Exhibition Meeting

Remember I was trawling through all my artwork last week? Well, Marie Knudson & Katie Kennedy from Tameside Art Galleries visited the studio again on Wednesday morning, to help me shape-up plans for the show. We went through everything I'd shortlisted and have now got a final selection.


They were both as excited as me (isn't that great?) which meant we just couldn't whittle it down as low as we'd planned. So... they are letting me squeeze even more images in - hurrah!! We are going to frame 24 double-page spread illustrations as the main show, plus another 12 smaller pieces, mounted lower on the walls, at child's height. All the above titles will appear.

In the centre of the space, we are still going to build a little ark, with working hatches, and make soft toys based on the animals, for kids to pop inside. I am also going to try and put together a whole section using Lark in the Ark to explain how a flap book is created, as it's quite complicated and interesting.


There will be a quiet reading area, themed around Smudge and Stripe's living room above. Marie is actually going to build a mock-up room, with the stripy sofa and the fireplace and even decorate the walls with props on foam board, like the clock and the vase of daffodils!


Instead of just a magnetic Stinky warthog, we've decided to make a huge print of this spread, onto thin metal, with magnetic flies and various toys for kids to add into the picture. And Marie is thinking it might be rather fun to make a vinyl game mat, recreating the Jungle game from this spread:

My job now is to trawl through all my digital artwork, so the team have all the images they need to make the various creations, then start writing copy for picture labels, wall features and info sheets. Plus I need to contact all the authors and publishers involved, to let them know our intentions. I imagine they'll be delighted, but it's polite to make sure!