Ich bin ein Berliner!

Arf arf. I went to Berlin for a few days with my gentleman friend the other week and my oh my did I love it. A lot of my arty friends in Manchester have been and raved about the place, so I was very excited to see it for myself. I did a lot of sightseeing and walking, with many a pit stop for wurst and beer, an ideal holiday really!
One of my favourite places was a tiny museum I'd read about online, called the Büchstaben Museum, which was hyped as a typography museum, but was actually more like a sign graveyard. Either way, I loved it!







I'm now pondering my next trip and have been looking at the Russian Red Arrow train from Moscow to St Petersburg, can't beat a good train journey in my view. This old beauty even has its own theme music! What's your dream holiday?

Two Ducks Disco

Ahoy there, here is a wee post that I've been planning for an age - since last September actually, when I took my self off to Leeds town to see the brillax to the max Magnolia Electric Co.
I'm a big fan of gig posters and am usually first in line to snap 'em up. I was a little too slow this time though, and the groovy limited edition posters had sold out by the time a crazy man in shorts had stopped dancing. Aiee! However, all was not lost as I put my name on a mailing list...and ordered a poster from that nice Two Ducks Disco

For a mere £10 I received my poster smartly through the post along with a few other goodies, not least an awesome poster for the European Poster Expo 2007, that was held at our very own Urbis, Manchester. I cannot recommend highly enough! Go! Read blog! Buy posters! xx

Feel the love...

In my last post I promised pictures of my Valentine's designs. They're quite simple and not too sickly, I've used the papercuts in screenprints and cards which are available in the studio now! (plug plug plug).

The last exhibition at the Craft Centre is being taken down as I type, the next one is 'Spun', Lighting by Jenny Bland and opens on February the 13th, so if you need to pick up a little Valentine's gift for your beloved, that would be a good day to do it!
I've got some work in NoiseLab, a pop up gallery/shop situated in what was Shelley's on Market Street. Go take a peek if you get a chance, there are doodles from influential artists Pete Fowler and Jon Burgerman featured in the shop, I'm pretty excited to have my work alongside theirs, whoop!

Happy New Year!

Moroccan terrace
Originally uploaded by little nell smith

Ok, this post is somewhat late, I was away over New Year with my family, soaking up a little North African sun in Marrakech. We stayed in a gorgeous riad and relaxed to the max! It was a welcome change from the frozen wastes of the UK and it's been difficult to get motivated with things being so quiet at the studio since my return.
But I feel my energy returning and I've been working on some slightly more sophisticated and complex designs, mainly with Valentine's Day in mind. I'll put some pictures up closer to the time, don't want to sicken you all too early in the year!
Aside from that I have a few exciting plans in the pipeline and resolutions a-plenty! I want adventures in 2010! How about you? Kiss kiss, boom boom xxx

No rest...

Hello hello lovely people. Just a quick one to remind Manchester types that the Craft Centre is open extra hours throughout December. Tonight is our first late night Thursday, we're open 'til 8, and on Sunday we will be open 11-5. Come and do your Christmas shopping in a relaxed and cosy manner, away from the insane Arndale crowds and chilly winter weather!

Crafting and grafting

The last couple of months have been all about workshops for me! It's been great, I've mentioned before that I always find them really inspirational and that my own practice moves on as a result. I'm on the last week of the Design for Life project, then I will be concentrating on Christmas and plotting the coming year...yikes!



Linocut inspired by the Egyptology collection at Bolton Museum



Linocut inspired by the bolt stamps collection at Bolton Museum



Mittens monoprint



Mittens linocut



Matryoshka doll monoprint with brusho colour




Matryoshka doll linocut, produced at my Ministry of Craft print workshop



Grumpy bird screenprint with bonded fabric elements, produced at my Ministry of Craft print workshop

Boltonia

Hi hi! Friday was the first session of the Design for Life project that I've mentioned before. The kids came to Bolton Museum for a day of looking, touching and drawing. We went down to the aquarium and took a peek at the beasties there and chatted to Paul, the awesomely knowledgeable aquarium guy.




This is a knifefish - related to the electric eel. Isn't he an amazing shape? Lovely stuff.

Later Don, the entomology guy, brought some of his insect collection from home for the kids to look at and handle if they were brave enough! I held the beauty below, a clicking cockroach, which felt a bit like a piece of varnished wood. All was well and fine until I tried to pass it to one of the kids and it started running away - I'm ashamed to say I squealed, dear reader. And swore. Oops!



Here are some of my sketches. It was really lovely to do some drawing from life as its been a while. I tried to encourage the kids to draw quickly and not be too precious about each sketch, quite a difficult task it turns out!







On Monday Kirsty, the project co-ordinator and I went to the school in Bolton to do a workshop on mono printing, which I was really nervous about as I hadn't done any for ages and had never taught anyone this technique. Luckily it went really well and the work the kids produced really impressed me. I like doing workshops as it always influences my own practice, it's easy to get stuck in a bit of a rut when you do the same thing every day. Fingers crossed the rest of the project goes as well! I'm also doing a workshop on Saturday at the museum for The Big Draw and don't actually have a clue what I'm supposed to be doing! Eek! Better find out really...