Working on a big drawing/dance, or dance/drawing… eventually took a scalpel to it, and inserted myself!
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I’ve always been fascinated by the body: its structure, shapes and movement. My new exhibition, Back to Black, at Paddock Studios Stable Gallery in Lewes, explores this obsession in black and white. Made using charcoal and ink, the pieces range from small sketches to life-size drawings, and from more realistic life drawings to looser, abstracted approaches to movement.
Stable Gallery, Paddock Art Studios
Paddock Lane Lewes BN7 1TW
17 August – 1 September
Wed-Sat 10am-6.30pm Sun 11-6pm (closed Mondays & Tuesdays)
Seven years ago I joined a contemporary dance company in Brighton, newly established. Three Score Dance Company was created to offer contemporary dance opportunities for women and men aged 60+. From merely watching dance theatre I started using my body. Three Score Co has a brilliant artistic director, Jason Keenan-Smith, and we’ve worked with some great choreographers to make performances .
I made some sketches of the other dancers when not actually involved. Of course there’s a great legacy of dance art: Manet, Degas, Matisse, Toulouse-Lautrec, Picasso… aside from the whole world of non-Western art. But while not daring to include myself in that list, I started to make drawings of dance.
Then I started to work the other way round: dancing the drawing. I was intrigued by what marks might result if an artist would dance over and on paper or canvas, trailing charcoal or paint. So over large sheets of paper I would move and (sort-of) dance with charcoal in both hands, tracing my movements. The results were intriguing, and formed a basis for building on; life-size figures in motion. It would be a real achievement to make a coherent performance from it, but it’s early days yet.
Back to Black:
Michael Munday Drawings
Stable Gallery, Paddock Art Studios
Paddock Lane Lewes BN7 1TW
17 August – 1 September
Wed-Sat 10am-6.30pm Sun 11-6pm (closed Mondays & Tuesdays)
The Lewes Artwave Festival
Since my last exhibition two years ago (Michael Munday: Through Still Life) I’ve been working abstractly, leaving behind (mostly) images of ‘things’. So there are no stories in this exhibition – these paintings are about shape, colour, line, texture and, sometimes, they venture into the third dimension.
They can be divided into two categories: painted before, and after, a recent trip to Kerala, South India. There I was very influenced by the bright colours of houses, clothes, sky, advertising, temples, and of course, something of the iconography of Kerala. But nothing in the paintings is to be taken literally. Here is a selection from the exhibition.
The exhibition is at Martyrs’ Gallery & Project Space, Star Brewery, Lewes BN7 1YJ, UK. It runs from 3-25 June, Thursdays – Sundays, 12-5pm. https://www.martyrs.gallery/
All paintings are 40.5 cm square, mixed media on panel, floating, in white frames.
San Sebastian: Pintxos heaven!
A five-hour drive from the Dordogne brings you via Biarritz (not stopping there) to San Sebastian, a seaside city with a fantastic bay. And many bars! The bars compete with each other in their displays of pintxos (the Basque version of tapas). They are crowded with locals and tourists, queueing in an almost orderly way to buy these delights. Described as a ‘small snack’, they are each rather a large and elaborate snack: on a piece of toast, for instance, you might find a construction of salt cod and prawns on aubergine, or deep-fried artichoke with cheese and ham, squid pieces in garlic…
Eaten (carefully), standing up, with a glass of chilled red rioja, this is a gourmand’s delight. Amazingly, I find a seat – and start drawing…
I’m showing nine abstract paintings from the last 18 months in a group exhibition, with Liesha Yaz, Marion McConaghie, and Noura Hardy, at Pelham House Hotel, St Andrews Lane, Lewes, East Sussex, BN7 1UW. Here are some of them. They are all 45cm square, framed in white.
There are no stories here – no narratives to be looked for; these paintings are about shape, colour, line, texture, and sometimes another dimension.
I love contrast: hard/soft, sharp/blurred, controlled/random. I use observation and play, chance and accident, distress and decay.
Among my many influences over the years are William Scott, Ben Nicholson, Antoni Tapies, and Kurt Schwitters. But you probably spotted that.
The exhibition runs from 19 August to the 14 October. Private view on Sunday 21 August, 4-6pm.
And so, once more, unto the beach… on the hottest day of the year (so far) and our pebbly stage is crowded with barbecuing flesh and the smell of weed is strong in the air. Most of the sunbathers move reluctantly away; some assert their rights to their beach, and we have to work round and over their bags, dogs, shoes, legs… We finally perform Tall Tales!
Crunching implacably from four directions towards our allotted (but not yet empty) performance space, in our costumes: traditional pacamacs in five colours, our props held high, unfazed by the puzzlement all around us…
“…they’re prawns affected by the sea’s plastic bag pollution”
“…they’re different bits of Brighton”
“… something to do with Shakespeare”
Come ON! It’s the Brighton Festival!! It’s bloody ART!!!
After another three hours rehearsal at The Spire, we’re finally on the beach! And it’s a dress rehearsal, so we’re in costume with our props, and working on the big pebbles. In front of us, the huge shining pole that is the i360; behind us, the sea and the West Pier skeleton. Lea is whistling our changes, and we’re crunching from position to position…
Freezing cold in the huge church! – our rehearsal space for this week. We’re watched by images of Jesus and saints from their bright stained glass windows. This is ‘The Oskar Schlemmer Re-Enactment Society’, (real title Tall Tales) and our carefully practised moves suddenly thrown by the introduction of our props.
Too cold for costumes in here, but it should be warm for Sunday’s performance on the pebbles by the West Pier. Pebbles?!!
Rehearsal of the whole group: An hour of warm-ups and stretches, followed by working through two of Jason’s exercise sequences. Fortunately in the (middle section of) the Corn Exchange, so plenty of room this time. While we’re doing these, Faith arrives with four big laundry bags: our costumes and props! We’re not allowed to see them just yet (nor are you); then Lea arrives in trademark black gaucho-style hat, and we’re into rehearsal. Groups 1&2 into formation for our ‘Dolly’ sequence, while the other groups remind themselves of theirs. Then 1&2 go through their ‘baby-smallnose-skewer-hand-bignose-kebab-headless’ sequence, and make adjustments. Meanwhile Lea is watching the other groups with Jason fine-tuning. Then the bags are opened…
Three Score Dance has been commissioned by the Brighton Festival to work with famous choreographer Lea Anderson (The Cholmondeleys, The Featherstonehaughs) to make a new piece, Tall Tales.The Founder’s Room at Brighton Dome is rather small for a rehearsal for 50 people. No collisions even though we’re all moving rather quickly in different directions (and that’s just the warm-up). Because the company is so large (yes, 50), we’re split into two groups to rehearse on alternate sessions, but we all do the exercises together. We’re looking forward to the finished piece in the Festival, though we don’t yet have an idea of the final shape of it. Working with Lea is really exciting, and her designer Tim Spooner has dropped some intriguing hints about possible costume designs (I’m not telling!)
The piece is based on paintings and designs by the Bauhaus artist/designer, Oskar Schlemmer.
If It's Munday... 