Dorset Art Weeks on until this Sun 13 June

The biennial Dorset Art Weeks event has been on for the past week and a half, and finishes this coming Sunday 13 June. It's a great opportunity to explore the local art scene, and there's 26 venues around the Bridport area, including several at St Michael's Studios.

I was up to London last week and caught up with my old artist friends Stuart Free & Kirsty Griffin in Wood Green. Stuart has created a fine career for himself, selling his urban landscapes from a framing shop in Crouch End, and was recently profiled in the Independent.

I also visited ex-West Bay painter Tom Katz, who is now based in Hartford, and shows in the Alexia Goethe gallery on Dover street.

I went up to London partly to get my "Portrait of the Artist" book into various art book shops, and catch a couple of exhibitions. I certainly recommend the Ged Quinn at Wilkinson, Vyner Street, on until 27 June, and Lisa Yuskavage at Greengrassi in Kennington, until 26 June. A couple more shows have opened this week that I'll try to see, first Emma Bennett at Charlie Smith Gallery on Old Street. Also, Picasso at Gagosian in Kings Cross.

It's always inspiring to see the likes of Ged Quinn and his 3 metre long canvases, though that's 10 foot, which is currently a bit long for my studio. I'll stick to 8 foot wide for now... I enjoyed Quinn's show and intend to come up to see it again before it finishes.


I also enjoyed the Lisa Yuskavage, she paints uber-feminine women, often with enlarged breasts, buttocks and an overly rich palette of pinks, creams and reds. She's a good painter, in the same school as John Currin and Inka Essenhigh, all painters who share my love of the oil medium, and I find her work enjoyable and personal. Her prices range from £60K for a tiny painting to £500K for the large.

The Greengrassi gallery is a brilliant space off the Kennington Road, and it's always inspiring to imagine my own work in there. I'm now measuring up stretchers for my next series of landscapes, and I've got a number of paintings in mind. First up I'm planning an 8'x4' Lewesdon View, slightly further up the path than the last one, late spring, with a lot more foliage making it darker and moodier. Then I've got three more views across the vale, from Dottery, Salway Ash and north Bowood, and it's just a matter of how big to make them, ideally all 8 foot ! See my work here.



We're now on the lead up to the Bridport Open Studios in November, and Philomena Harmsworth is getting into her stride as director of the event. She's got great enthusiasm, and I think that together with our dedicated team, we can take the event to new heights!

Philomena is also showing at the Little Art Gallery, Beaminster, as part of Dorset Art Weeks.

Meanwhile, sculptor Clare Trenchard is showing with other gallery artists such as painters Alex Lowery, Vanessa Gardiner and furniture maker Petter Southall, at Sladers Yard, West Bay.

The next exhibition I recommend is West Bay painter Jon Adam at Artwave West in Morecomelake, currently showing a group show of gallery artists.