In September, I was fortunate to return to Greece for a residency at the Skopelos Foundation of the Arts on the beautiful Island of Skopelos, one of 4 islands of the Sporades archipelago in the northwestern Aegean Sea. The island is hilly and forested, surrounded by the blue green of the Aegean. Beaches ring the island and provide access for swimming during the warm months, and a great place for sea gazing at other times. The main town of Skopelos is built up the hillside from the harbor with lovely whitewashed, terracotta tiled houses and winding stepped pathways often too narrow for anything but a pedestrian or a scooter. During the warmer months, the harbor front is filled with people enjoying a coffee or a meal, a stroll, and children playing. Have I made it sound bucolic? It is! And the people are so warm that returning is always on my mind.
Of course, the main purpose of my trip was to work in the printshop at the Skopelos Foundation of the Arts or SkopArt. The studio, equipped with presses, inks, brayers and other necessities, is located high on a hill with expansive views of the Aegean. For a desert dweller in particular, the ever-changing water, which can go from a placid turquoise on balmy days to steel blues and grays with wind whipped white caps during stormy days, is so mesmerizing that it was necessary to occasionally just gaze at the sea. This had a tremendous impact on the body of images I produced—you can clearly see the colors of the sea reflected in these pieces. In fact, the colors are highlighted in large part due to the very minimal compositions.
Artist residencies provide a physical space but also uninterrupted time, free from the demands of daily life. I find I normally put in long hours of often physical work during residencies but, since it is what I love doing, and I can (mostly) ignore those daily distractions and necessities when not at home, I have found residencies to be a great place for developing new work. Residencies force one to literally work in different ways to adapt to different equipment, materials, and even climate. Certainly, this can be stressful, but it is a challenge that can often produce a new body of work in a new and interesting direction. SkopArt is one of my favorite places for a residency and, I am pleased with the pieces I produced in short two weeks I was in residence this time.
I’ve included some examples with this post. Let me know what you think and, of course, they are available for purchase. They aren’t up on my website yet, but if you are interested, e-mail me and I will provide a list with prices to you.