What a fabulous time I had in Glasgow last weekend. The Merchant City was buzzing with excitement on Saturday, as I negotiated the crowds of people enjoying the street performances and the Continental Market stretching through the creative hub of Glasgow.I had met up with my friend Tonia earlier in the day and we had just come from taking my two boys round the Wasps Studios open day and we all had a wonderful time. There were artists on hand to talk to you about their creative practice and show off their fabulous talent and they really welcomed the children, some of them even had sweets and chocolates for the kids. I did buy a lovely ceramic petal from one artist, after my youngest boy Daniel accidentally knocked over something or other, to be honest I really didn’t need an excuse the artworks were beautiful. The highlight of the day had to be the Glasgow Circus School workshop, where young and old got to try out as budding acrobats and trapeze artists. I have to admit skin tight jeans are not the best attire but, I wasn’t going to let a wee detail like that put me off! Tonia (rather wisely) decided to spectate as myself, Christopher and Daniel made for the warm up mat, after a lot of swinging about of limbs and jiggling we had a go at the acrobatics, Daniel bailed only coming back for the trapeze (he had decided acrobatics wasn’t for him) and I surprised myself with a bendiness I knew nothing about. On to the trapeze this time the jeans did get in the way , well that’s my story and I’m sticking to it! Christopher keep trying on the trapeze – having one hand can make some things bit difficult but the circus teachers were great and really supported him. The trapeze award in our family went to Daniel, he had no bother at all and Christopher and I retired to the sidelines to watch in wonder!

Sunday was an entirely different experience, as I did my first stint as a volunteer at The Forgotten Island and what lovely sunny day to start. I was really quite amazed at how beautiful The Forgotten Island looked, a little piece of paradise in Glasgow. It was such a lovely way to spend a Sunday, I met lots of lovely people from Giant, then there were all the other volunteers, who were kind enough to teach me about the island and all the wonderful activities that children and their families can do on The Forgotten Island. The best bit had to be meeting all the island visitors and getting involved with activites, decorating recycled plant pots and filling them with plants, making wonderful creations at the Museum of Curiosities and discovering all the other wonders of The Forgotten Island. It was great to see so many of the parents making the most of the picnic area, relaxing in the sun, while the wee ones enjoyed the freedom to explore the island.

I’m really looking forward to next Sunday, maybe I’ll see you there…

When does your creative mess make you a creative mess? Well in my personal experience, it’s when your work area is no longer accessible without clambering over, under and around excess art supplies, artworks, books, mail and generally anything I haven’t unpacked since moving here a year and a half ago. I told myself at my last house a plan chest would stop the creative mess from taking over my front room and it did… For at least a week. Then when I moved house and had a room just for creative mess, I was convinced that my creative activities would be contained and kept in order and they were, for a while at least. So why is it no matter how much space I have my creative mess consumes it at breakneck speed? Mess is to creative practice, as spending is to earning money; they grow together until the mess or spending starts to have detrimental affects on the the accelerator (i.e. the creativity or earning ) if it’s money you might get an overdraft to tide you over knowing that it’ll only make things worse but with creative mess there are more sinister consequences. After shutting the door on the art room, in despair for the umpteenth time, a wee voice thinks I could just do some work in the front room, it’s less cluttered… I’ll get more done there. That’s fine until my boyfriend returns home only to find that my creative mess has engulfed another room of the house and unless someone stops it, the entire house will be awash with piles of paper new and old, piles of books things stuck on Walls, sketches on important letters ( his important letters) and worse letters lost in the paper piles. The consequence of which could be worse than bank interest. There is also the chance you run out of space for your creative mess and creative practices must cease until more space is cleared, this is the stage where I find myself. Pleased that enough creativity energy has been produced to create a mess, daunted by the mammoth tidy up needed to get back to creating. Perhaps I should have listened to my mother and remembered to always put my toys away when I am finished playing with them

Graduation tomorrow! Looking forward to seeing my uni buddies, finding out what they’ve been up to since we parted ways. I’m still in post uni limbo. Waiting to start my placement, which has been delayed by another month , I’m keeping myself pretty busy though. Really enjoying being back at Ricefield Arts and Cultural Centre it’s a really interesting organisation and I’m looking forward to being involved with new projects.I enjoyed my stint at Upmarket there were some really amazing artworks for sale and I met some lovely people.

I’m putting together  two new portfolios; a digital portfolio and a fine art portfolio, I’m having trouble converting my swf. files to mov. or quicktime. Does any one know of any free software I could use? I would really like to include my flash work with my portfolio and for some reason flash will not export quicktime movies on a macbook pro :/ I’m also working on personal creative projects, my focus has been split between printmaking and web design at the moment – I like to keep up my traditional and digital art skills.

I’ve left the Digital Renaissance website as is at the moment, as we might be moving forward with a new name and some bigger ideas, so you can still have a look at all the artworks for the time being. It’ll be a few months before we relaunch there’s a lot of work to be done, we’re keen to hear from any creatives or business professionals who would like to be involved with the group or future projects.

You can view my professional profile at http://uk.linkedin.com/in/marypettigrew

keep in touch

This Saturday  I will be found flogging my artworks at the CCA Terrace Bar in Glasgow. Their UPmarket event offers people a stall for the weekend, a chance to bring their arts, crafts and vintage goods to the public. I’m looking forward to seeing the selection of goods on offer and hopefully making a few sales, while having a nice cold drink and a bit of chat. So if you’re in Glasgow this Saturday pop along to UPmarket at the CCA Terrace Bar and see what’s on offer and have a bit of a blether. See you there:)