21st UKCPS Annual Open Exhibition 2022

The 21st Annual Open International Exhibition (2022) of the UK Coloured Pencil Society is now online. 

It's particularly interesting for me as I was one of the Judges this year in terms of reducing 250 images from coloured pencil artists from aropund the world to the 83 images in the exhibition which can now be viewed online. All we get as Judges was the digital image (online), the unframed dimensions and a spreadsheet to include our marked for each work. The other Judges were

• Richard Rees PPS - President of the Pastel Society
• Nuala Henry - UK Marketing Manager, Hahnemuehle

Alyssa Tidwell - Editor of International Artist magazine was the Judge making the awards

YOU too can be a Judge and VOTE for the image you think deserves the People's Choice Award. All you need to do is:

• click the images to see a larger version of each image
• complete the form on The People's Choice Award Page - and then click the submit button

The 21st UKCPS Annual Open Exhibition Award Winners

Links in the artists' names below go to their websites where you can see more of their art.

Best Picture in Show 

Best Picture in Show - Black Sea by Megan Seiter (Pic No. 241)

Megan Seiter is an American artist specializing in colored pencil still life drawings. Originally from Rhode Island, she received her BFA from Maryland Institute College of Art, and in 2009 moved to California. Megan has shown her work internationally, in galleries and juried exhibitions hosted by the International Guild of Realism, American Women Artists, the Colored Pencil Society of America, and the UK Colored Pencil Society, among others.

This for me was the standout drawing in the show in terms of its HUGE impact and technical proficiency. I remember looking at it very, very closely to check it wasn't a photograph!

Reserve Best in Show

Melissa Scott Miller paints from Tower Bridge Walkway

Melissa Scott Miller has been painting from the Walkway at the top of Tower Bridge. This summer she's been its official Artist in Residence

Melissa is a portrait and urban landscape artist who has been commissioned by the Trust which runs Tower Bridge (which is owned by the City of London) to create a panoramic painting of the views from the West Walkway at the top of Tower Bridge - from City Hall and the Shard on the South Bank, across the Thames, to the views of the various buildings old and new in the City of London on the North Bank of the Thames

You can find out more about #ABridgewithaView and Melissa on this page

To immortalise the very same views in 2022, we have commissioned English artist Melissa Scott-Miller to paint what she sees from the West Walkway. A Bridge with A View is a celebration of London and an ode to this vibrant city. The project takes place throughout the summer, and will include public workshops and family activities. Visitors to the attraction will be able to observe Melissa painting during their visit and see how the artwork progresses.

The intention is that the painting will be 150cm x 100cm - or maybe a triptych - and that the City of London will sell the painting at a charity auction later this year.

This is a video of Melissa painting her second painting in response to the views of Tower Bridge’s West Walkway - which covers the Upper Decks of HMS belfast to the Dome of St Paul's Cathedral.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Tower Bridge (@towerbridge)

Imaginative and stimulating art in "Planet Future" Exhibition

The theme of the annual art exhibition for sixth form colleges is "Planet Future"

This is the national art exhibition for sixth form college students. It contains a lot of very thoughtful imaginative and creative art from students at various sixth form colleges in the UK.

I was impressed by the diversity of media used, topics tackled and different approaches used to portraying messages about sustainability and the current and future risks to planet earth.

"The sustainability agenda has never been more important and the exhibition highlights students' hopes and fears about the future, while also showcasing their enormous creativity and innovation,"
Alex Burghart, former Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Education - who launched the exhibition.

As I began to look at the art it struck me that there's a bit of a gulf beginning to open up between art created by younger people - who are focused on things which matter a lot to them - and artwork by much older people in other exhibitions where the artwork seems to be more traditional and very often demonstrates little interest in topical issues.

 

My favourites included the following. 

• Click the links in the title to see a much larger image online. 
• I've also included links to the students where I could find them online.

Hope for the future by Ruby Currie (Woodhouse College) 

I particularly liked the use of the textile art and its use of various messages addressing many different aspects of contemporary life and issues of concern and the designs she used to catch attention. 

Pricing "Winners"

Today I'm commenting on the prices of artworks sold during the first 2-3 days of the "Winners | Award Winning Artists 2020-2022" Exhibition at the Mall Galleries. (Note: I'm going to be writing a long post about pricing in the context of the current economic climate in the near future.)

This follows my two previous posts

• REVIEW: "Winners" Exhibition at the Mall Galleries (Part 1)
• REVIEW (Part 2): "Winners" Exhibition at the Mall Galleries

This post includes 

• a chart of all sales (to date) analysed by the size of the artwork and the price category of the sold artwork.
• commentary on my conclusions about the chances of artwork selling - by size and price categories

Winners Exhibition - View of West Gallery last Friday

As most of you know, most sales in an exhibition occur during pretty early in an exhibition. Notably 

• when it goes online and 
• at the Private View before it opens to the public, 
• then in the first few days after that. 

I'm not going to Private Views routinely at the moment - and indeed I'm still walking round with a mask on given the fact Covid infection rates are rampant in London - and I've still not had it....

However I did visit last Friday - after the PV on Tuesday evening (and the rail strike on Wednesday) and the last thing I did before I left the gallery was to walk round and photograph every artwork which had sold.

I've also checked what sales have since occurred online and it's pretty much the same.

So today is an analysis along the lines of those done in previous reviews of exhibitions in these galleries. I've crunched the numbers and created an excel file with a data sheet and a chart. All sold artworks are categorised according to

• price categories are those which I observe most sales in this location
• sizes are new - and includes small, small medium, large medium and large - scaled according to the size of the artwork and NOT the framed size.

General observations on pricing

First of all though I'm going to make some general observations

REVIEW (Part 2): "Winners" Exhibition at the Mall Galleries

Yesterday I reviewed the Winners Exhibition at the Mall Galleries. In this post I'm going to comment on the artwork which stood out for me. 

Artwork worth a mention

I've grouped images of artwork I liked according to broad subject matter / genre.

Portraits/figures

I'd be entirely unsurprised if I had seen this double portrait painting in what used to be the annual exhibition of the BP Portrait Award. It's large and expensive....

Emily Gillbanks completes her MA in Painting at the Royal College of Art in September and this painting was included in her degree show in June. I predict we'll be seeing a lot of her work in future.

Four Things by Emily Gillbanks

Oil, 160 x 190 cm, £16,588

EMILY GILLBANKS (b. 1999) is a Painter and Researcher who grew up on the Essex and Suffolk border, United Kingdom. Emily was most recently awarded the Royal College of Art’s Fribourg Philanthropies Painting Prize 2022, and in 2021 her painting Three Things was awarded The de László medal for Excellence by The de László Foundation.

Frances Bell's portraits are getting better and better and she seems to be much in demand for commissions - and I'm not surprised! She has shown in the Royal Society of Portrait Painters Annual Exhibition since 2005. 

Edd in the Window by Frances Bell RP AROI
Oil, 80 x 80 cm (94 x 94 cm framed), £7,800

Curtis Holder, Winner of the Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year in 2020 (see 
Curtis Holder wins Portrait Artist of the Year (Series 7 Autumn 2020) and PAOTY Commission: Curtis Holder draws Carlos Acosta) has two large and impressive drawings in coloured pencils in the show.

Left: Will You Hear Me? by Curtis Holder
Coloured pencil, 120 x 120 cm (130 x 130 cm framed), £4,250

Right: Sunday 5:04 am by Curtis Holder
Coloured pencil, 140 x 120 cm (145 x 124 cm framed), £4,500

I'm a fan of those who paint paintings by other artists - particularly if they are paintings I recognise and also like a lot - such as in this smallish painting by Robbie Wraith.

Keys & Postcards by Robbie Wraith RP
Watercolour, 41 x 28 cm (53 x 43 cm framed), £3,500

I very much liked these two black crayon drawings by Shaun Duke - who's a new name to me. He won The Pastel Society Young Artist Award in 2022. However it's very easy to see that he's got considerable skills in drawing people. I also prefer his line drawings to his paintings.

Two drawings by Shaun Duke

both in Black crayon, 56 x 38 cm (75 x 53 cm framed), £650

The transient nature of the sittings is of great importance. To provide an honest account, marks are rarely erased and his works on paper are never altered after a session has ended. Duke wants to record instances in time between people and believes that only through documenting these small moments can we reveal a truthful view of contemporary culture.

Plants

As some may be aware I'm very engaged by those who draw or paint plants.

I loved these two stylised and organised paintings of Euphorbia Leaves II and Silage Grass VI by Gareth Brown RSMA. Gareth has a way of being able to see abstracted shapes and forms in natural subject matter. I'm a big fan and I've been repeatedly highlighting his paintings in reviews of the RSMA exhibitions