The day I visited, they had an open studio so I could wonder round and watch the artists at work, browse the lovely array of paintings, pottery and textiles, as well as have a chat. I was drawn into one of the last studios, seeing a lot of nautical imagery and spotting some mermaid postcards. Inside was artist Ruthy who was busy painting a watercolour fish scale piece.
I complimented her mermaid drawings and got chatting to her about my project and how it is based on a mermaid living in Portsmouth. Funnily enough she was from Cornwall, St Ives, where I originally became interested in mermaid folklore. She spoke about this a lot, we joked about my research (not being able to find any old mermaid tales in Portsmouth) saying the water in the Solent surrounding the city isn't lovely compare to Cornwall, and that she didn't blame mermaids for not wanting to live there! If mermaids are real, perhaps this is true!
I purchased one of her postcards as I love her mermaid character. Ruthy argued that all artists have a slight obsession with mermaids. I like the watercolour techniques she has used for the background, I think the splashes work well to mimic the water as well as her blue and green colour choices. This emphasised to me that I have made the right choice within my own work to use this colour pallet. Her character also has a connection to a boat, similar to my illustrations of a mermaid with The Mary Rose. Although this painting seems to have a more modern anchor, based in a more recent time period. This shows the links between mermaids and man, including their manmade boats, are a strong recognisable theme to the majority of people. I feel I made the right decision by taking my project in that direction.
Hotwalls studios was great to look round, I definitely want to return in the future to take in more of the work and look round other studios that weren't open the day I was there.
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