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I work mostly with oil, watercolour and charcoal.

However, I am particularly interested in working in charcoal drawings. The freedom offered by the use of charcoal creates a dramatic and varied mark. Shadows and open white spaces take on realities that have a gravitas not discovered with pencil. The fluidity and chiaroscuro provide the observer with an opportunity to create new impressions with the imagination.

The use of charcoal also has a tradition, which one can build upon. There have been many masterpieces made using this material and even artists starting their careers are able to express with these sticks something that seems to unravel emotion and touch something within our human psyche and spirituality not discovered in other works. Perhaps it is due to its very nature – part of what the earth has always produced.

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I trained as a biologist before graduating in fine art. Drawing is the primary recording tool of both disciplines and also an endlessly flexible medium in which I can explore my interest in line, tone and form. I am currently experimenting with ways of combining my knowledge of biology with the broader perspectives and references of fine art.

My work tends to focus on the natural world of everyday: a piece of waste ground, a back-yard vegetable garden. The anatomy of plants, insects etc. becomes the anatomy of a landscape.

In the two drawings seen here, the plant forms are deliberately depicted in the nineteenth century tradition of highly-worked botanical engravings, but instead of being presented as specimens in isolation, they’re seen in their natural surroundings. Although both drawings are worked up in a similar way their energies and impact are completely different.

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My work is concerned with an ongoing engagement with the language of drawing and its place within contemporary artistic practice. For me, drawing becomes a site in which to explore and celebrate notions of conversation and relationship – that between the mark and its reserve, the drawing and its viewer, image making and its creation of meaning. Often plucked from their original context, the images aim to deny any fixed reading offering instead a multiple of possibilities – glimpses into moments of ‘becoming’.

My recent body of drawings explore the often bizarre, intriguing and sometimes problematic relationship between humans and animals.

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Second place in the Kyffin Williams Drawing Prize 2009
It is with a degree of reservation that I have to admit that this is a time of particular uncertainty in the artist’s life. I say ‘artist’ because the him in me has always been difficult to sustain and he is yet to offer me a practical solution towards a time when this might not be the case.

To care for the curve of a nose or the hem of a dress or the curious history hinted at in the corners of a loved one’s mouth; to have faith in the possibilities of a line, the possibility of departure; to have faith in a pencil, a brush and a canvas that seems utterly ill-equipped to pay for its part in this life and to do this obsessively, without reservation and with the unceasing curiosity of a child’s mind remains for me (and him) the greatest challenge and the highest of arts.

This model was great fun to draw. Her clothing and her shoes were bright, strong colours, she had bobbed, blond hair, scarlet lipstick and spectacles. The liveliness and colouring of the subject was the inspiration for the way that I drew her, although little actual colour is used in the work itself.

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John Berger described drawing as ‘a gathering of encounters’. Absolutely right.
I draw the things that I like. It’s a way of capturing them, owning them and putting yourself into them. It’s a form of possession: ‘a gathering’. Drawing requires commitment and concentration, its slow, difficult, totally absorbing and is the bedrock of all the visual arts. It is honest, haptic and hand made. It was ever thus.

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Living and working in North Wales, I am fascinated by the fast changing weather and dramatic skies. Light and shadow give form and atmosphere to a subject and observing the area day to day allows me to identify views which could form paintings one day when the weather is favourable. I enjoy exploring the many landscapes of North Wales – coastline, lakes, mountains and scenes of rural life.

I find inspiration in each of the seasons. From the earthy browns of autumn, through the bare vegetation of winter revealing striking structures, to the fresh light of spring and summer filtering through the new growth of wildflowers and unfurling ferns in mossy woodland.

I paint in oil and draw with charcoal, a medium that lends itself well to the depiction of strong light and shade, and the textures found in old stonework and woodlands so typical of the area.

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I moved to Anglesey with my family in 1978. Having done very little art since leaving Manchester Art College in the sixties, I was inspired by the wonderful local natural history to begin to paint again. That led to work being printed in two botanical painting books and ‘The Flower Arranger’ and also to a Gold Medal awarded by the Royal Horticultural Society in 2006 for a series of twelve month by month pages of flowers, trees, lichen and fungi found on the island, which I named ‘An Anglesey Calendar’.

I like to work with coloured pencil which is just beginning to be recognised as a fine art medium. It allows for multiple layering of colours and great detail. This particular branch of oak galls inspired me to depict it with graphite pencil as it was already an interesting monotone subject. I particularly enjoy working into the fine detail and developing the highlights and shadows and also showing the inevitable imperfections that are on most plant material.

There is a moment between night and day when I feel at one with the landscape that surrounds me and the forces that shape it. I want to explore it’s high and low horizons, edges dotted with our temporary structures, clinging onto water sodden earth and stone. For me spontaneity and speed is vital in expressing emotion in a mark, and I strive for the ambiguity that can come with each stroke, bleed or scuff acting differently. I attempt to combine drawing with painterly movement, pouring and seeping the ink on the paper so that some of the shapes seem to make themselves and the details are pushed to the edges.

I primarily focus on the relationship between chance and control whilst working.

I consider the photo journalism work of my father and the disciplines learnt in designing for the theatre the strongest and most consistent influences on my work.

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Born in 1943 and brought up in London but since the mid 1960s have lived in Cumbria, Scotland and Wales. Attended a full time foundation course at Bangor during the 1980s. Recently attended University College of Wales Life Long Learning department’s Life Classes. I have work shown at various venues, was commissioned to paint Mural at UCW Bangor and a number of the information boards at Llyn Alaw, Anglesey and also illustrate site leaflets.

Charcoal drawing of Chrysanthemums - I waited until they were about to be thrown out. I found that the dead desiccated blossoms and stick like stems caused me to draw them with enthusiasm. No thought of sunny garden days just blackness with a little light. Rather than the exact representation of landscape and objects, I try to interpret their colour and shapes, and I work in various media depending on the subject.

“32 WEEKS” portrays the female form in the later stages of pregnancy.

I was privileged that the model – a friend of mine who was pregnant for the first time, agreed to sit for me every four weeks throughout her pregnancy.

Drawing from life is the starting point, or essence of all my work. To hone my hand/eye co-ordination I strive to draw on a daily basis, much as a concert pianist practising scales.

If the subject matter is moving – as in horses, musicians and dancers that only serves to increase the adrenalin flow as I search to express the spirit, to grasp the core of the reality in front of me. This drawing practice forms the bedrock from which the rest of my work springs.

Energetic mark making is, to me, the essence of drawing – achieving the right combination of tool, medium and support paves the way for everything to come together – a gathering that celebrates the hand and eye singing in tune.

‘Cup’ is one of a series of 50 drawings made whilst attending a residency at the Philadelphia Clay Studio, in the United States. The work relates specifically to the death of two close male friends at a young age from cancer.

The drawings are imbued with transitory sense, at any moment the clay could be washed from the surface of the paper to leave nothing but a stain, clay has flaked off from the images. Bodies with a pencil outline purposefully have a fluid interior, as if dissolving, whilst others have no discernable boundary and are bleeding off the page, not restricted by the paper edge.

Cup, is a self-portrait drawn in clay and pencil, the material used relates directly to the object I am holding. The cup and the action of cupping one’s hand is a sign of comfort and sustenance.

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I regard drawing as the primary form of visual expression. It is in the process of drawing that I learn to see and first become aware of creative possibilities. The three works chosen for exhibition show some different aspects of the process.

Lucas
A quick study in line moving freely from the general to the particular. The loosely spaced lines vaguely suggesting shadows and the posture of the body merge to form the tonalities which, more precisely, describe the head and character of the face.

The Singers
A drawing of choral singers showing their different expressions and intense commitment to the sound they make. This is partly achieved by variation in line, broken edges of forms and unifying dark background tone contrasting with the white paper.

Workmen
The drawing of two workmen emerges vertically from white paper, the suggestion of hands and the darker tones of clothes, to the more defined faces. All these elements are shown through simple marks of lines and patches of tone. They are set against a dark background which has more variation and luminosity than appears at first sight.

The drawing ‘Untitled’ is from an ongoing body of work of over 400 watercolour drawings and several 3D objects entitled ‘From Brynna To Merthyr Mawr & Others Stories’.

‘They are snapshots of memory, events and observation of a child’s upbringing, recollections of life in one small Welsh community, fairly insular in its day. Together they work in the emotions in the same way that folktales do, as an emotional response to the enclosed surroundings, defining the community by using symbols identifiable mainly to them alone, drawing us into fantastical world, bringing magic to the mundane, making the extraordinary out of the daily grind’.
Pete Stevenson, Aberystwyth, 2009.

I love colour and the sensuousness of paint but find that my original reason for creating the image gets subjugated by the processes of painting! For me, painting means months of building up and knocking down, decisions about surface, colour etc which frequently take me further away from my initial responses.

I came to realize that a subject had to inspire in me a need, an urgency, to create its likeness. Ironically I still go through a similar process to paint but find that drawing has an intuitiveness, passion and spontaneity which retains that initial excitement. For me there is nothing to mach drawing.

I have tried working small but find the expansiveness of working big so much more satisfying.

My landscapes need elements of ‘taking a line for a walk’ as in ‘Windforms’, a series of complex, rolling, interlocking fields and windblown trees on the side of the Straits.

My work is an investigation into techniques used by artists and other practitioners in constructing interior and domestic spaces on a two-dimensional plane. I study the works of some of my favourite artists, dissecting paintings to examine and comment on their construction. The resulting studies are represented as illustrations; interpretations of the techniques examined and illustrate my own personal situation of the time.

The drawing featured makes direct reference to issues faced when dealing with an ongoing digestive condition, Achalasia in 2006/7. In the grim image I position myself as the character, examining changing perceptions of myself, my body and its functions within the contrived, measured and intimate space.

Using animals/creatures as added characters is a tool to add life to the pictures without making the reference too personal. They also add a further thematic depth, keeping in the realm of fantasy and cartoon in references for perception, sex and medical diagnosis.

When printmaking I create images directly from my sketches by producing a negative. This is then exposed onto the screen allowing me to squeeze different colours through the mesh just like a stencil. Sometimes painting on the screen directly with the ink to produce backgrounds for the prints.

Working in layers I build up the image and use the stencil again and again creating different interpretations of the original drawing. It might be on recycled paper or even layers of paper or material with batik.

Drawing is the most important part of my work and it is these original lines I manipulate within my work.

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Muriel Delahaye is a figurative painter whose primary interest is in painting people against the background of the sea and the beach which she can see clearly from her studio windows.

Originally from Oldham, Lancashire, she trained at Manchester Regional College of Arts and then worked at Jersey Potteries where she hand-decorated china in the 1950s. Muriel then returned to Manchester where she gained a teaching certificate and, after teaching for a short while, she moved with her son to Borth Cardigan Bay where she has now lived and worked for over 30 years.

Drawing has always been a part of me and a natural force within that needed an outlet for expression. Life drawing in particular feels like the foundation for everything else because it requires a high level of observation and concentration and the sheer rawness of flesh means there are no hiding places.

I have used crayons for many years but recently have searched for spontaneity and vigour in my work and to move away from the tight controlled style that can come from using this medium. The result of working with a high level of energy and speed layering the crayon colours on white paper in what seems a hap hazard way creates a piece of work that has luminosity and vibrancy but there is nothing hap hazard about the execution.

Skin is an incredible palette as it has all colours in it from the obvious pinks and yellow to greens, lilacs, purples and reds and that’s before any reflected colours from the surroundings. I find searching for these colours and portraying them along with the structure of the body, the pose and the mood of the sitter exciting and exhilarating. I hope the onlooker enjoys it as much as I do.

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The area, the country and things in my surroundings have and still inspire me whilst I create my work and I know that this is unlikely to change in the future.

At present I feel that I am still developing and I investigate in order to learn, to discover ideas, styles and new materials. During my first year at University in Cardiff (UWIC) I was influenced by Picasso, mainly by his line drawings and now two years later I feel that this influence is manifesting itself in my work.

This is a picture of my great grandfather Moses Jones from Penrhyndeudraeth. I was inspired to produce it after seeing it whilst looking through family history papers.

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Ruth Jên Evans is an established and prolific printmaker, who has exhibited extensively both here in Wales and abroad.  Although printing is her main activity, she has expanded her skills to include design, illustration, murals and part-time teaching.  Having worked extensively as a n artist in education, in galleries, schools and colleges, she has also gained experience working and running many community based projects.

Her design and illustration work can be seen on posters, CD and book covers, as well as her own range of t-shirts and cards.

The three drawings I made in response to the Kyffin Williams Drawing Prize followed a year of painting, so were the first drawings I’d made for a long time.

My pictures evolve from observations, memories and imaginings. I set these still lives up in my studio and worked intensely, using a combination of pencil, biro, watercolour crayons, charcoal and pastel.

I enjoyed the rigorous exercise in looking and mark-making in response to that, followed by a dreamier sort of experimenting.

Ink & Instinct
I like to draw with pen and ink. A line in ink is clear, strong, and, of the moment. The pen is intimidating as it demands your commitment; there is no second-chance with black ink on white paper. Nevertheless, confidence blooms with ink and the line becomes more assertive, more instinctive. Perfection does not interest me, neither does imitation. Capturing the essence of a scene in its purest form with a few lines and dabs of colour is what excites me about drawing. The immediacy of the line seems more reflective of the world we live in rather than the cultivated line of a rehearsed masterpiece.

Charlotte Reading

I enjoy many media and subjects, but am currently concentrating on the pleasures of still life and the fascination of portraits. The still lies have been the focus of my exhibited work, but so far the portraits have not been shown. Since early 2008 a small group of artists has met for monthly evening portrait sessions in my house. Our subjects are usually friends rather than professional sitters and I usually work in charcoal, pastels or paint.

However, I had worked with Charlotte for a couple of years before she sat for us, so I was sufficiently familiar with her features to take a confident approach, which is essential with ink. The amaryllis was in full bloom and too good to leave out of the composition.

I have always been interested in the equine form. I work mainly from images taken at horse events and agricultural shows and these form the basis of my work, but they are used merely as a starting point and from there I use the knowledge and experience gained drawing, riding and working with horses to develop the work. My early work concentrated on angular, linier studies as I have always been fascinated by the essence and simplicity of a single, fluid line. With my most recent ink drawings I have been trying to capture the dynamics and tension of the horses’ relationship with man. I am in the process of exploring gestural, drawings that will convey solid form, structure and movement through expressive, energetic mark making; it’s all about trying to capture the spirit and soul of the beast.

Head works intuitively, using drawing as an exploratory means of dreaming. Working both from memory and observation she creates environments where the physical forms of her characters are interchangeable, mutating and sometimes even elastic. There is a duality in the imagery – danger juxtaposed with tenderness, seduction with repulsion. Head suggests the power of the mind over the body as she explores subconscious desires and fears, metamorphosis between man and beast and subtle anthropomorphic shifts. In her graphic animations the tremulous sensitivity of her drawing technique is countered by moments of fluidity and release, piecing together sequences like half-remembered dreams.

Observation and Imagination - A tiny, Horse-chestnut-shell boat, floats on a sea of pure white cotton. Within it, a sleepy butterfly nestles in safety from outward perils.
The whole scenario evolved and the components were found as the work progressed. How to portray the sea? The rise and fall of table-cloth waves of course!
What a lovely tonal contrast, with the light from my studio window. In line and tone the work developed, using a full range of pencils from 4H to 9B plus graphite sticks.
I need a boat on my ocean; what better than a spikey Horse chestnut shell?
What about a snail? A butterfly has passed peacefully away on a sunny café window sill, its folded wings mimicking a canvas sail.
Can you spot the cactus, secretly snapped from my mother-in-law’s plant?
I wonder when she’ll notice her best table cloth has gone missing.

The work that I am showing in this year’s exhibition is the result of staying in one place for six years. Since 2003 I have worked exclusively from the landscape within a seven mile radius of our farm in Knucklas / Cnwclas, Nr Knighton, Powys.

I don’t work from photographs and I often revisit the places that I paint and draw in many times. The research of landscape painting is important to me.
I begin to walk. I make a series of pen drawings and then small sketches in gouache and on site paintings in acrylics. Acrylics help me respond to the landscape live as it were and I admire the work of the late Peter Prendergast.

‘Power line’ is a ‘white work’ in gesso and graphite that developed out of both the pen studies and the paintings. It is a gestural work intended to evoke the vigour of Landscape. A comment on how looking at the landscape is very different from being in it.

‘Crucifix’ is a reflection on the common place nature of the cross in today’s landscape.

In the ‘Corrigan – stone study’ series I have brought stone and grass and ice samples back into the studio and made the work ‘Carreg Du’.

Born in Bangor 1944. I have had an interest in fine art since my teenage years and followed numerous classes in painting, sculpture and drawing. Whilst maintaining an interest in art over the years, I did little practical work until I restarted on my retirement.

My main interest is in drawing and in the art and techniques of the Renaissance period. I find my inspiration in the drawings of Michael Angelo Buonarroti, Raffaello Sanzio and Albrecht Durer.

I believe that drawing is the fundamental of all art, and the decline in craft level in contemporary art is due to the lack of the teaching and application of drawing.

Bryn a self taught artist living on Anglesey began painting about four years ago. He has since held four exhibitions at local libraries and is looking forward to exhibiting a new body of work later this year. Predominantly, his main work features the seascapes and landscapes of the Isle of Anglesey and the rugged terrain of Snowdonia in both oil and watercolour, but lately his interest in portraiture has begun to lead him down other exciting paths.

Working on the drawing of ‘Hero’ was an emotional journey in which I have attempted to portray a story behind a face, my subject concerning the impact and futility of war.

The face was chosen from the photographic archive of the Imperial War Museum, one face among hundreds of captured prisoners of the First World War, and especially intriguing, since despite the swathes of dirty bandages, the remainder of the prisoner’s face describes both the weariness and trauma of defeat while at the same time, epitomising pride in adversity.

The image is timeless: son, husband, father, hero: no special uniform required to show rank or nationality.

I have used graphite, charcoal and chalk to create a sensitive portrayal, polishing and scratching into the surface as though making a photograph which might be found anywhere in the world, in any box of family mementos.

Drawing is a core element and its process creates meanings in its own right not just a supplement to my sculpture practice but a primary medium. I try to push the boundaries of drawing in fresh directions. Its immediacy allows me to bring new visions to life. Drawing is a global visual language and “The Process of Peace” is a drawing that I hope will express this. The medium of cast iron dust is magic and I never lose that sense of wonder and power that drawing brings to us all.

Steffan Johnson is an artist from Caerphilly, South Wales. He earned his BA degree from Carmarthen University and has also studied in Bath University. He graduated in 2005. He found his interest in art when he was studying at school, and has pursued painting and drawing since, but found his creative niche in oil painting and mixed media drawings. His work has recently been inspired by the history of his home village, Machen, as well as the aesthetics of oil paints and also painting plein air. Steffan has recently finished a PGCE and is pursuing teaching in a local Welsh medium primary school. He has shown work in diverse places from Bath Abbey to the Washington Gallery in Penarth. The Riverfront Arts Centre in Newport, and the Norwegian Church Arts Centre in Cardiff Bay.
You can follow updates of his art work at www.steffspainting.blogspot.com

I draw my ideas directly from rural Dyfed. I was raised in one of these communities, a particular place where the boundary between mythology and this world is ambiguous. That was a time that belonged to the horse, before large scale mechanisation and a time when the country was full of original characters, their bodies bent from physical work and their imaginations alive with stories.

Although I left for Art College in Swansea to learn the craft of drawing my imagination did not entirely lose its grasp on locality and by accepting the position of head of art at Preseli School I was back in an area not unlike my place of birth, namely a neighbourly wold with all its heroism. After that I planted further roots in Cardigan, the region of the Welsh Cobs. These elements – the agricultural community, the rural poise and the excellence of the Welsh Cob – fire my creativity.

Conveying the drama and power of the landscape looking down the Lleyn Peninsula over Yr Eifl and down past Garn Fadryn towards Mynydd Rhiw was the intention. I enjoyed the cloud shadows on the slopes and the sea, the shapes of the mountains, the bright sun to the North-west and the patterns of heather, gorse, stones, ferns and grasses, sometimes sharply outlined but often blending into each other. I used black paint with graphite powder to create a deep black applied with brush, pen and finger.

My background is in textiles although drawing has always been a thread running through my creative practice. Since graduating I have endeavoured to maintain and develop my drawing skills.

The human form has been an enduring theme in my work and I have drawn the figure in many different situations. These drawings have been made in life classes as well as observing performances by dancers and acrobats.

I have utilised my skills and experience in teaching life drawing in both adult and further education colleges.

My recent drawings focus on the exploration of line using charcoal.

I attempt to create images which, while being rooted in the experienced world are not intended to represent specific phenomena. Rather, by combining such elements as line and colour, together with implicit notions of movement, light and space, I intend to make images which afford ambiguous fleeting glimpses of memory, the passage of time and emotional experience.

Born 1947, Bournemouth. Lives and works in Wales.

I have worked full time as a visual artist since 1999, and have spent those years exploring ways to communicate thoughts and concerns with my paintings and drawings.

It’s not all you see on the surface, it goes deeper than that. The work goes back many years; what I have seen, experienced, touched and collected.

My present surroundings, here in Wales, inform the work, and inspire the subject matter.

Then with the painting and drawing I remember, and try to make sense of it.

A graduate of Liverpool Art College. Her tutors were Adrian Henry and Roger McGough. She was educated at Llangefni Comprehensive School in the early sixties.

A creative and inspirational teacher of art and design, her career span over twenty years. Jane was always fascinated by the changing face of landscape, and the rocks and native life of Anglesey and, after retiring due to ill health, returned to the island.

Her intensely personal paintings reflect her deep affinity with the Welsh landscape captured in mixed media with a unique style.

“I feel a deep ancient life force trapped in the rocky outcrops, the cromlechs, in the small paddocks and grey lichen coloured walls that lead to coves and rocky headlands”

‘In These Walls Welsh Minds Meet’ – features Kyffin Williams, Ceri Richards, Gwen John, Peter Prendergast and Josef Herman listening to Dylan Thomas reading from his poem ‘Do not go gently into that good night…’ These six artists were pivotal in their contribution to Welsh Culture.

There are symbolic elements throughout the piece beginning with the setting which is an adaptation of the room featured in Van Gough’s ‘Potato Eaters’. Although Van Gough had no links with Welsh Culture, he was a man of the people and together with the artists above produced works reflecting the journeys and memories of their experiences. Rodin and Titian are also featured. All these form part of my artistic journey whilst at Coleg Menai. Through the window, is a view of Wales’ most iconic landmark – the magnificent Snowdon.

On the right hand side of the table in the foreground is the following news clipping ‘….but for an art lover it is the product itself that is important…..’ – a possible subject for discussion after the reading?

The images of Dog 4 – 6 were made alongside many other drawings as part of an exercise aiming to broaden the themes and imagery that I was trying to incorporate into more “finished” works on canvas.

My original interpretation for the dog imagery was that of the “black dog”, but it soon became apparent, through the character, dynamism and expressiveness of the work that there are a lot more themes and interpretations present than first meets the eye.

I have subsequently incorporated the dog theme into four paintings alongside other such imagery as vermin, pigeons, kingfisher, skulls, plastic carrier bags, wine bottles and toxic waste.

I am interested in the realisation of eternal form. The rhythms and patterns, harmony and balance inherent in nature are my guide. I am interested in creating works which contain and reflect these qualities, and which unite the human soul in this dance.

My approach relates to the Eastern Artistic perspective: Inspiration lies with the rhythm of the ‘cosmic life’.

In Taoist landscape painting all elements are there in order to emphasise by contrast the void. In my practice the elements, predominantly figurative, are also played out against a luminous void. I try to depersonalise the figure so as to make a general archetypal statement about the soul and its position within the cosmic order.

My work spans Eastern and Western perspectives, combining observational drawing techniques, glazing and sfumato, and geometry. I continue to experiment with different methods and processes in order to most effectively capture the vision I have.

I draw birds, mainly chickens. I love to watch them move and hear them chattering amongst themselves as well as calling to me asking for food or showing off when they have found a particularly tasty prize. Running around and trying to defend it from the others they display traits seen in wild birds and in other animals. This behaviour fascinates and intrigues me. Some are objects of pure beauty, some are bred for food production but all are intriguing and spellbinding characters, which I feel compelled to draw. My drawings are characterful interpretations, they are almost like caricatures of birds but what do they really mean? Am I commenting on the way we intensively produce food from animals? Am I turning them into pets? Or am I perhaps depicting my own alter ego? Or is it just an interesting drawing? I leave this for the viewer to decide.

Because of its angular nature and many surface irregularities and fault, a piece of rock is an ideal subject matter for a drawing. However, drawing a lump of rock is merely an exercise. To motivate me to begin such a large piece of work the subject itself would have to be inspirational. Being primarily a mountain painter, scale and drama would be two elements I would be looking for in my search. Hidden away on the side of a damp gully high up on Clogwyn Du’r Arddu is this large overhanging precipice. This had all the prerequisites I was looking for: drama, scale and threat. It has wonderful detail, corners, grooves, arêtes, cracks and overhangs – a spectacular rock sculpture.

The climber, despite being the title, plays second fiddle to the intimidating situation he finds himself in.

Originally from Morfa Nefyn, Niki Pilkington graduated in June 09 with a First Class (Hons) degree in Fashion Promotion & Illustration from Ravensbourne, London. She has just finished assisting Fashion Photographer, Rankin and now works between London and Wales as a freelance artist, specialising in portrait commissions and undertaking all types of projects.

“I have always been fascinated by a certain type of girl – the ones that look different in some way that you just have to stare at. They’re confident, charismatic, flamboyant and attractive. Their choice of clothing and individual style stirs my imagination. I’m intrigued and compelled not only by the way they look, but also by their own perception of how they look.”

With work that feeds off the everyday people and places she sees, her illustrations aim not just to document, but also to understand why these girls have drawn her to them.

I am an Environmental Artist, based in Flintshire, working with natural and recycled materials to create temporary sculptures, drawings and installations.

The artwork I have submitted for the exhibition is a pencil and mixed media design sheet, illustrating ideas based around embossing a beech tree for a previous exhibition in Llanarmon, Dyffryn Ceiriog in North East Wales. Thus, the working idea sheet is a compendium of sketches of what I proposed to do, just prior to drawing on to the actual tree bark itself.

These sketches documented ideas such as decorating the beech surface with the names of past prominent poets of the Ceiriog Valley, or incorporating simple beech leaf outlines, envisaging using charcoal to rub into the bark.

Sketching out ideas gave me lots of useful insights into what worked best and in the end I selected beech leaf patterns as the most effective design to transfer onto the tree trunk.

In Blankscape Series 3 the sprawling abstract image of a landscape emerges map like as if being woven into a blanket relating to ethnicity of place by referencing the Welsh textile (hence the name blanket and landscape i.e. Blankscape). The mark-making is one of an expressionist trying to liberate a primordial aesthetic. My work is concerned with cultural identity, language and mapping. People feel excluded because they do not speak the same language. Being able to speak the same language as someone is a powerful part of one’s identity enabling us to fully engage with individuals on a basic amiable level as well as with whole communities on a survival level. Frustrations and tensions in the mark making, expressing feelings of not being understood or not understanding others including loved ones, enables the Blankscape images to have a universal meaning across boundaries of cultures and personal experiences.

I am interested in making work that alludes to a specific object, or kind of object. Put simply, I make things that look like stuff – stuff being the materials, objects, constructions and buildings that collectively form an everyday landscape, its constituent parts standardised, normalised and provisional.

A grid of hand-drawn lines on a surface suggests a wire mesh, and in turn implicates a constructed landscape.

This picture is part of a series of faces on the maps of Wales which was started in 2005.

Playful, enjoyable and accidental elements are part of my processes. Whilst drawing I will note striking names such as Nant (stream) or cwm (valley), or names that are relevant to me personally. Subsequently and in relation to technique a symbol may impair on an eye or lips or the map’s colours will affect tonality. In order to control this I use an electric eraser to remove marks or to create highlights.

The title of the drawing in the series is Journey/Language/Identity. Whilst drawing I travel through the land, through the two languages and therefore my identity.

There is no monolingual Welsh map available therefore it is not possible for me to travel through my country in my mother tongue alone ….without an eraser. Despite this my hope is that the face means more than the surface.

My work reflects upon the loss of traditions, skills and craftsmanship passed from generation to generation and the memories imbedded in these undervalued activities. Every piece that I make is intricate in detail thus enticing the eye to recognise that which is often overlooked or taken for granted. For me the act of drawing is similar to that of the reaction that many have towards insects; a constant battle between facing it and running away. I do not know where my ability comes from so I fear that I will fail me. When a piece is finished I feel like I am looking at it for the first time and only now am I being allowed to see the outcome of the conversation between my hand and my eye. It is the desire to find this unexpected beauty, created with mere pencil and paper, which draws me back into battle.

Dawn gives a feeling of optimism and hope for the future, the dawning of a new day, and for a few lucky cocklers on the Dee Estuary a reliable source of work and income.

Before 2008 cockle pickers from far and wide would harvest the Dee Estuary, creating a boom bust economy and damaging the fragile habitat for fish and bird life, such as oystercatcher, knot, curlew, and redshank.

With around 9000 tonnes of cockles on the beds at the start of the season, it was no wonder that this created gold rush fever come harvest time.

Now thanks to North Wales Police cracking down on illegal cockling, and the introduction by the Environment Agency Wales of a new regulating and licensing order the Dee Estuary now provides a sustainable livelihood for 50 licensed cocklers, and leaves enough cockles on the beds to feed the area’s internationally important bird life.

Elly Strigner is an artist, illustrator and animator from Old Colwyn. She graduated in 2006 from the BA Illustration with Animation at MMU with First-Class honours. Since then she has collaborated with SONS record label and independent film companies Zoomcitta and The Route creating promotional artwork, website design and animations. She has exhibited work at Denbigh Library, Fringe Arts Bath, and the Zion Arts Centre in Hulme, Manchester. Elly currently works as artist-in-residence at a home in Rhyl, which specializes in the care of elderly people with dementia. She spends her time there talking to the residents, doing simple creative activities with them, and painting colourful murals to brighten up the home.

Winner of the Kyffin Williams Drawing Prize 2009
I work mainly in compressed charcoal making drawings that depict a place that, although now derelict, still holds a sense of having once been occupied and busy. In my work I aim to capture that elusive atmosphere that can be felt in such a place. Communicating through drawing, emotions words cannot express. Through the use of vigorous mark-making it is intended to generate a sense of motion and the possibility of an imminent happening. The scrawling lines create a feeling of a changing landscape and an on-going narrative. The building up of layers of dense black marks creates a thick claustrophobic darkness that contrasts with areas of whiteness where the marks have been worked away. The contrasting whiteness is a welcome relief from the oppressive blackness and hints at the possibility of hope for the future. Perhaps only for a fleeting moment, of something almost indefinable.

Born on Holyhead Mountain in 1975, I was largely self-taught under the guidance of my father Joseph, who is the subject of this drawing. My early influences were Charles Tunnicliffe and Peter Scott which my father and I shared a passion for. This is for you dad.

Manon Awst and Benjamin Walther began their collaboration in 2005 after they met in Berlin. Pooling their expertise in theatre and architecture, Awst and Walther began to explore their shared interests in social, spatial and experiential concerns, creating performances, installations, sculptures and drawings that critically address fundamental themes of human existence. Calling upon references and insights from architecture, urban development, fashion and the porn industry, Awst and Walther dissect the flaws in the foundations of broader culture. They divide their time between North Wales and Berlin.

They have gained a reputation through exhibiting in the UK and internationally, most recently at the Hannah Barry Gallery in London and the 53rd Venice Biennale. Their solo exhibition If only dust could speak runs at Oriel Davies Gallery, Newtown until 24th November.

Welsheness – or rather the experience of living in Wales – is an obvious theme in Catrin Williams’s work. Elements from her background and upbringing in Meirionnydd insist on inclusion in her work - the home and the farm; the celebrations and the clothing; the Welsh culture; the family traditions and the familiar faces.

Catrin’s work has been exhibited widely throughout Wales, in galleries in Scotland, England and Ireland – her series of Ffrogiau Cerdd Dant – Cerdd Dant Dresses has lately been shown at the Belger Arts Centre, Kansas City, U.S.A. as part of the highly successful Prints of Wales Exhibition. Over the past year her work has been in demand from many private collectors and their response to the newer works has been very rewarding. Pieces of Catrin’s art are in private collections all over the British Isles, France, Germany, Hungary, Japan, Canada and America and in the public collections of MOMA Wales Machynlleth, Cyngor Sir Gwynedd County Council, Oriel Ceredigion Aberystwyth and the Newport Gwent Gallery and Museum.

Nearly twenty years after graduating from the Art College in Cardiff, Catrin
still gives her energy to paint and draw her world. She constantly produces original series of works, exhibits consistently and strongly believes in encouraging and supporting other artists.

Studied Fine Art (Painting) at Manchester College of Art (1961 – 65). Taught in inner city comprehensive schools for several years before moving to North Wales in 1990 where I started a small business producing prints and greeting cards. Finally I have the time to develop my own work. I have exhibited in various group exhibitions in the North West and Wales.

I consider drawing to be an essential part of my life and always carry a sketch book, drawing anything and everything, especially when travelling. I also never tire of drawing from the life model. I am more concerned with observing and finding ways to interpret what I see than in producing a ‘Finished’ piece of work. I sometimes use these drawings to develop with paint and other times paint direct always looking to find interest, however mundane the subject.

The drawings relate to current ideas in my work about location, inside and outside and the experience of travelling south to north across Wales at night. They were made in my studio on a cold week in January, the images relating to an ongoing series of drawings and watercolours.

When making them I thought about the tradition of drawing in Wales and therefore was interested in making images that would be powerful, resonant and present a materiality that seemed final, resolved, ambitious and uncompromising. I liked the connections of charcoal, carbon, coal and blackness and night time; so for me the pieces were a meditation on drawing; on what it has been and what it now may be in Wales, practically and metaphorically. In that sense they were stimulated thematically by the exhibition in the way that a poet might write a poem on a given theme for a competition.

Fumbled is of a man’s struggle through a blizzard. He does not know where he is or where he is heading, yet he keeps on going….

Andrew Wilson is a Liverpool-based artist, originally hailing from North Wales. Andrew moved to Liverpool to do his BA in Fine Art at Liverpool John Moores University following on from doing his Art Foundation course at Coleg Menai. He currently has a studio space with a collective of artists at The Royal Standard in Liverpool.

Andrew mainly works in the medium of drawing, sculpture and photography, currently focusing mainly on drawing. The figure and the immediate surrounding spaces tend to be the subject of his work.

I have now been a professional painter for half a century, and as my early nurture was on the principles of objective study, drawing has been the equation in all my work. Drawing is surely the closest encounter of subject and object, vision and touch united, an abstract language of comprehension.

A childhood in Shropshire hill country where Wales spills over the border is the cause of my love for mountains, their chaos and the fusion with their weather is a perfect raw material to be ordered into pictorial structure.

The two drawings entered are working drawings for paintings not yet begun, although I regard a drawing as in no way inferior to a painting. Each took about twenty days and the addition of wash take structural information to shape, space and atmosphere.

Since art school (Stafford, Brighton and Chelsea) and a period of teaching and other work in London, Jeremy Yates has lived in North Wales, painting, teaching and exhibiting. This year his landscape work in watercolour, acrylic and oils has been shown at Wrexham (Open Exhibition), Bangor (Open Exhibition), Chester (Grosvenor Open and at Down to a Fine Art Gallery, Stretton), Llanberis (Caban, Bryn Refail) and Conwy (RCA); his figure work has been seen at Machynlleth (Open Exhibition) and Mold (North Wales Open), and in the Wales Portrait Award touring exhibition which had its final Welsh venue at Rhyl in September.

My artwork, at the moment, is concentrated on figurative drawing. I find it interesting to make up or imagine the model in a particular setting, and try to convey a scene we could all find ourselves in, whether in reality or our imagination.

I draw on past experiences from both my private and working life, and hopefully, communicate with the viewer.

“Medda hi” – (“She said”), is hopefully one of those situations we women have found ourselves in, - gossiping!