Our 'Exhibition of Three Generations'

Here comes the first of a couple of catch up posts... this exhibition of ours back in September seems like a long time ago now, but I thought it would be fun to show you some of it! This was our 'Three Generations' exhibition with my Mum, Heather's wonderful big oil paintings, my illustrations and bits and bobs, and of course my two daughter's fantastic artwork too!
I'm not a big fan of those stiff formal preview do's where everyone feels very self conscious and attempts awkward forced conversation... so we thought we'd have some fun instead!
Lots of pretty cakes and nice drinks and live music...

 These pictures below were taken just as my daughters arrived and before any guests came along, it was the first glimpse they had of all their work up on the walls and Elswyth's face tells it all! I loved their reaction...

The music was a family collaboration too - first my Dad and husband Tony played some acoustic blues while all the children began a mass drawing session completely of their own initiative which I thought was brilliant... I hadn't thought of that at all or I would've got in some better things to draw with! But it was great that they all felt fired up to get drawing after looking at all the artwork around them. It was a lovely atmosphere with the guitars and singing accompanying their happy drawing...

 My Dad has a wonderful voice, especially for singing the blues - I will have to film some of his music another time to show you... Later our friend and Tony's bandmate Wendy joined in with some of her songs and even the girl's aunty joined in for a couple near the end too!

 It was difficult to get many pictures while it was thronging with people, so here's some from either before or after of some of the artwork:

Work by Elora and Elswyth aged 5 & 8

 By Elora age 8

Still life paintings by Heather O' Brien

More work from my Mum Heather

I thought I'd show some roughs from my Dummy Book I am hoping to find a publisher for

Some more of my illustration

By Elswyth age 5

Some life drawings of mine...

By Elswyth age 5

Grandma has a well deserved cup of tea when all the guests have gone!

 I think my girls really enjoyed being part of this little show and having their work admired, and it was lovely to put this together as a family to celebrate that creative bond between us all. It really felt like a bright circle, and I felt that my children's book illustration was the perfect bridge between my Mum's fine art painting and my children's wonderful expressiveness. It was fascinating actually...
I learn as much from my children in their art as I hope they do from me and Grandma, and they are very much the inspiration for a great deal of what I do. I love children's art and it was great to kind of validate it in a way by putting it into an art gallery for the general public to see alongside 'grown up' art. I think children's art should be taken just as seriously.

There were some lovely comments from some of the children over the fortnight that came in to look... and a few mums overheard saying things like "...look that little girl's only five, that's the same age as you! You could do that!"
One little boy said to me, "...I wish I could be an artist" and I replied "Everyone can be an artist, but children are the best artists because children have all the stories already inside them. Grown ups have to think a bit harder sometimes to find them...."
But my favourite comment was from a little girl aged 8 who brought her Grampy in to have a look after seeing it advertised  in the paper, she said   "... I love painting and drawing because it makes you see the world in a more delicate way."
Lovely!