Thanks to funding support from Herefordshire Council via the UKSPF programme,  we re-launched the Herefordshire Visual Artists Network back in November. Gemma Moore, the Herefordshire Visual Artists Network Coordinator, has been reaching out to visual artists in the county to get involved. Read what Gemma has been up to in this short blog post written by her below.

Herefordshire Visual Artist Network, or HVAN, is a new group for Herefordshire-based artists to network, develop and grow. The network provides a forum to celebrate the creativity in Herefordshire. 

The idea was launched in November 2023, and since then I have been contacting artists based all over the county to develop an exciting artist group. We met in person for the first time on the 19^th of January at the Hereford College of Arts (HCA) and discussed our ideas for the group. This was a great way of learning more about what the artists of Herefordshire think and feel about their practice within the context of Herefordshire. 

Since then, we have had two online meetings to discuss potential ideas for a summer show in Hereford. We have also had our first in-person activity session, which involved HVAN member Mike Clements demonstrating how to make fishbone book art. This was interesting and highlighted how effective book art can be when presenting and engaging with new information and how they may work in an exhibition context too. It was so great to see how every artist’s practice influenced the designs and choice of colour, collage and message presented in the book. 

We are looking forward to organising more artist-led sessions and seeing what HVAN gets up to next!

Gemma Moore, Herefordshire Visual Artists Network Coordinator

A delightful workshop, hopefully the first in a series for HVAN, led by the maker of art books from the Marches, Mike Clements. Firstly we followed his directions in creating an intriguing folding concertina book with a fishbone image from an A4 sheet which had a satisfying complexity within a simplicity of form. We then moved on to our own efforts working with materials and self-selected subject matter. 

This was both a worthwhile and relaxing afternoon making something different to our own diverse practice but gave us some food for thought. It certainly deepens our appreciation of what went into making the book an art form.

HVAN Member

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