and it’ll be exciting to see what she does now that she has shown! I’m excited too. Keep you posted!