Plaque by trustee Derek Morris destined for Bethel Hospital

Paul King kindly broke the news to us that a bronze plaque by our trustee, Derek Morris, that he had designed and had cast way back in 1989, and had lost sight of, is finally to be placed on a wall in St Peter Mancroft church in Norwich. It was originally commissioned by the Bethel Hospital in memory of Mary Chapman, founder of the Bethel. Derek had thought that with the closure of the hospital and its conversion into flats, the plaques would continue to languish in some dusty cupboard and never see the light of day in his lifetime. So, this is good news at this present time of uncertainty. Here it is, using Derek's father’s different alphabet moulds.

Derek Morris

Covid19

Following government advice, ncas is pleased once again to be able to host our usual exhibitions and events, and to promote the shows of our Norfolk galleries and artists.

Protecting our communities, particularly the older and more vulnerable members of society, and our NHS is still a priority.

We kindly ask our members to respect Government guidelines and where appropriate to observe social distancing and wear masks. In line with all organisations, we ask members not to attend public events if they are experiencing any Covid19 symptoms, have recently been in close contact with someone with Covid19, and where possible to take a lateral flow test prior to attending, especially indoor events.

We have been very grateful to our members for their on-going support during these difficult times. We are delighted once again to be able to offer the full range of activities that ncas membership brings. Thank you.

Darren Barker Exhibition

Just a few more days to catch this impressive exhibition in Great Yarmouth by artist Darren Barker. Skipping’s Gallery at 133 King Street, Great Yarmouth, is a 17C listed building that Darren, in his role as managing director with the Great Yarmouth Preservation Trust, has rescued and rejuvenated as a gallery with associated accommodation.

In his other role, as a trained artist, he has had exhibitions both here and also recently with John Kiki in the National Gallery, Sophia in Bulgaria. Deeply influenced by the German expressionists and in particular Max Beckman, Barker has a similar set of recurring motifs culled both from his imagination and from his own past such as the ubiquitous mackerel and pike from childhood fishing trips with his father. These are ambitious, disturbing and vivid canvases and the whole exhibition brings to life the gallery he helped to create.

Skippings Gallery, 133, King's Street, Great Yarmouth

Tuesday 10th December - Monday 15th December

Open 10.00 am to 3.00 pm

Free ncas membership for all NUA students

ncas has been a strong supporter of NUA and art education in Norwich for over 60 years, and we are now able to offer free ncas membership to all NUA students. Registering for your free membership will entitle you to receive, by email, the programmes for all our talks, trips, auctions and exhibitions.

Whether you have registered or not, your student card will still entitle you to free admission to all our talks, by artists, critics, gallerists and curators (usually £4.50). Recent studio visits and talks have included Michael Horn, Wayne Hemingway, Rosie Snell, Lawrence Edwards and NUA alumna, Rachel Long. NUA students will also be eligible to submit work for our open exhibitions of Norfolk Contemporary Art.

To register your interest, receive our programme and join for free, simply email our administrator at norfolkart@googlemail.com, stating your name and student number.

More information about ncas, including our art collections, our recent talks, future exhibitions and events and other local art news, can be found on this website.

Review: Landscape in Abstraction

Abstract art has been with us now for more than a century but, compared to figurative art, we have often found it hard to understand and difficult to approach. It is the apparent divorce between the forms, lines and colours of abstract art and any reference point in our real world that seems to trouble us. Yet historically, seemingly abstract works by artists from Kandinsky and Mondrian to Bridget Riley and Howard Hodgkin often have a clear underpinning referent in the real world, frequently landscape. Indeed many of their titles make this very clear. This exhibition in the Fermoy Gallery, part of the King’s Lynn mini-festival tackles this complex issue head on.

Again, curated meticulously by Rosy Gray, this is the second in her series of three exhibitions in which she explores aspects of ‘place’ by using carefully selected works from the Norwich Castle Museum’s extensive but seldom seen collection of contemporary art of which she is currently the guardian. This is a rich vein to mine and this second exhibition focuses on the many seemingly abstract works by major 20th century artists that in fact have their deep roots in landscape, connecting interestingly with the original core of the Castle’s collections, its huge holding of paintings from the Norwich school of painters.

Starting with works that have a slightly more overtly stated basis in figuration such as Undulating Valley by Anthony Gross, the series works its way round looser and looser connections to real places, through mythical or imaginary landscapes, and finishes with an explicitly non-figurative work by Ben Nicholson that nevertheless has the same ‘feel’ as many of its neighbouring works. There are some real gems here, only some of which, like the vast Bridget Riley, have ever been brought out into the light. The large and early 26.7.74 No.314 by Sean Scully is a revelation (currently, in Sea Star, his National Gallery exhibition, he is influenced by Turner). His severe rectangular grid riffs on US city plans and property boundaries, but also on the small fields of his Irish heritage, also separated by sharp ownership boundaries.

The undervalued Roy Turner Durrant has a beautiful work here, Autumn at Alderworth 1971, an abstract work, almost a Nicholson look-alike, but with subtle shades of a real autumn, experienced and reworked so delicately. And the revelation for me was Gulf of Corinth 1982 by Marjorie Wales. This work, sensibly used as the show’s poster image, reimagines from a family holiday, both the forms and colours of a view in central Greece and the feelings that it engendered. Still relatively unknown, Wales taught, together with her husband Geoffrey, at what is now Norwich University of the Arts and produced only a small body of finished work. So, while the Castle is lucky to have this small masterpiece, we are lucky to have the opportunity to view it now.

ncas prize awarded to Helen Ireland at NUA degree show

This year's selection process was organised by artist and NCAS trustee, Andrew Eden. From a shortlist of five, the final decision was that Fine Art graduate Helen Ireland was the clear winner for her work Evocations. Her delicate, moulded, paper objects in a bespoke perspex case and her two associated cyanotypes of everyday items explored links to personal memories of the past. She was subsequently presented with her prize of £500 by Andrew. Congratulations, not only to Helen, but to all the students whose work was presented in this year's degree show, and thank you to the committed NUA staff who conducted us helpfully around the show.

Norfolk Sixth Form Art Prize from ncas

Alice Weatherill, Money and Water
Acrylic, 60cm X 60cm

The annual exhibition of selected work by Sixth Form students from across Norfolk and Suffolk is again being shown in the Crypt Gallery at Norwich School. ncas was again involved in the selection process and is also awarding a prize, selected this year by trustees, Selwyn Taylor and Andrew Eden. Their choice is a remarkably mature work, Money and Water, by Alice Weatherill from Dereham Sixth Form College. She describes the background to her large acrylic work as follows: 

I looked at Malca Schotten's work during a workshop at Norwich Castle and I decided to look at how science and maths can be represented in art. I researched mathematicians who lived in Norfolk and found Thomas Blundeville who lived in the village of Newton Flotman. This lead me to include circles in my final piece. A trip to the science museum in London inspired me to create an abstract version of the MONIAC. I used acrylics to create both texture in the water and the colours in the MONIAC.

Latest issue of Art In Norwich is now out!

 The latest issue of Art In Norwich is out . . .

You can download a pdf here.

Derek Rae: A Retrospective

The late Derek Rae was an artist who had been a long-term member and office holder of both ncas and the Norwich Twenty Group. This is a timely and very welcome chance to see a broad range of Derek's work,  carefully and sensitively selected by friend and artist Caroline Hoskin.

Anteros Arts Foundation 5 March to 19 March 2019     PV: 7th March 6.00 – 8.00 pm 

"Photographs are perceived to present a reality which we can safely rely upon to convey information about the images they portray. In fact, the only realities are the photographer and his camera, which records whatever the photographer chooses to document and in a context of his choosing.

I have taken this a stage further and have used the various techniques at my disposal to fabricate objects, such as shop window reflections and vases, upon which are imposed images relevant to any message I wish to convey and, at the same time, using the camera’s ability to lie convincingly."

Educated at Rutlish School Merton 1943 – 50. Moved to Norfolk in 1961. Studied Fine Art – Printmaking as a mature student at Norwich School of Art and Design and graduated in 1996.

Ros Newman: Woman of Steel Retrospective

A Retrospective of the Life and Works of Ros Newman
19th February – 30th March 2019

Ros Newman, the Norwich-based sculptor will be celebrating her 80th birthday with a solo retrospective exhibition at the Fairhurst Gallery. The artist, who has lived in Norwich for more than 40 years, has recently dismantled her studio and has been working with the gallery to catalogue her works for this insightful exhibition.

A contemporary of Elizabeth Frink and Barbara Hepworth, Ros first exhibited her work in 1969 and mounted her first solo show in 1973 at The Alwin Gallery in London, it was a sell out and she used the proceeds to buy an old barn in Fakenham. Surrounded by a family of artists, Ros’ uncle John Rothenstein was director of the Tate (1938 – 1964) and her grandfather was Sir William Rothenstein, an English painter, printmaker, draughtsman and former Principal of the Royal College of Art (1920 – 1935) where he mentored Henry Moore.

“My family has been dominated by artists and creatives. My Grandfather, Sir William Rothenstein was a painter… over 200 of his paintings are held in the National Portrait Gallery and he inaugurated the War Artists following a request he made to the King.” Ros Newman.

Ros began her studies at Chelsea Art School at the age of 16 but, finding it wasn’t for her, she left to teach woodwork at a progressive school, making guitars before attending Hammersmith College of Art where she discovered her love for welding. She developed a unique method of oxy-acetylene welding to use steel as a modelling material and used this to capture the movement of human and animal forms, initially creating works on a domestic scale before moving into large, outdoor installations.

It is appropriate that this exhibition is organised by her friend Dulcie Humphrey, who was nine when she first met Ros in Taiwan. Dulcie has curated sculpture trails in the past that included Ros’s work. Both the Royal Society of Sculptors and the British Artist Blacksmiths Association have recognized her distinctive use of steel as a sort of soft modeling material to create animated and exuberant figurative works. So it is time now for her to shut off her gas cylinders and for us to wish a very happy birthday to the torch artist, Ros Newman.