Artist in Residence Exhibition Launch

| Jane Sunbeam

My residency is almost over – and what a wonderful time it’s been! I have fallen in love with etching again, and had a chance to really push my work forward. Suzanne’s work has entranced me, filling my every thought with her characters and scenes from Paris and her travels.

So now it’s a chance for you to come and see both my work and Suzanne’s stunning etchings which have been my companions for the past 4 months. The Launch is on Saturday the 11th August and you are all welcome to come and join the celebrations.

Sunbeam-Balkanyi-Launch Invite

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Artist in Residence – catching breath!

| Jane Sunbeam

Well, I am half way through my Artist in Residence time at Leicester Print Workshop – the last six weeks have flown by. The days have been passing in a flurry of  learning about acids, drawing in Leicester Market, finding a voice that shouts louder than the market sellers and well, finding my way generally.

I will be writing more write more about this fabulous opportunity as time progresses, but for now pop over to my Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts for the news so far. And you can read a brief introduction to the Residency, and the amazing, humorous and fantastic work of Suzanne Balkanyi that my work is inspired by on Leicester Print Workshop’s site.

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Meet the Artist – Saturday 2nd June 2018

| Jane Sunbeam

Meet the Artist Jane Sunbeam @Cank Street GalleryIt would be lovely if you could join me for an afternoon of cake, collagraphs and chats this coming Saturday 2nd June.

I am delighted to have the Meet the Artist event at Cank Street Gallery, Leicester to celebrate the closing of my “sketchbooks” exhibition at the Gallery. It has been such a lovely show, with some very kind and generous feedback – which was a relief as I did feel that opening my sketchbooks for a display was like delving into the back of a deep, dark cupboard – one never quite knew what would be pulled out! But, Dayle Flude, owner of Cank Street, with her lovely curator’s eye, selected a beautiful collection of pages that complimented each other perfectly (I wouldn’t have known where to begin).

In addition to being able to peek further inside my sketchbooks, I will also have a range of collagraph plates for people to handle, and some new plates at various stages of construction for people to see the processes. And, you may even see me capturing the event in my sketchbook! So please do join me – it will be lovely to see you! Continue reading →

Inside/Outside group exhibition at The Eye Leicester

| Jane Sunbeam

You may have noticed that I have been rather quiet here on my blog. Well, it is for good reason – I have been working away on a gallery project with friend and fellow artist Moira Robinson. It was a voluntary project and we were lucky enough to be loaned an amazing space for 6 months by the local Adult Education College. Soon we had 48 artists have faith in us and came on board, and we were assisted by 4 hardworking group coordinators who helped us in ways too innumerable to mention….. Continue reading →

The First Flowers of Summer.

| Jane Sunbeam

The Spring is ending, the bulbs have finished their glorious display and I am looking forward to what the Summer brings. My group show (with 11 other very talented artist/makers) which is based on the theme of Inside/Outside at The Eye is going well, with a number of sales and potential commissions. Many people have been interested in a particular piece especially when they realise it is embroidered – and many have been asking how it was done and the layering involved, which is always lovely.

So here is a little history of that particular piece: Continue reading →

Saying YES!

| Jane Sunbeam

Hello there!

Thankyou to all the visitors since my rather long (ahem) absence. Truth be told, I’ve been saying “yes” lots to some exciting projects…some larger, some smaller.

My first “yes” was this cup a dear friend and writer asked me to create for a project she was working on. We had shared rather a magical afternoon over tea and biscuits, discussing our favourite books, illustrators and picturebooks etc. This was the cup she had become rather entranced by, and asked me to capture the essence of it for her project. This dear friend had supported me greatly through my Ma, so I leapt at the chance to say thankyou.

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Getting connected (and living with self doubt).

| Jane Sunbeam

Hello all, thankyou once again for visiting this site, and my blog. Its been a while, and I have somewhat failed in my weekly blogs – it seemed such an easy idea – a blog a week, but my goodness, Self Doubt has been sitting quietly by my side the past few weeks (as it does with so many creative people – perhaps we can organise a Self Doubt group for them to play whilst we work away). Not especially about my work (I think self doubt is often part of the territory and is what pushes us to keep creating and striving to make artworks), but about whether this blog is worth writing and whether it adds anything to the mass of amazing blogs that are out there. Continue reading →

Meet Pepe – #WorldBookDay

| Jane Sunbeam

Happy #WorldBookDay to you all from myself and Pepe! Some fellow illustrators have felt like they have had a “world book week” so I am not too late…..(I am good at being late, you may notice a pattern here, but I am getting better at being less late! It all takes practice). I’ve seen so many lovely bookish things this week – visiting the library where I used to do the craft activities at the toddler times, seeing old faces, and the now grown children dressed up as their favourite characters from books. Continue reading →