#digswellarts

🎬✨ Meet Sandra Smith at Forge Open Studios 2025! ✨🎬 Sandra’s latest twin paintings blend architecture and nature in cinematic style. One casts the Shredded Wheat factory as a Kubrick-inspired protagonist against the High Welwyn skyline; the other layers stencilled grain silos with chalk-ground pigment for a sculptural, organic flow. 🌾🏭 📅 21–22 June 2025 📍 The Forge, Hertford Road, Digswell 🎟 Free entry – drop in anytime! Discover how domestic interiors, grand structures and verdant motifs come together in her immersive landscapes. 🔗 Full details: https://digswellarts.org/forge-open-studios-2025/

🌿✨ Explore the crossroads of nature and creativity with Katy Cook at Forge Open Studios 2025! ✨🌿 Katy’s practice weaves together drawing, monoprint and collage, gathering fragments of the natural world and reshaping them into poetic compositions. From the very first year of her Digswell fellowship, she’s been fascinated by how simple shapes can evoke complex stories—and her latest series pushes those explorations into new dimensions. Every line, texture and cut reveals a dialogue between mark-making and material. 📅 When: 21–22 June 2025 📍 Where: The Forge, Hertford Road, Digswell 🎟️ Entry: Free! Drop by Katy’s studio to see her process in action, chat about her journey and take home an original piece that speaks to the harmony of art and environment. 🔗 Full details: https://digswellarts.org/forge-open-studios-2025/

🌿✨ Meet printmaker Heather Ellis at Forge Open Studios 2025! ✨🌿 Discover Heather’s stunning original prints—monoprints, collagraphs, drypoint etchings, relief prints and even innovative tetrapak pieces—each one inspired by the wild beauty of the UK’s landscapes and the tiniest details of the natural world. Currently, she’s exploring the intricate patterns of Trametes versicolor (that remarkable bracket fungus you often spot on woodland walks with your four-legged friend!). 🐾🍄 📅 When: 21–22 June 2025 📍 Where: The Forge, Hertford Road, Digswell 🎟️ Entry: Free! Pop in to chat with Heather about her process, pick up an original print for your home and immerse yourself in her nature-inspired world. Find out more: https://digswellarts.org/forge-open-studios-2025/

Small folded works on tracing paper by Digswell Arts fellow Jane Bottery

#repost @jbottery North 2020 Oil on canvas on board 50 x 40cm

🎨 Digswell Arts Open Studios This September, we’re opening the doors of The Forge in Digswell as part of Herts Open Studios — and you’re invited! Come and explore our working studios, meet the artists, discover new work and get a closer look at the creative processes behind painting, printmaking, drawing, collage and more. 📅 Sunday 6 September 📅 Saturday 12 September ⏰ 11am–5pm 📍 The Forge, Hertford Road, Digswell, Herts AL6 0BU 🎟️ FREE ENTRY You’ll also be able to enjoy live creative demonstrations. Work will be on display from Digswell Arts Fellows and Print Group members, alongside invited alumni and former print members — celebrating both the artists working at The Forge today and those who have been part of its creative community over the years. Whether you’re passionate about art, curious about how artists work, looking for inspiration, or simply fancy discovering something creative on your doorstep, we’d love to see you. Save the dates and come inside the studios!

Art Anniversaries: Andy Warhol and the power of repetition Born on 6 August 1928, Andy Warhol changed how we think about images, fame, advertising and mass culture. Before becoming one of the defining figures of Pop Art, Warhol worked as a commercial illustrator in New York. That background shaped the way he looked at the world: products, celebrities, photographs and printed images became raw material for art. His work asks questions that still feel very contemporary. What happens when an image is repeated again and again? When does something become iconic? And how do print, design and media shape the way we see? For artists working today, Warhol is a reminder that the everyday visual world around us — packaging, screens, photographs, logos and popular culture — can become a serious site of artistic enquiry.

What does it mean to build a creative community beyond social media? In our latest article, Digswell Arts Fellow Nade Simmons shares how Patreon has become a home for her creative practice — a space where she can share works in progress, sketchbooks, workshops, experiments and the thinking behind her finished work. Nade also reflects on building trust through consistency, creating content that people genuinely value and developing a more sustainable connection with those who follow her artistic journey. Read “Patreon: Building a Home for Your Creative Practice” on the Digswell Arts website. You can also connect with Nade and support her work on Patreon: patreon.com/cw/WhatNadeMade