Diana Ashdown
Memories lost and found is the focus for this body of work, what do we collect and take away from special occasions, visits or holidays? Plants pressed between the pages of books, photographs and other memorabilia, keeping memories alive, pasted in scrapbooks and on the wall. I create work in response to my personal journeys, family memory and transience of the seasons, by capturing the fleeting shadows of plants onto paper and textile, freezing that brief moment in time, which shifts, emerges, recedes and diffuses. The qualities intrinsic to lino are essential to my process, etching with caustic soda and careful use of colour gives the work an aged appearance, like a historic document or fragment in a museum case. Working and inking the plates intuitively, I enjoy the inherent marks, blemishes and textures of the sun plate, re - inking with rollers and overprinting builds a patina and depth of focus like a long retained memory gradually fading. The anticipation and excitement of lifting the paper off a new plate does not diminish, the paper picks up many unexpected but welcome marks from the plate, which makes the print process so addictive. I exhibit regularly with groups and have solo shows, I am represented by Obsidian Gallery, Stoke Mandeville I have work in CraftCo, Southwold, Walsingham Barns Gallery and Verandah, Holt, North Norfolk. My work is in private collections across Europe, America and Australia and my work has been purchased for permanent collections such as the Art for Wards, at the Nuffield Hospital, Oxford.
Exhibitions and events:
Continuing to show work in Wallsingham Barn Gallery.
Work selected for Peterborough Museum Exhibition - 29th March to 26th May
Work in the collection of Buckinghamshire Museum, Aylesbury 2018
Norfolk and Norwich Open Studios 2018
Cley18
Norwich Print Fair 2018
Printfest Cumbria 2017
NOPE Bankside Gallery 2015
Graduated M.A September 2013 Anglia Ruskin Cambridge Group exhibitions 2013 - Affordable Art Fair, Battersea, London 2013 - Art of Poetry, Obsidian Gallery, Layby Farm, Stoke Mandeville 2013 - 'Portable and Affordable' prints by M.A students, Williams Art Gallery, Cambridge 2013 - Pressed Into Paper, The Oxfordshire Museum, Woodstock OX201SN 2013 - Spring Show, Oxford Art Society, Old Town Hall Oxford 2012 - Edition 3, Affordable Art Fair, Batersea, London 2012 - Gainborough House Printmakers Exhibition, Bury St Edmunds Gallery, Smiths Row, Bury St Edmunds 2012 - Gainsborough House Print Workshop Members Exhibition, Cathedral Gallery, Angel Hill, Bury St Edmunds, , Bury St Edmunds 2012 - Making an Impression, Buckinghamshire County Museum, Aylesbury 2012 - Making an Impression, Buckinghamshire County Museum, Church Street, Aylesbury, Bucks, HP20 2PQ 2012 - Pushing Print, Margate Gallery, Margate 2012 - Winter Open, One Church Street Gallery, Great Missenden 2011 - 12 Printmakers, R.K. Burts Gallery, London 2010 - Inked, Ruskin Gallery, Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge 2010 - Mini Print, ADOGI, Cadaques, Barcelona 2010 - Mini print, Artlink, Hull, England
Competitions, prizes and awards 2012 - Gainsborough House prize for graduate printmakers, Gainsborough House, Sudbury. Jane Muir atart up grant