Notes from the Pink Egg

REMINDERS
REMINDERS 20th February 2025  Forgive me if I repeat myself but there is so much art on offer at the moment, it’s easy to miss a closing date and regret it. When it’s gone, it’s gone! First up is next Tuesday 25th February. I am giving an illustrated  talk about 3 prominent artists – L S LOWRY RA, SHEILA FELL RA AND PERCY KELLY  who came together in the fifties and  sixties in Maryport and Allonby.  It is in the hall of Keswick School and there is plenty of parking.  It starts at 7.30 (admission £7.50 on the door. )  *Look... Read More »»
COINCIDENCES
COINCIDENCES 10th February 2025 I  love coincidences. It’s great when things join up and make sense.  There is one in particular which sets my imagination going.  I wish I could have been around when 3 of my favourite and most interesting artists met in Cumbria. Each of them have had a solo show at Castlegate House in the past. Yes, it’s L S LOWRY, SHEILA FELL AND PERCY KELLY. They all met a few times in Allonby and Maryport between 1958 – 68. They chose the same subjects but painted and drew them in entirely different ways. F... Read More »»
THIS WILL TAKE YOU TO HEAVEN
THIS WILL TAKE YOU TO HEAVEN 25th January 2025 THIS WILL TAKE YOU TO HEAVEN Written in Percy Kelly's final report from Carlisle College of Art   I won’t be in The Beacon at Whitehaven today. The forecast isn’t good and there is too much to clear up in the garden after the ferocious storm and I guess that many of you will be in the same position. I will definitely be there next Saturday 1st February for my talk THE SWINGING SIXTIES. I am thoroughly enjoying putting the talk together. The decade from 1959 – 1969 was astonishing for PK. He m... Read More »»
THE SWINGING SIXTIES In Whitehaven
THE SWINGING SIXTIES In Whitehaven 15th January 2025 INSPIRED BY INDUSTRY A reminder that the exhibition INSPIRED BY INDUSTRY opens next Saturday  18th January at the Beacon in Whitehaven. You will be able to see the BRIAN KELLY COLLECTION of 11  of his father, Percy Kelly’s paintings that he donated to Haig Pit which have never been seen before. Brian Kelly gave them to Haig Pit in 1993 for their planned museum but they were lost for 32 years despite my frustrating search for them. Brian died in 2002 aged 57 so had never seen them hanging in a g... Read More »»
CHRISTMAS GREETINGS
CHRISTMAS GREETINGS 19th December 2024 Once again I’m sending a charity donation instead of a Christmas card.  It doesn’t mean I don’t love you all but it is disturbing to see people sleeping on the streets in our towns and cities.  No Christmas cards for them!  The numbers  have grown massively as rents and evictions have increased. So this year I’m  supporting Crisis at Christmas.  Your Christmas card by Percy Kelly is at the top of this newsletter. As I write this an exciting year ahead is unfolding.  The Sheila Fell exhibition a... Read More »»
SHEILA FELL 1931 - 1979
SHEILA FELL 1931 - 1979 28th November 2024 Cumberland has never been painted as I would like to see it, so I should love to do it. Cumberland is not like the rest of England. It is like no other place.                                                              Sheila Fell                                                            Don’t miss the new Sheila  Fell exhibition CUMBRIA ON CANVAS which opened last Saturday  at Tullie House in Carlisle  (the name  has just changed to Tullie but it will always be Tullie House to me.) Sheila ... Read More »»
YOU MIGHT LIKE TO SEE …
YOU MIGHT LIKE TO SEE … 20th November 2024 Several years ago a couple of retired academics from Cambridge,  Andrew and Eleanor Bradley, called to see me. They were on a mission to make a Catalogue Resonne of all Sheila Fell’s work and had found my catalogue of the 2005 exhibition of over 40 works that I mounted at Castlegate House.  It drew crowds at the time, hit the national press as well as an interview on Woman’s Hour and I sold a lot of them.  The Bradleys calculated that it would be a managable task because Sheila died at the age o... Read More »»
TITLES
TITLES 6th November 2024 A piece of art can be anything you want it to be but a title helps us understand what the maker hoped to achieve. When I opened Castlegate House as a gallery in 1987 I soon discovered that a good title could sell a piece of work. When Percy Kelly died leaving a cottage packed full of his work I was overwhelmed with the task of listing, measuring and photographing them all. In the first exhibition of 100 paintings in May 1994 I realized I couldn’t just label them as numbers. So I titled them mys... Read More »»
SUNFLOWERS
SUNFLOWERS 22nd September 2024 What is it about sunflowers and artists? Even the most miserable painters were drawn to them - even Percy Kelly splashed the yellow paint about at times.  After our non summer … again… we are all up for a bit of cheering up. What could be better than a visit to the National Gallery for their first major exhibition of Van Gogh’s works - Poets and Lovers - marking their bi-centenary. A hundred years ago they acquired one of his sunflower paintings and The Yellow Chair painted in 1888 so it just s... Read More »»
A new Kelly etching is released.
A new Kelly etching is released. 15th August 2024 KIRKGATE COCKERMOUTH This is a new print  taken from one of  Percy Kelly’s etching plates by Master printer Robert Adam (MA Hons Cantab, BA Hons ECA, HDFA Slade) of Graal Press in Edinburgh. When Percy Kelly died in July 1993 his printing press was lying in the long grass in the garden of his cottage in Norfolk. I offered to get it brought back to Cumbria and persuaded his son Brian to donate it to the print department of Carlisle College of Art where his father had learned the art of printing... Read More »»