News and Events
February 2012 - Current projects
Starting the year on design work for a potential new commission, Melissa has also been working on a small garden gate in her freezing workshop. She is also about to start a magical fantasy tree for Copnor Junior School in Portsmouth and a forged steel and bronze sculpture for The Slade in Oxford. There will be community involvement in this piece, more information to follow. Courses are going really well at Puthall with days booked now in February and April and she has just returned from a most enjoyable weekend teaching at West Dean College.December 2011
Melissa has been on working on new pieces for the small exhibition 'Foursight' at Puthall Farm Old Stables in December. New unique bronze 'Jennywrenvils' and forged steel 'Flightpaths' will be on show alongside other work. Look at the Exhibitions page for more information. These pieces can be seen throughout the year at the gallery, please contact me if you would like to visit.October 2011
The piece Melissa has been working on is a complex glass topped table for a local client. The table has a forged base with pedestal legs and a flowing design that supports the weight of the glass top.Melissa has recently finished working with St Francis Church of England Primary School in Swindon where she made a 2.5 m cross for the new extension that forms the entrance to the school.
Working with children from all ages, Melissa developed an idea of creating a cross that depicted the childrens journeys to school. Translating these memory maps into a working design was an exciting challenge and the finished cross incorporated roads, roundabouts, bikes, cars, traffic lights and repetitive marks showing the differnet journeys culminating in the arrival at school. Images to follow.World Forging Championships, Stia, Italy. 1-4 September 2011
Melissa has recently returned from Italy having competed in the 5th World Forging Championships in Stia, Italy over the last week.
Representing the UK on behalf of The Worshipful Company of Blacksmiths who funded the trip, Melissa was part of the only all woman team, including Wendy Alford of Norfolk and Michelle Parker of Worcestershire.
They started forging on the first night of the biennial celebration of blacksmithing in temperatures of over 45°C next to the forges, the team had 3 hours to produce a completed piece of traditional forging along the theme of ‘Evolution’ working in front of the massive crowds that had gathered for the opening live forging event.
Working with two forges and two anvils and tools they took from home, the team created a flowing piece depicting man evolving from fish; a fish tail and wave, ripples in the sand and a figure forming from the waves was forged from the limited stock sizes available for competitors. The finished piece was a strong contender for the title and stood out among the rest of the work in the class which comprised of forty teams from across the world and was won by a group of blacksmiths from the UK.
Following the team event, all of the UK women’s team went on to compete individually with the first prize being won by Michelle for her excellent dinosaur reading a book. The women had a separate class from the men which is unique to this event as it is the World Forging Championship. There were six entries in the women’s class and 104 entries in the men’s class. Blacksmiths came from Italy, UK, France, Spain, Germany, Belgium, Ukraine, Austria, Czech Republic, Russia, Israel, and the USA.
The whole town is taken over by blacksmiths from all countries, trade stands and exhibitions live forging and drawing contests go on for four days and are supported and celebrated by all.
More information about this event can be found at: www.comune.stia.ar.it/biennaleferro/eng
PUTHALL PARK SCULPTURE SHOW
The First Puthall Park Sculpture Show was first held in June 2004, then June 2006 which was supported by the Arts Council England.
In response to the lack of opportunities in the area for showing larger scale sculptural work, Melissa devised and raised over £23K of sponsorship for this large outdoor exhibition.
Set in the farmland and gardens at Puthall and showing selected work from 40 different artists each time. The exhibition attracted 4500+ visitors over three shows and was featured on Meridian News in 2006. Each exhibition also provided education opportunities for schools though artist’s workshops and talks and workshops for teachers.
This exhibition was supported over the three shows by: Arts Council England, Kennet District Council, Tin Horse, Wylye Valley Vineyard, Quintons, Nude PR, Dolby Laboratories Inc, Hiscox, Armadillo Coffee Co. and Arts & Business. It would not have been possible without the kind help and support of the sponsors and friends.
Quotes from these exhibitions: ‘First show I’ve seen, really inspirational and enjoyable- thank you’, ‘A delightful display and so much to see, we thoroughly enjoyed it’. ‘Brilliant, lovely to see a diverse range’, ‘Outstanding! A great joy for the soul and free to boot’, ‘Wonderful, just as lovely as last year, can’t wait to come again’. The last show successfully moved to November for 2008 and was enhanced by the dramatic change of colour through the forest and downland landscape.
The sculpture show is currently on hold while Melissa focuses on her own practice and commissioned work but she hopes to be able to bring some large scale sculpture exhibitions back to Puthall in the future. In the meantime there will still be smaller scale exhibitions at Puthall, check the exhibitions page for details and to get on the mailing list.