Review: The Pastel Society 126th Annual Exhibition (2025)

I recommend you go and see the 126th Annual Exhibition of The Pastel Society. It opened at the Mall Galleries last week and is on for another two weeks.  This is an OPEN exhibition and is not limited to work by members and it contains 382 artworks in.....

All types of pastel including: soft pastel, hard pastel, oil pastel, ink pastel, water-based pastel, conté crayons or sticks, sanguine, and other dry mediums that are similar in their application including charcoal, chalk, and pencil.

In addition this is what The Pastel Society is about

“Membership of The Society will be granted through a strict assessment of technical skill, originality, innovation, enthusiasm and a willingness to promote the objectives and activities of The Society.”

I've visited three times so far

• at the PV last Tuesday when the Mall galleries were packed with people; 
• again on Thursday morning - with the aim of photographing the exhibition for all those who cannot get to see it in person and 
• again yesterday morning. Can I recommend viewings on Sunday mornings - they're nice and quiet!

The Private View - and this was after some people had gone home!

This post provides you with:

• facts about the exhibition - and how to see it
• events
• prizes
• what's different about the 2025 exhibition
• when is a pastel not a pastel

Facts about the exhibition

You can see the exhibition at the Mall Galleries until 8th February 2025. 

• Open every day (10am-5pm)
• Admission £6, Free for Friends of Mall Galleries and under 25s. Concessions available. No booking required.
• Catalogue is available at the Gallery - or you can view it online

You can also see the artworks in the exhibition ONLINE via

• the Mall Galleries Shop website - 60 artworks to the page + you can see the media used easily 
• The Pastel Society website 
• my photos of the three galleries in which it is held on my Facebook Page
• West Gallery (78 items) - mainly artwork by members
• East Galleries (22 items) - a mix of members and Open Entry
• North Gallery (47 items) - mainly artwork via the Open Entry 

The artwork I liked typically gets a photo of just that work....

The West Gallery

Review: Episode 1 of Landscape Artist of the Year Series 10 (2025)

This is the first of my reviews of the tenth series of Landscape Artist of the Year in 2025. I've reviewed  every series of Landscape Artist of the Year since 2018.

Pods and wildcards in the Privy Garden
next to the baroque extension to Hampton Court Palace

This review follows the same format of my other reviews and considers.

• the location and weather
• the artists' profiles
• themes arising during the episode
• who was shortlisted and who won

Preamble - about my reviews

At the beginning of this new series, for those unfamiliar with the way I review, first a little bit about me. I retired early and have been writing this top 10 art blog in the UK for the last 19 years - and I'm now 70!

• I like to provide a comprehensive perspective on what I review. 
• Hence, my posts tend to be VERY LONG and packed full of CONTENT - and there's a few winners of Artist of the Year series who have thanked me profusely for what they read before they participated!!
• I also like to say what I think
• I often won't say exactly what I think about artwork in the heats as I have absolutely no beef with any of the artists.
• If I make critical comments they tend to be generic, oblique and anonymous 
• ....until we get to the shortlists and near to the final. That's because there's a £10,000 prize at stake and I have always adopted the philosophy on this blog of saying exactly what I think about artwork winning prizes of that magnitude.
• I also say exactly what I think about the way the programme is made and how the judges judge. That's because they're also paid a lot of money to do their job by Sky Arts and they need to be professional and do it well - for the viewing public - and there's been a LOT OF CRITICISM by the viewing public in recent years. Notably about some of the  extremely silly locations and views!

Some of what I say is often a repeat of what I have said in previous years. 

• I do recommend people read my previous reviews before they participate in the programme! 
• You can access my previous reviews of ALL the episodes of Landscape Artist of the Year since 2018 on my Art on Television page.

I welcome contributions on both the programme and my comments from the viewing public and you can find me posting links to my reviews on my Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/makingamark2/ where the reviews tend to get lots of comments.

(I apologise for no comments facility on the blog. It ranks very highly in Google and became a big target for spammers and it just got very tedious so I had to close comments down!)

Preamble - about Landscape Artist of the Year

The episodes are broadcast at 8pm every Wednesday evening on Sky Arts (on Freeview Channel 36 and Sky and Now TV).

• 48 artists are selected - from c.2,000 applications. 
• Eight of these artists compete in each heat on location in a pod by creating an artwork within 4 hours about a selected landscape 
• Six Heats are held at each of the six locations which were filmed last summer in North Wales, Bristol and London.
• 50 wildcard artists also attend each heat - although we see very little of them
• Three pod artists are shortlisted and their submission artwork and heat painting are considered together
• the winner of each heat moves forward to the semi-finals 
• where all the heat winners and one or more wildcard winners will compete for the three places in the final
• the three finalists produce two paintings - a commission (prior to the final) and a painting 
• The Judges remain the same as they have been for all previous nine series
• one artist is chosen as Landscape Artist of the Year
• he or she receives a £10,000 commission to produce an artwork. 

New for 2024 - and continuing in 2025

There is no "wall of submissions". The the Submission Painting is now located in the pod with the artist. That makes it very difficult to assess them together as a group. However I guess the relocation means the Judges tend to look at both together for longer.

New for 2025

• I'll be including extracts from public comments by different individuals from my various LAOTY posts on Facebook in my blog posts
• This year the commission is to create a landscape in a very special location in the South of France
• The painting commissioned (by Sky Arts) will be on view in the LVMH Great Room at The Courtauld Gallery in the Spring - after the end of the series.

Episode 1: Hampton Court

Location and Weather

The Pods at Hampton Court

"The geometry is quite overwhelming"

Call for Entries: Society of Women Artists 164th Annual Exhibition (2025)

This is about the call for entries for the Annual Open Exhibition 2025 of the Society of Women Artists (SWA).  

The SWA seeks works of the highest standard within its specific field. The SWA continues to promote female artists and prides itself on the very diverse nature of the work shown during our Annual Open Exhibition from both our non-members and our members.

Below you can find a summary of how to enter and relevant terms and conditions - although you do need to read the complete set of details.

All the images below are from the Annual Exhibition in 2024.

SWA Annual Exhibition: Call for Entries

The Society of Women Artists exhibits at the Mall Galleries on an annual basis (although not a member of the Federation of the British Artists).  This year the exhibition will be held there between 24th June to 28th June 2025 (5 days ONLY).

The DEADLINE for entries is 8th March 2025. If you enter, you can find out whether you have been successful if you visit the SWA website on or after the 29th March 2025.

In this post you can find:

• details of the exhibition
• who is eligible to enter
• what types of artwork are eligible
• how to enter 

but, first, why enter this exhibition?

Why enter the SWA Annual Exhibition?

East Gallery, SWA Annual Exhibition 2024

The Society of Women Artists have been on an important journey of improvement in recent years. It's one which can provide lessons for other art societies - in a variety of ways.

In general the artwork has improved over time and the number of younger artists now exhibiting with the Society has improved.

There's also a keen sense of the exhibition being a place where women artists can exhibit work on themes with meaning to women - which might get overlooked by panels where men make up the majority of the members.

What was your first art competition?

I've just finished writing an article for The Artist about an art competition/exhibition that I'm particularly familiar with (of which more at a later date this year).

It made me wonder what makes people enter art competitions. 

I know a lot of people find them very scary - which is one of the reasons why I write "calls for entries" posts to demystify some of the aspects which frighten people.

My first art competition

I then remembered that I won an art competition I didn't even know I had entered. However I was six at the time! 

That's a great way not to get nervous!

This very fine painting of a Squirrel enjoying a nut while sat on the branch of a tree with lots of smaller branches won my age group in a competition run by the Hale National Savings Committee. Children were asked to develop a painting based on the word "Saving".

I think the idea was to introduce children to a good habit and maybe get some artwork for use in promoting savings in the area! I've got a feeling my painting went on to the national finals.

I won first prize in an art competition in 1960 - age 6.

The odd thing is I have a very clear memory of the infants classroom in which I created the painting - and how much my teacher liked it. 

I can remember virtually nothing of my infant school days - apart from doing this painting.

Which is, of course, the other great thing about paintings. They help you remember where and when you painted it. 

Drawing development in children

See also this post from the archive about Drawing development in children (courtesy of the Wayback Machine - because the original website is no longer online)

It included a reference to this excellent website about drawing development in children developed by Susan K Donley

This says that age 6, the child arrives at The schematic stage

The child arrives at a "schema," a definite way of portraying an object, although it will be modified when he needs to portray something important. The schema represents the child's active knowledge of the subject. At this stage, there is definite order in space relationships: everything sits on the base line.

I think, despite being 6, I had gone past that stage. The next one is described below

The gang stage: The dawning realism

The child finds that schematic generalization no longer suffices to express reality. This dawning of how things really look is usually expressed with more detail for individual parts, but is far from naturalism in drawing. Space is discovered and depicted with overlapping objects in drawings and a horizon line rather than a base line. Children begin to compare their work and become more critical of it. While they are more independent of adults, they are more anxious to conform to their peers.

I've definitely got overlapping objects!

By way of contrast, Betty Edwards perspective on the 6 year old was as follows 

The Landscape

By five or six, children develop a set of symbols to create a landscape that eventually becomes a single variation repeated endlessly. A blue line and sun at the top of the page and a green line at the bottom become symbolic representations of the sky and ground. Landscapes are compose carefully, giving the impression that removing any single form would throw off the balance of the whole picture.

followed by, age 8

The stage of complexity

At nine or ten years, children try for more detail, hoping to achieve greater realism, a prized goal. Concern for where things are in their drawings is replaced by concern for how things look-- particularly tanks, dinosaurs, super heroes, etc. for boys; models, horses, landscapes, etc. for girls.

Watch Landscape Artist of the Year 2025

Landscape Artist of the Year starts next week. Below I've identified 

• the day, dates and times that all the programmes in the series are being broadcast
• the locations they went to
• what the commission is!

Series 10 in 2025

Broadcast Dates and Times

Most people will watch live on Wednesday evenings at 8pm. You can view it via Sky Arts, Freeview and NOW

However if you want to set your recorder or like getting up in the middle of the night, you can watch it at 2am!

• Heat 1 - 22nd January 2025
• Heat 2 - 29th January 2025
• Heat 3 - 5th February 2025
• Heat 4 - 12th February 2025
• Heat 5 - 19th February 2025
• Heat 6 - 26th February 2025

Clare Rose's submission to get a place in a pod
see yesterday's post about
Call for Entries - Landscape Artist of the Year 2026 (Series 11)

This is not the order they were filmed in - because they film at two venues at three locations - and then mix them up to arrive at the heats which are broadcast. There's usally something very good or special about the first one.

Then we have:

• Semi Finals - 5th March 2025
• Finals - 12th March 2025
• Plus the Commission Programme - which in recent times has followed straight after the Finals Programme.

I suggest you keep an eye out on social media as the artists are beginning to post pics of their their experience - in a way which does not disclose outcomes!

Locations

It looks to me as if there was a bit of a bodge going on re securing locations to film back in Summer 2024. 

HEATS

When I wrote my post How to watch Landscape Artist of the Year 2025 being filmed - these were the only ones which had been highlighted.

More had to exist - and I've highlighted the new ones to be announced below - in red.

There are supposed to be three locations with two venues at each

BRISTOL

• Bristol Harbourside (by the Cottage Ferry Terminal) onThursday 13th June 2024
• the iconic Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol - which I suspect must be the second Bristol location 

SNOWDONIA

• Llanberis, Snowdonia (near the National Slate Museum) on 
• Wednesday 19th June and
• Thursday 20th June 2024
• Llanberis Lake at the base of Yr Wyddfa (Mount Snowdon) - which I'm guessing is the second Snowdonia location

THIRD HEAT VENUE

I'm guessing this is West London - near to the Storyvault Films HQ.

We know from recently publicity that they filmed at

• the historic grounds of Hampton Court Palace
• the newly redeveloped St. Pancras Basin. 

Presenter Stephen Mangan at the "new bit" of Hampton Court
- with the amazing yews.

I'll just insert my sketches of the Yews at this juncture - done 13 years ago! (see Hampton Court Palace and its 300 year old Yew Trees)