Pauline Allomes' quaint and pretty cottage in Barrack St is again opening its doors and garden for Artists Open Studios. Exhibiting their work alongside Pauline are Mel Fleet and Simone Jacquat.
A priority for Pauline this year is health and safety with Covid in mind, so while all Artists Open Studios'
visitors have to be fully vaxxed and have a lanyard declaring that to be so, masks and physical distancing will be required. Pauline says Christina Emery has volunteered to be on the gate, letting restricted numbers on to the property at any one time.
"We'll have chairs all over the place so people can sit and wait," says Pauline.
Inside the house will be Pauline's work; sheltered down the side of the house is where Mel will be set up, and the picturesque garden will be the perfect location for Simone's art.
"Everyone will be spaced so we're hoping it will keep everyone safe."
Mel Fleet and her work will be ensconced in a sheltered nook at the side of the house, accessed by the same path that leads to the back garden.
"With my driftwood art, photography and jersey coats," says Mel. Her jersey coats are coats made from jerseys, as the name suggests. Mel has been creating jersey coats for 10 years, buying up op shops' supplies of woollen jumpers, but these days she likes trying new and different things. Her work should appeal to many. Mel also has a solo exhibition coming up soon.
"Then you'll come around into the garden, and that's my space," says Simone. "I do mainly stone sculpting." Some of her work is huge and heavy, half a tonne or more, so selected pieces of more manageable weight will be exhibited on the lawn. "Sometimes I do wooden pieces as well, because they are lighter." She also works with clay or wood when forming an idea which she will transfer to stone later.
Simone is traditionally a stone sculptor, working with such New Zealand material as Taranaki andesite, a fine-grained, dark volcanic rock.
"At the moment I am working a lot with Italian marble which I imported from Italy a few years ago." Her website has images of a marble quarry in Carrara, Italy. She worked in a studio in the Tuscan city for three months in 2019.
A knowledge of rocks and their characteristics is necessary for her art.
"It needs a certain density and a certain soundness ... every stone is different. Some are harder, softer, some take a polish, others do not ... you have a lot of choice. It's one material, you think, but they are really different," says Simone.
Inside, Pauline has a room full of new work.
"I'm still painting the bush, because I just love it, and still doing some micrography [painting with words], but I've got some ideas in my head that I want to go in a different direction with word pictures, combining paint and word a bit more," she says. Pauline's work talks to the viewer about the importance of unspoiled natural spaces and the need for a collective conscious effort to preserve those spaces we have.