Loco Glass

Circles of bright fire fill a room with heat as the blowers work. From a furnace, hot glass is drawn and the blower steps back, his feet sending odd shards of solid but impossibly hot glass across the floor. The blower roles the glass over a rail and begins to tease glass away from the heat softened core of its parent. Expanding, as the other blower’s lips push air into the tube, slowly the glass expands.

Light catches swirls of colour as the glass rolls, the object takes life as the blowers tease another unique form into existence.

Taking pictures, my body close to the furnace, my head begins to swim. Occasionally warning me, the blowers are mindful of my presence. Reminding me that the glass on the floor is still at 800 degrees Celsius, forcing me to move around them as their patterns of work take them across the room, I continue to see, to make shapes from the light and form. 

Finished work lines the entrance to the workshop. As I leave, I mention the heat. He nods, telling me that sometimes the blowers are overcome by it. For the sake of their art, for the sake of a work of beauty, they graft, close to the furnace. 

Tracey Elphick

Flowers on an easel, bluebells in a small, brightly painted jug, bright walls with canvasses, scenes from nature and the environment, easy to enjoy and ready to brighten any wall, Tracey is here, relishing her work and bringing vibrancy to the space she works within at the Brewery Arts Centre.

Tracey has her mother and her dog with her when I arrive. Her dark apron, splattered with silver, purple, green is a worn canvas, worn with memories of paintings that have left her space and taken life elsewhere. Seeing me for the second time, Tracey makes me welcome. Her mother leaves us and we begin to try taking pictures.

Conscious of the camera and not immediately at ease with its presence, we arrange set pieces. After cutting collage paper, she moves across the room to an area where finished work is displayed. We have spent some time talking, she lets her hair drop and suddenly, things begin to work. Tracey smiles, content. The final pictures are of an artist, satisfied, happy and at ease with her space, her work and facing the camera.

Tracey was a teacher. Now she makes pictures that are bold, bright, blue and white with accents of primary colours that make the world appear inviting, exciting and full of life. I would like to spend my life within those scenes. When the rain and cloud makes our towns gloomy, I’ll remember Elphick’s England and smile.

Cirencester Graffiti Artists

Taking a walk through an underpass, I come across four Bristol artists. Stencilling and spraying, they begin to transform a black wall that, the night before, they had prepared for their work. They play music as they work, a space, together, to create something public. something bright in a concrete tunnel.