Nightingales and other voices

Wren

My first craft stall was at a plant fair at Wimpole Hall in 2002. I had a tiny trestle table amongst the pots of campanula and dahlias. Some of my pieces were made from gems and beads from my own jewellery that I'd taken apart and reworked. To my huge surprise I sold 15 necklaces in a couple of hours. It was the start of something.

Since then I've had small collections in several galleries in East Anglia, participated in Cambridge Open Studios and organised sales of handmade goods. I had never showed my work in a public venue though. I always thought it was something that 'proper' artists did (the ones with art degrees). I wasn't even sure how to go about holding an exhibition. Wait to be invited? Ring the venue? Just walk in, lay out my jewellery and put up a sign outside? Maybe not.

Nightingale, long-tailed tit

Last year I was invited to the preview of an exhibition by Natasha Newton. You may know her work - exquisitely painted stones, soothing starscapes, landscapes and charismatic birds. It was to be held at Snape Maltings, a place I know well. It's a series of truly lovely shops and cafes in converted barns and oasthouses on the edge of the river Alde in Suffolk. I snooped about on the Snape Maltings website and realised that they had a small building, called The Workshop, next to the river that used to be used by the RSPB and could be hired for exhibitions.

Robin's nest, robin

For some years I've wanted to make a series of necklaces of individual bird species, particularly British songbirds. This was my starting point - you may remember it - a recording I made of a nightingale singing in our village wood in 2009.

I wondered whether another artist may want to show their work with me. I drove to Rutland to drink some tea with Angela Harding. Angela's linocut prints are of garden and coastal birds and she provides seasonal illustrations for BBC Countryfile magazine and Gardens Illustrated.

I love the charisma of her birds and the detail of the plants they sit in and the background scenes. To my delight she was keen to co-exhibit.

We decided that our show would be called 'Nightingales and other voices'.

Over the first weekend of the Easter holidays (April 4th-6th) Angela and I will show our current work in the Snape Maltings Workshop. The exhibition will celebrate the return of Spring through tiny wearable silver versions and prints of our best loved songbirds. We hope to capture the thrill of spotting an oystercatcher on the shore or hearing a wren singing in a hedgerow.

We'll be encouraging visitors to walk into a wood, up a path or stand near a hedge and listen to birdsong. I'll be making a series of silver birdsongs' nests in necklace form, including that of a robin, long-tailed tit and blackbird.

You can find out more about the show here.

Blackbird, Angela's new print: nightingale

Angela and I will also be holding vinyl block printing and silver clay workshops in the two days following our show. The images on the left below are of Spring-inspired pieces made by beginners in some of my previous workshops. On the right are Angela's hands carving one of her blocks.

You can find the workshop details here and here if you'd like to come along.

Just a few weeks after the exhibition, nightingales will return to Britain. Every year they edge closer to being on the endangered list due to loss of their preferred habitat of dense woodland, so it is a huge privilege to hear them singing. A few of them will be in Walberswick woods and a several other sites near Snape. I plan to take a picnic rug, lantern (and perhaps some wine) and go and listen to them.