Posters and publicity about the exhibition taking place on Bardsey Island (Ynys Enlli) next month. Several of my Bardsey paintings will subsequently be on show at the Summer Open Exhibition at Oriel Plas Glyn y Weddw near Abersoch from mid-July to October (www.oriel.org.uk)
VISIONS OF BARDSEY
An Exhibition of Drawings, Paintings, and Murals taking place in Carreg Fawr on Bardsey Island from Wednesday 19th June to Wednesday 3rd July 2024.
This exhibition will feature works by Brenda Chamberlain, Amelia Shaw-Hastings, and Jon Hastings.
Brenda Chamberlain lived full-time on Bardsey Island in the 1940s and 1950s and made her home in Carreg Fawr. She was both a painter and a writer and left a tangible legacy on Bardsey in the form of murals painted on the internal walls of Carreg. Though they have inevitably deteriorated in the intervening years they remain impressive, and since the exhibition is to be located in Carreg, they will, unusually, be open to public view. There is another permanent exhibition about Brenda Chamberlain’s life on Bardsey elsewhere on the island.
Amelia Shaw-Hastings visited Bardsey regularly through the summer months with her family, during the 1960s and early 1970s, staying firstly in Ty Bach, her sister Marjory’s house, and then later leasing Ty Nesaf. She had been a precocious talent, attending Junior Art School from the age of 13, and after several years as a Commercial artist during and after the War she was inspired to take up sculpture and portraiture which became the focus of her professional career. She also loved to draw and sketch and found great delight in making quick sketches of the landscape, shoreline, people, and animals of Bardsey during her visits, a selection of which will be on show in the exhibition.
Jon Hastings is Amelia’s third son, and he was first brought to the Island as a 6-year-old in 1960, accompanying his Aunt Marjory. This and subsequent visits throughout his childhood forged a deep emotional bond with the island, and he has continued to visit regularly as an adult, with his own children and, more recently, his grandchildren. Unlike his mother, Jon’s desire to make art arrived somewhat later in his life, but he has been developing his practice now for 25 years, and his interests include painting, drawing, and creating immersive installations using sound and moving image. He has been working on a series of expressive semi-abstract paintings of Bardsey over the past two years, and this exhibition is the result of a wish to share these paintings in the place and landscape that inspired them.