‘Here & There - Spain’

 In March 2022 I finally arrived at Los Gázquez for my Covid-delayed Joya-AIR arts residency (www.joya-air.org). Owned and run as a not-for-profit by Simon and Donna Beckmann, Los Gázquez sits within the Sierra María-Los Vélez Natural Park in the Almeriá district of Spain. Joya gave me space. Space in the form of a studio. Space in the grandeur of the landscape. Space for my head to think – or simply float. Space for my body to work, walk, or rest. Joya also means distance from the clamour, demands, interruptions and noise of everyday life. Joya gave me an existence within deep silence with only the sound of the wind, the bees, the birds and after dark, the calling of frogs and the subtle vibration of the vast night sky. Stimulation exists in this space, in this environment and in the company of, and conversation with, other artists.

The land around Los Gázquez is rich in clay ranging from a creamy off-white, to pale yellow/sand through to a soft, dusty apricot. I collected, dried and ground these soft colours, using them to complement the pigments I’d brought with me, and was able to work on different surfaces to obtain texture on the linen. Other colours exist in the region but due to unseasonably poor weather (lots of rain and even snow), I couldn’t get off site to collect them, but even poor weather brings its own rewards through the different qualities of muted light and colour.

The region around Los Gázquez in Spain
contains many colours of ochre
The harvest is imagined, and closer to home

The water catchment system is being restored
The Saharan dust arrives, carried on the wind and in the rain, connecting two landscapes

Fences, walls & buildings

The rain in Spain… unseasonably cold and wet at Los Gázquez