Design Debate

How often do we really stop and consider the ordinary, everyday things around us? I love how artists can help us do just that, encouraging us to pause and contemplate the details of daily life. Canvas Gallery in Plymouth is exhibiting work by Amanda Carpenter and Hannah Oram in an exhibition called Tables of Colour , running until 11th April. I thought I would share these joyous works with you today. Amanda’s art is free and full of life. Her paintings ‘hold space for transformation, where fragility and resilience coexist, and where growth is messy, layered and deeply human’. This is Limonata , filled with layers of pattern and colour. Dinner in Bloom feels like a warm invitation. Hannah Oram is Exeter-based and wants to bring everyday moments to life on canvas. She says: ‘I believe these small rituals add poetry to everyday life. I paint them as joyful reminders that the most meaningful moments are often the simplest.’ Dans L’attente de L’Ea...

Absorbing myself in the world of internet publications, it was lovely when reading posts on Berlin-based website Ignant to find an artist in Cornwall I hadn't heard of. I am sure there are many I don't yet know, but finding an artist from my neck of the woods just makes me feel instantly intrigued by their work. Jess Allen , originally from Dorset, is married to sculptor Simon Allen and lives on the moorland near St Ives, the Cornish town famed for its wonderful light.  Light is important to Allen, her paintings return to the theme of shadows, impressions and moments that are so evocative and familiar they draw us in. Her subjects are minimal, inconsequential even, but beautiful. An open book left on the side, an embrace played out on the living room wall in shadow form or perhaps stacks of cardboard boxes, piled in such a way we stand and stare where naturally we would pay no heed.  It is the peace also I feel enriched by, Jess says o...