Colin Orchard

Both of the paintings are by Colin Orchard, a wonderful exhibition we saw at http://www.penhavengallery.co.uk/ oiled by a lovely glass of red wine. The first painting looks so much better in the flesh, it is of The Penwith Gallery quite the most beautiful space you could hope to own and yet as a gallery it did not work at all. The work was a mish mash badly hung and a rather odd atmosphere pervaded so that you could not wait to get out. In stark contrast the Penhaven gallery was so lovely I could have moved in. It is tiny and David Beer uses his living room as an extension to the main gallery which makes it even better as you can see work in a more realistic context. There is a comprehensive website well worth a look. My other favourite space is the Plumbline gallery opposite Babara Hepworth's garden, the owner here was so utterly brilliant with Leyla she became a charming model of a child. I wished I could have popped him in my suitcase and brought him home to be her nanny. Talking of which today has become black Tuesday not only have I bashed the tyre on Emin's precious bloody Lexus (this will be a big big row ) The British Consulate in Ankara Turkey have sat on our new Au pairs visa application for over 8 weeks having told her it would take 6 she had a flight booked to fly out today to start work on Monday so she has lost her flight and the consulate have been so rude and unhelpful. So we try to do things the right way and this is what happens yet thousands of illegal immigrants wander in every day with no hassle at all. I sometimes hate our ridiculous bureaucratic government I bet not one single MP has this problem.

Gulls

The first print is by Bryan Pearce, www.lemonstreetgallery.co.uk the second is by Peter Davies. The gulls did not stop calling morning noon and night, they are large and very aggressive. Daisy was holding a piece of pizza by her side and one came and tried to prise it from her hand! When she was 6 one took the ice cream from her cone. I have seen them quite literally take food from from the mouths of babies.

Jason Lilley

It is hard not to become obsessed with roof tops but despite having a new camera I never felt able to get the right composition. Jason Lilley does it so much better, a lot of his work incorporates wonderful textures as well as shape and manages to break free of Ben Nicholson's heavy shadow. We found his work at www.belgravegallery.com it has some lovely art work well worth a look.

Paul Geraghty

The paintings are by Paul Geraghty (not the childrens book illustrator) more of which can be seen at http://www.stivespainters.com/

No one was more surprised than I was when Daisy dragged me over to look at a painting of the sea on the wall of the Waterside Gallery, as I peered to look at the name I realised I had worked with Paul at an "Inner city school" I remember he got married in St Ives so I guess it was a natural progression to settle down here. How lovely to do that and he was a lovely man (he wrote a cracking set of generic reports!) So I am glad he is now very successful. I have often thought I would like to live in St Ives I first went when I was 15 and still vividly remember the narrow lanes and the rather bohemian air of Fore street. Despite holidaying in Polzeath many times in my early 20s I never made it back until on a whim I took Daisy to stay for some quality mummy time when she was 6. She loved it, we stayed at The Ship which dates back to the 14th century, I still find it hard to imagine what life was like in the 18th century so this was a seriously beautiful old pub. I have visited since and thought about retiring here but 2 weeks gave me a lot of food for thought and actually I could not stand the constant and I mean constant noise of the gulls and strangely I miss the trees. Flora and fauna is limited here and I miss the variety of green you get deep in the countryside. So my short list is Wales or the utterly wonderful Cambridge which strangely is where another ex colleague has settled.

Julia Platt

The verticals are by Julia Platt at http://www.printmakersgallery.co.uk/ The horizontals are bashed paintwork on the boats in the harbour.

The web site is small but interesting like most gallery's it carries an eclectic mix of prints ceramics and jewellery. As my sister in a heroically kind gesture lent us her car I bought her a beautiful designer charm bracelet, I have not worn bracelets since I had children and I gave my collection of antique silver cuffs to my mother who wears them constantly, I did however covet this bracelet a lot but she loved it so that was good. In return for her favour I offered to clear her flat up. My sister is head of Human Resources of an international company whose offices over look The Mall, she is ruthless, mean and efficient and yet incapable of picking up her clothes off the floor and worse in the process of tidying up I found 3 yes 3 unpacked suitcases still filled with clothes from previous holidays! She does the dirty washing then leaves the rest so the last time she saw some of her clothes was this time last year when we were all in Egypt! How is this possible? so 65 skirts were reunited as were 15 bikinis 7 bloody hours this took and as she had a hangover she took a while to warm up. No doubt I will have to pop round when she returns from Cuba in a couple of months lucky me.

Eric Ward

Eric Ward at http://www.printmakersgallery.co.uk/
My homage to the 2 strongest influences in the town the first view was first made famous by Ben Nicholson, the second is one of the most lovely gardens in the world.

I must have visited over 15 small private gallery's, all were wonderful in their own way and I am going to feature some over the coming weeks as well as sneak in some of my photographs. The overall effect of this combination is a resounding victory for art over photography as I feel that all the paintings and prints I saw captured the environment far better then a photograph (or mine at least) although it is hard to take a bad photograph in Babara Hepworth's garden. Interestingly I did not see any photography in the gallery's. The range of art work is amazing for a small town and all the studios are thriving. I am slowly catching up with some blogs and I am itching to comment on a range of issues. The Sartorialist has some wonderful photographs taken in Stockholm making me itch to go back one summer, however mother is keen for a villa in France or Italy but at £2600 for 7 days I guess it would be cheaper to buy one.

Tall Storys

We are back, we had a lovely time lots of pasties, fudge, ice cream, fish & chips so much delicious food so little time.... The house was perfect with wonderful views and the weather was very kind. The girls body surfed, dug a lot of holes in the sand and spent a lot of money on this & that. The people were lovely even my mother behaved.....I went to a lot of galleries all of which I will be posted over the next few weeks. I dressed like a complete slob, took far too many photographs especially in Babara Hepworth's Garden, paradise as always. On the down side the gulls were far too loud, the beds uncomfortable I did no painting and Leyla ,well she was just a very naughty little girl.