Dear OVAS Members,

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Well, what a summer we have had this year! I hope, like me, that you have been able to get out and about in the lovely weather, either at home or away, getting inspiration for your art work.

My visit to the wonderful Wastwater in the Lake District has already provided me with material to try out the interesting techniques of deconstruction and reconstruction that Rod Ashman, our artist for the September meeting and workshop, encouraged us to try. We were certainly challenged to be bold and daring and to take risks! The use of acrylics, on heavy watercolour paper, meant that we were able to work fast and in layers, once we had worked out our basic composition. Tearing the paper and glueing it back together in a different way gave the painting a new perspective to further work on. Most of the participants enjoyed the day and it gave us all food for thought for the future development of our art.

OVAS members also enjoyed two plein air sketching and painting days this summer. The first of these was on a very hot day at the end of June at Beer with artist Nick Watton, who gave us some good tips about sketching people and boats on the beach. The second day was at Sidbury allotments in August, in the company of Phil Creek our president. We practised painting glass greenhouses and wooden sheds, in the setting of dahlias, sunflowers , runner beans, courgettes and fruit trees, some of us attempting to place figures working in the environment.

As usual, one of the highlights of the summer was our annual exhibition at the Institute in August. As it was my first exhibition as your chairperson, I was gratified that the preview evening was well attended, and I would like to thank all the members of the committee and other members who helped to make the show a great success. As you will be aware, each year the committee put in a lot of hard work to put on the exhibition and other events, and I would urge you all to consider putting your names forward to become a committee member as we are very short of committed persons to share out the work. If you would like to join the committee, or discuss this possibility, please contact me or any other committee member. We really do need your help to keep the Society running smoothly.

I agreed with Rod Ashman, our judge for the different categories, that the standard of your work was higher than ever this year. Rod was a popular choice of judge and he gave us positive feedback on each of the prizewinning paintings.

The prizewinners:

Tracey Rapson, “View from the Common”, mixed media

Jacqueline Ward, “Knightstone Lane”, oils

John Evans, “Porthleven”, watercolour

Maureen Stone, “Morning Sun”, acrylic

Nicolette Bitschi, “Three quarters”, pastels

Linda Hampson, “Eternally intertwined”, drawing

Jacqueline Ward, ”Devoted Doves”, sculpture and 3D

Popular choice :

Carolyn Barker, “ Sea Mist Rolling In” was 1st with 17 votes.

£164 was raised in the raffle for the Ottery help Scheme. We would like to thank Phil Creek and Ray Balkwill for donating a painting and print for prizes. Although we all like to sell a few paintings at the exhibition, the main aim of the week is to display our work and showcase to the public what we have been doing over the past year. So you will be pleased to know that we made a small profit overall.

We are also pleased to have received an invite to his exhibition to our members from Adrian Sykes, an oil painter from Bristol who came to demonstrate his intriguing techniques to us in the spring. The preview day is on Saturday 29th September, 11.0 – 5.0, at the Marine house gallery at Beer, and the champagne is opened at 11.0! Do try to get along if you can.

There is a change to the published programme in October. The demonstrator will now be Colin Brown, painting a cityscape in acrylic. We do have to make some changes from time to time due to changes in demonstrators’ schedules, so please keep an eye on our OVAS website – www.ottervaleartsociety.com – which is very ably managed by Chris Poole, in case of any future unavoidable changes to the programme.

As a reminder, our November meeting will be an afternoon meeting at 2pm. There will also be a sale of some art materials at this meeting.

We will also be announcing before long the society’s arrangements for our Christmas social event – yes, I’m sorry but it will be creeping up on us before we know it!

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I look forward to seeing your Autumn paintings as the colours in our beautiful Devon landscape begin to change over the next few months, and I wish you happy painting.

Penny Lamb

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