First I spotted a small river scene chalked at St Helen’s Wharf.
Then there was a huge array of marks stretching along half of Marcham Road, and part of Ock Street – a huge abstract piece of art, covering not only the pavements but also the road.
At the Mostly Books Bookshop in Stert Street Abingdon this evening there was a sell out book event,
Local author Bryan Brown has written a book about John Henry Brookes – the man who developed the art and technology college in Oxford, that became Oxford Polytechnic in 1970, and Brookes University in 1992.
Mark, from Mostly Books, invited Bryan to talk about John Henry Brookes, and sign some books.
Brookes was an artist, as well as enthusiastic educator. During World War I, he became a conscientious objector. His interesting life influenced so many people.
Without Brookes I would not have met my wife. She went to Oxford Polytechnic to study history of art, and we met.
Thanks to Jane for reminding me that The Oxfordshire Mind art group, based in the Abingdon Mind centre, are hosting another exhibition of their work as part of Art Weeks.
The exhibition takes artists such as Pollock, Rothko, Munch and Van Gogh as a jumping off point to produce new work. ‘New Responses to Old Masters’ is part of Artweeks in Abingdon.
Some of the Rothko inspired works are shown above.
Meanwhile at Peachcroft Farm a recently refurbished barn is being used by a group of local artists.
The old threshing barn makes a lovely setting, with lots of space, to stand back and admire both the barn and the art.
As always artweeks is full of suprises.
Artwork from a number of young artists at The Unicorn School in Abingdon has been selected as part of the Young Art Oxford exhibition at the Ashmolean Museum. The exhibition is open until Thursday 7th May, and has work by children aged between 5 and 13 from Oxfordshire Schools. Money raised from the exhibition goes to Cancer Research UK to help fund research into cures and treatment for childhood cancers.
As Iain commented, the Oxfam window shown yesterday has self portraits from students of Larkmead School – part of a project called ‘Message in a Bottle’. It includes a wave created by empty water bottles.
The project for Oxfam has in total 1,400 children’s self portraits and wave sculptures with 1,400 empty water bottles. They represent the 1,400 children that die every day from diarrhoea caused by dirty water.