June offer

This lovely new A3 print ‘Through the dew’s mist’ is currently available in the Catherine Hyde Shop for £50 rather than £75 for the month of June.

  • Through the dew’s mist

May

This summer I am really happy to be able to offer some new original paintings in The Catherine Hyde Gallery


News

EXHIBITIONS AND EVENTS 2019

This year’s overhaul of my studio brought up lots of old memories and influences and I was struck by how my book ‘The Hare and the Moon’ (due out later this year) is really the culmination of a life long obsession with place and atmosphere and the story of the changing seasons.

So in a kind of double confirmation of this my solo show at the Lighthouse Gallery this year focuses on my childhood passion for John Masefield’s story ‘The Box of Delights’ and the entrancing magic of the box containing a vision of all that is beautiful, that is Nature. It has never been so important to celebrate this fragile beauty and to revisit our profound relationship with the land and its mythology.

‘Inside the Box of Delights’
2 – 18th November at The Lighthouse Gallery, Penzance, Cornwall

Events

May 11th: Gallery opening: Elementum Gallery, Sherborne

A mixed show celebrating the new Gallery, home of Elementum Journal including original illustrations, paintings and cards by Catherine Hyde

*

26th October: Book launch event for ‘The Hare and the Moon’

Events at Number 7 are famous for their magical atmosphere and warmth.  Catherine will be signing copies of her new book ‘The hare and the moon: a book of paintings’ and reading the hare’s song by the fire in the afternoon.  

Number 7, Dulverton

*

31st October: Book launch event for ‘The Hare and the Moon’

Join Catherine Hyde at Waterstones Truro at 7pm for an evening of reading the hares song, telling the story of the book’s journey and creating a drawing from her new book ‘The hare and the moon: a book of paintings’

Waterstones, Truro

*

2 -18 November: Solo Show ‘Inside The Box of Delights’

Catherine Hyde’s solo show this year at The Lighthouse Gallery takes its theme from John Masefield’s classic The Box of Delights and invites you on a journey through the landscape inside the box itself.

For the wolves are running.

Lighthouse Gallery, Penzance

*

November: Book launch event for ‘The Hare and the Moon’

Elementum Gallery, Sherborne

*

Easter Weekend

In The Catherine Hyde Shop this Easter we have free shipping in the UK for all my signed Prints and Original paintings and drawings.

The weather here in Cornwall is glorious today: All the windows are open, the birds are singing and everything is flowering and greening.

Spring Clean part 2

Once the studio was looking crisp and clean I launched into new work and then realised that I was running out of room in my three plan chests. So began another marathon. I’ve found so much paper – false starts, ideas, unfinished projects and I’ve been ruthless with these. But having worked for many years just on paper going through the drawers is like looking back at old journals. I’ve paintings and drawings of landscapes, old cats, friends and parents and looking at them takes me to visceral and vivid memories of 20, 30, 40, 50 years ago. I can’t get rid of these – I don’t care if they are good or bad they are just part of me. So I have sorted life drawings, drawings, college work, watercolours, mixed media and post-college work into separate drawers. Now I can find all my newer work: the illustration roughs, final pieces, clayboards and prints easily. It all feels fresher but I still have loads to sort.

Perhaps unsurprisingly I am finding the repetition of key elements over the years – unformed and unrealised and I am suddenly aware of how much I have progressed over the last 20 years. My early work is so energetic but is jumpy, restless with no clear direction of where to take an idea or how to achieve it. Now, looking at them I know what I wanted and I now know how to get there. Which is giving me ideas..


Spring Cleaning

I have had a major clear out in the studio – it was needed. At the beginning of the year I began to reduce the number of cards I was producing because the sheer amount of boxes and paper stock was threatening to overwhelm me. I then realised that I needed to do more: the walls needing painting and the floor was horrendous.

The early stages were very difficult to navigate

    • books and a book of paintings
    • much loved books old and new

    Then I kept slowing down to look at old favourite books and finding piles of photopraphs. This is me at 20 when I was on a Field Trip to Cornwall (of course) when I was at Central School of Art.

    Gradually things got clearer and I managed to paint all the awkward corners in the window, helped by a few spiders.

    The cat Nin and my beautiful daughter Chloë in her cat skirt came to inspect

    The final and probably best bit was painting the disgusting floor. This is Farrow and Ball Modern Eggshell Hardwick White and it went on like cream, covering all the marks.

    My studio is at the top of our house in Helston. It is a calm and bright space (especially now). I can hear gulls and pigeons, distance sheep and the chuck of jackdaws. I sometimes listen to the radio, sometimes music or Audible stories. Mostly now, I like silence.

    There are still a few bits to do but first I need to focus on an illustration for Elementum Journal’s next edition Hearth. Once that is done I shall take a deep breath and start painting.

    Whilst I have been recovering from having the operation on my eye I have had time to reflect on where I want to go this year. I have lots of ideas for things to stretch me, make my own.

      The beginning of Spring

      For the past few days Cornwall has had glorious weather: warm and bright with a softness to the air that seems full of green promise.

      My latest project is for Elementum Journal. I am illustrating a piece by writer Jim Crumley and I am loving interpreting his words with images that are new for me.

        In the studio I am still working on final tweaks for The Hare and the Moon and excited that it really is nearly there now.

        February

        February

        I am having an eye operation today – a cosmetic procedure to rectify a problem following a Bels Palsy (paralysis of the facial nerve) which I suffered 20 years ago.

        My extreme short-sightedness has always meant that it is more comfortable for me to wear lenses, but for the next couple of months, I will be wearing glasses instead.  I’m not sure what impact this will have on my studio time but I am planning to work on small pieces: drawings and pen and inks.

        If there are any orders in the shop please bear with me as I will probably be a bit slow over the next few days.

         

        Plans for the future

        Plans for the future

        It is not good to feel overwhelmed by ‘stuff’, particularly in your workspace so I have made some decisions:

        CARDS

        I am trimming down my range of cards and will be selling off packs of 20 cards for £10.00 until they are gone.   There will be a limited range of the absolute best sellers in my catalogue and occasional new cards will be added for freshness.

        PRINTS

        I will be reducing the number of prints in the shop but am always happy to reproduce images on request.

        BOOKS

        My new book ‘The Hare and the Moon’ (published by Zephyr, an imprint of Head of Zeus) is due out in October 2019.

        This book of paintings is a new departure for me comprising over 50 paintings celebrating my love of the hare within the landscape with a very spare but lyrical text.  It is suitable for both adults and children and I cannot wait to see it all put together.

        Here is the publishers descriptive text I found online:

        “A beautiful, full colour country almanac by artist Catherine Hyde, follows the phases of the moon and a hare’s journey throughout the twelve months of the year in a lyrical tribute to the natural world.

        Waking from the winter solstice a hare begins her journey. Through the landscape and its changing seasons, moving in harmony with the moon. Atmospheric and gorgeous paintings show the hare running in January, watching in February, leaping in March until it comes full circle, sleeping in December. Twelve textless double-page paintings of the hare’s journey are accompanied by three full pages of art showing a tree, a flower and a bird for each month.

        This rich celebration of flora and fauna includes hawthorn and cowslips, swallows, blackbirds, buzzards and owls, harebells, holly, olive, rowan, poppies and much more. Titbits of text – folklore, fairytale, myth and legend complimenting the art – complete this desirable gift book.”

        PAINTING

        My focus will be on producing new work for my solo shows, on drawing and printmaking and filling the shop with small originals.

         

         

         

         

         

         

        December

        December

        The final month of the year:
        By now I am normally making cakes and puddings, dusting off decorations and purchasing presents but as it is I am still working hard on my latest book.  This has so many paintings in it I can hardly move in the studio and  I can’t wait to begin to share more about it next year.  What I can promise is a book of paintings, poetry and folklore.  I wrote the first bones of this idea nearly twenty years ago and it has re-emerged transformed with the help of my publishers Head of Zeus into something much lovelier than I originally imagined.
        Next year: painting, of course, and printmaking but with a different emphasis.. roll on the Winter Solstice.