WELCOMING YOU BACK
We're open again, with all the necessary adaptions, after the coronavirus shutdown. We have an upgraded cleaning régime, hand-sanitiser dispensers, a one-way system and floor markings around the gallery, and do need to ensure proper social-distancing is adhered to - but of course most of us have been practising such measures since March.
We're initially operating on reduced hours
1-3 July (Wed-Fri): 10am-2pm
Commencing Sat 4 July: 10am-3pm Tues-Sat
For now, the Eatery remains closed
Our workshop programme remains suspended, though we hope to open some classes by the autumn. In the meantime, keep an eye on our website for information about summer online classes that don't require students to use specialised tools and materials.
It's very uncertain when our live music programme will be back on track, but we can continue to support our favourite musicians by buying, directly via their websites, CDs and other merchandise. | | | | This year's Painting with Words Exhibition opened just 10 days before lockdown commenced - and will therefore continue until 25 July. This will be followed (1 Aug to 19 Sept) by our annual Shropshire Guild of Contemporary Crafts Exhibition, when the gallery will be full of gorgeous local crafts for visitors to browse and pick out their favourites.
Coming up in the autumn, Merseyside-based Re-View Textile will be showing vibrant examples of all forms of textile art. Our own Borderland Visual Arts, who missed their scheduled exhibition slot in May/June, will also be exhibiting. | 
LESLEY FISHER
Provençal Gateway
Mixed media | | | Thanks to everyone who placed orders online during lockdown. We continue to present an extensive collection of artwork online as well as items from our shop, and can take telephone orders. | | 
Spread the cost of your purchase over 10 months with no interest | | | | ARTISTS IN LOCKDOWN
Thanks to all those artists who sent us work created whilst under lockdown. Some have found it a real challenge and have lost income; with fewer distractions, some feel the isolation has given them time to think about new creative projects or return to unfinished work; whilst others feel they are pretty well practised at isolation and haven't felt much of a difference. Your photos and video clips are being showcased on our website in a special online exhibition. Just a few examples below... | | JUDITH SAMUEL'S STARGAZING BIRDS In March 2020, using ink, oil paint and gold leaf, I filled my studio with paintings of birds - 36 species from across the world, the ordinary, the exotic, the endangered and the not-so-rare, but with one thing in common - each bird is gazing at the stars. I wanted to recreate a moment of stillness, a sense of awe for the natural world.
Originally this artwork was intended to be exhibited at Plas Bodfa on Anglesey, but in this time of lockdown I installed the work in my own studio and (CLICK SEAGULL RIGHT) invite you to step inside. | | | BOB KNOWLES
Lockdown has been hard due to exhibitions and teaching suddenly ending: hence end of income. It seemed at first a great opportunity but it has been difficult to produce artwork. Despite this, I carried on and now have over 20 wooden bowls and numerous wooden forms to show for it. The latest set of work, mostly turned, is a series of pieces all with a flaw of some kind. This was not deliberate but, after producing a number of them, I noticed all had something that made them imperfect. I was delighted that unconsciously I was creating artwork reflecting our current condition.
 We now have a regular visitor to our garden in the form of a flawed magpie. He has no tail and a damaged wing. Curious that another flawed form has caught my attention.
I now feel I am back on track and moving back into steel. The only thing needed now is an audience to complete the circle. | | | DANIEL YEOMANS I've had a long period of creative block. Having moved to Switzerland, not finding a studio, not really being able to meet people, after a while I realised that so many creative people must be going through this so I would try and put it in a painting. So my latest painting, called Creative Block, is about expectations and creative struggles. Here's a link to the time-lapse video and, below, the final painting. 
I also wrote a blog for anyone wanting to try a self-portrait themselves
https://danieljamesyeomans.com/how-to-paint-a-self-portrait | | | JOHN NEILSON My work as a lettercarver has continued much as usual. Inscriptional commissions usually take a long time from start to finish anyway, and I have had three memorial stones to keep me busy, all of which were first discussed at least a year ago. The first is a large replica 18th-century sandstone tomb slab commemorating a Methodist preacher in South Wales. I tried to carve this in the fairly unplanned, free spirit of inscriptions of that time. The other two are new slate memorials, both quite local to the Oswestry area. The photographs show me carving dates on one of them. |  | | | KINOKULTURE Oswestry's community cinema It has been confirmed that cinemas can re-open in July (subject to conditions). In line with many other independent cinemas, Kinoculture is taking a more cautious approach and planning for a possible re-opening in September. | | |
Click on graphic for more information
| | STATUES IN OUR MIDST
Highly-visible on their plinths, many public statues today are seen as divisive relics of past times. Some of the people portrayed had no problem with conquest and exploitation, and made fortunes on the back of human misery.
Now more people are demanding a say over controversial public statues and call for the worst of our so-called heroes and philanthropists to be removed. But would their removal make us even less aware of the ills of our history? Perhaps we could move them to a museum and rewrite their plaques to provide a more balanced account of who they were and what they did. | |  He's alright
Wilfred Owen statue, Oswestry |  And so is he!
Wilberforce statue, Hull | | DISTANCE DANCING
 Remko de Waal/EPA Ballerina Kira Hilli of the Dutch National Ballet social-distancing on the streets of Amsterdam in a whacky 3-metre-wide tutu, made of denim and specially designed for the recently-premièred Safe Distance Ballet | | | SOTHEBY'S RE-OPENS WITH AUCTION OF
STANLEY SPENCER WARTME GEM  Photograph courtesy of Sotheby's Cottage Garden, Leonard Stanley, painted in April 1940 and quite unlike the artist's multi-figure compositions, will be on view at Sotheby's London gallery for three weeks before its sale on 28 July, part of an exhibition covering five centuries of Western art. Visitors are required to wear masks, use hand sanitiser and maintain social distancing.
Celebrating the fondness the English feel for their gardens, however modest, the slightly tumbledown plot is dotted with springtime daffodils, tulips, hyacinths and primroses, with daisies, clover and dandelions running riot on the lawn. It is one of a series of garden scenes painted while Britain was at war - and it is estimated will fetch between £300,000 and £500,000 at auction . | | Tel: 01691 657575
email: willowgalleryoswestry.gmail.com
Website: willowgalleryoswestry.org
Facebook: Willow
Address: 56 Willow Street, Oswestry, Shropshire SY11 1AD Editor: Hilary Moorcroft
July 2020 | | |
