Commissioned artist: ‘Artful Cumbria’
I am an interpretative artist, who primarily, though not solely, works through painting, making and poetry. An intrinsic part of my creative practice has been connecting with the wider community in dialogue, workshops, or through audience. I am inspired by living in, travelling through and engaging with the landscape of Cumbria – its shapes and moods, its heritage and culture; the temporal expressed in the spatial. I enjoy experimenting with mixing media to achieve my paintings. My work is concerned with exploring the human condition, in our relationship with the land, often through the metaphor of the landscape and the horse. Music is also a strong part of my life and I use elements of it to inform my use of colour, mark-making and composition.
The pandemic challenged my thinking for several months, and now my practice has become centred around slowing down, looking at new ways of recording journeying, such as making structures, engaging audience, and reflecting further on our “emotional wealth”.
Through this commission I wanted to explore how we have connected with each other in recent times, how others have thought about the three Artful Ways questions, and what people’s responses tell us about engagement with the arts, the land and the towns in Cumbria, within the context of connectivity and sustainability.
I have spent a lot of time sifting through the responses on the Artful Ways map, and my artistic response has been inspired by the routes people chose, by all the words I have read, and the other creative responses I have seen.
Read Alex’s thoughts about her piece, it’s development and final form, here.
To find out more about Alex’s work, visit her website here: www.alexjakobwhitworth.co.uk