The Old Goods Shed, Clare Castle Country Park, 7th– 22nd May 2022

A BIG thank you to our SEAW Friends who visited and stewarded our recent exhibition at Clare. Your support for our exhibitions is always much appreciated and we are delighted that some of our Friends have recently become Associate Members of the SEAW.

Thank you also to all of the Friends who contributed their ‘PEACE’ paintings to the Ukraine display and to everyone who donated to our Ukraine collection which raised £347.00. All of this money has been sent to the Disaster Emergency Fund – Ukraine. Thank you also to Jan Couling for helping to hang the exhibition and for checking very regularly that the exhibition was going well.

 Some facts and figures about Clare:

  •  106 framed paintings and 70 unframed artworks were submitted by 39 Members
  • 12 framed paintings and 8 unframed artworks were sold alongside 242 cards
  • During the exhibition period we welcomed 1173 visitors, an average of 69 visitors a day; 199 of these voted for their favourite painting
  • The visitor’s voting card drawn ‘out of the hat’ belonged to Ronald Donaldson who chose Surinder Beerh’s ‘The Ranger’ painting as his prize (the Society contributed £75 towards his painting and Ronald paid the remainder)
  • David Harrison got the most visitor votes, closely followed by Lesley Munro and Carol Whitehouse
  • George Grayland, an SEAW Member won the raffle prize painting ‘Living in the Shadows’ donated by Mel
  • Thank you to Penny Newman and Linda Purdy for leading our ‘Painting in the Park’ initiative
  • Feedback on the Old Goods Shed venue, the quality of the exhibition and our workshop offer from stewards, artists, members of the public and Clare Castle Country Park staff has been extremely positive:

Steward – ‘lovely space, everyone who came enjoyed the variety and quality of the work’

Artist – ‘a beautiful exhibition, well laid out and a great venue’

Visitor – ‘great to see so many works, very inspirational’ (a record 85 people commented in the SEAW Visitors Book!)

Workshop participant – ‘very good timing, perfect match of tuition and practice, well worth the money’

We also received some super comments from Clare Castle Castle Country Park staff

It was a pleasure to have the SEAW exhibiting at The Old Goods Shed. All the feedback I have heard from local people has been very positive both in terms of the quality of the artwork and the organisation of the exhibition

Julia Burge – Administrator of the Trust

 Waterways at the Babylon Gallery, Ely, Cambridgeshire Thursday 1st – Sunday 25th September 2022

It won’t be long until we are setting up our final exhibition for this calendar year! This year the Waterways Exhibition will be for SEAW Members and Friends only, not for non-Members. If you know of a non-Member who has exhibited for SEAW exhibitions in the past or you know would like to exhibit at Ely, please encourage them to become a Friend.

As you know Friends membership only costs £20 a year and being a Friend has lots of additional benefits: reductions for workshop bookings, access to the Friends and Members Facebook group, Friends competitions and tutorials, three issues of a dedicated Friends newsletter and a range of opportunities to contribute to SEAW activities and paint-in-company.

Important dates:

Submission opens: *Friday 1st July via a google form

Submission closes: *Sunday 31st July at midnight

Hand-in Day: Tuesday *30th August 10.30 – 1.30pm – no pre-booked slots

Hanging and Preparation Day: Wednesday 31st August – 10.00 – 4.00pm; Private View 5.00pm-7.00pm

Exhibition opens to the public: Thursday 1st September 12noon- 4.00pm

Exhibition closes: Sunday 25th September 4.00pm

Collection of unsold work: Sunday 25th September 4.30pm-6.00pm

 

*We hope these dates allow our artists plenty of time for framing

 

Friends’ work will be selected by the Committee and Friends will be contacted after their submission with details for sending photographs of their paintings. Selection will take place online and Friends will be contacted by Monday 8th August if their artwork has been selected. Please ensure that you submit the best image that you can. Details about image size and image quality can be found on our website but do email contactSEAW@gmail.com if you have concerns or questions.

Friends can submit up to 2 paintings but Friends cannot submit unframed works or cards. The cost of submitting is £6 per framed painting.

Please note the Babylon Gallery closes on Mondays although we will be offering workshops on the three Mondays, 5th, 12th and 19th September. Friends will get a discounted rate for booking workshops.

A new Treasurer

Finally, please note that our financial year ends in November 2022. It would be great to get a prospective Treasurer in place by then to work alongside Helen for a few months until a new Committee takes over at the AGM in February 2023. If you are interested or know someone who might be keen to take on this interesting role please email seawtreasurer@gmail.com.