OpenHand OpenSpace (OHOS)

It has been a privilege to be Chair of OHOS from 2010 - 2017, and a joy to work with the many artists who have come together to provide exhibitions, practical workshops, talks, discussions, collaborations, support to other artists, and school visits.  They have sustained the studios and gallery in Brock Keep, and helped deliver OHOS's aim of education of the public, especially in the visual arts.  I am grateful to sponsors Reading Borough Council, ClarksLegal, the Architectural Heritage Fund, and the Heritage Lottery Fund for their support for the studios, and to Arts Council England and the REME Museum of Technology for their support for the New Grounds project.

To make these things happen takes a lot of time and energy, and generates a mountain of paperwork.  There is a risk that this distracts from an artist's own practice.  For me it has become part of my art practice, generating works such as Keep Folding (2010, magic cube), The Persistence of Ideas (2011, plaster, wire, papers, table & chair),  A New Life for the Keep (2012, a pile of admin papers), Crowsnest Picnic (2014, picnic and participants), A Great Big Enormous Sculpture (2015, ephemeral wall text), Administrative Compost (2016, plaster, wire, shredded admin papers, drawings on found canvas box) and Fragile? (2016, installation, wire, paper, archive photos).