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Hello,
What a wonderful Official Opening we had for our Annual Exhibition
on Friday night - although it had been such a hot day that evolved into a
hot evening, we had a good number of visitors and members in attendance
and a friendly ambiance to enjoy. Susan Templeman spoke very positively
and from her heart about the value of the arts in society, offering her
support to our organisation, and Graham Swain, HCAW Patron, shared his
memories of the early days of HCAW. Both Susan and Graham encouraged us
in what we have achieved and to look towards the future.
The Piggery Studios and Gallery looked beautiful with new artworks
on display to showcase members' art making - in the form of painting,
printmaking, drawing, ceramics and jewellery. It is a visual feast to
browse the venue.
Lots of hard work and organisation went into the exhibition -
preparing the venue, hanging and displaying the artwork, food and
drinks, donations, signage, decorations, roster, promotion, invitations,
flyers, cleaning and tidying - thank you to everyone who helped in this
massive task. The exhibition is open this weekend - some of us had a
chance to have an informal discussion around the food table and we
agreed that it would be good to somehow get more visitors to the venue,
so if you haven't visited yet, perhaps you could call in today (Sunday
20th) 10am - 4pm. Chrissy Goska and Rosa Visciano ventured to Hawkesbury
Radio 89.9FM during the week, to be interviewed about HCAW and the
exhibition - a new way to promote HCAW to locals.
Yesterday (Saturday) we welcomed some special visitors to our
exhibition - Sally and Carl Corte who are executors of Kevin Oxley's
estate. Kevin Oxley was the founder of HCAW in 1978. He worked
tirelessly for several years to establish a very strong foundation for
the arts on campus and in the community. Sally is Kevin's ex-partner,
their son is Tim Oxley. Sally and Carl were visiting from Queensland and
brought a painting of Kevin's to donate to HCAW as a fitting tribute to
Kevin and his work in establishing HCAW all those years ago. We are
delighted and proud to have a beautiful contemporary landscape painting
as an example of Kevin's work on display at the Piggery Gallery. Sally
also gave us a 2017 Calendar which features some of Kevin's paintings.
This will be on display and very useful at K13 next year.
During Sally and Carl's visit (with Carl's sister as well), we
visited K13 and K3 to show Sally the places where Kevin first set up
HCAW, the Old Woolshed and Feedshed. Sally had only heard about the
places from Kevin so it was of special interest to see the places and
take photos. We visited Stable Square and Sally noticed some familiar
names on plaques on the pathway of Hawkesbury Foundation from Hawkesbury
Agricultural College days. There was a definite feeling of nostalgia
during this time.
While this was happening, preparations were under way for the
delivery of the new kiln to K13 where Donna and Oggy were dismantling
the old kiln. We are grateful for their tireless work in assisting us in
so many ways. The new kiln has come about by the combined efforts of
members applying for grants from Club Grants (North Richmond Panthers),
Bendigo Bank and others. Thank you to Vicki White for filling in all
those application forms and writing the applications. We have changed
our banking to Bendigo Bank and have been able to have use of a
Community EFTPOS machine from Bendigo Bank, for the exhibition weekend,
making sales more convenient for customers who can use a credit card to
make purchases.
Coming up on Wednesday 30th November at 5pm at K13 is our special
meeting to update our Constitution and to come to a final decision about
new fee structures and to finalise our Licence Agreement with WSU. Our
membership continues to grow which is a positive sign for the future.
Malcolm has started up the Life Drawing Group on Thursday nights at K13
which has already attracted a lot of interest and new members. I'm
looking for someone who would be able to use the "new" old computer at
the K13 office and compile our Membership List in digital format
(Microsoft Office Word). Please let me know if you have these skills and
would be willing to help in this way.
With many thanks for your continued support,
Josephine
Photos: Graham Swain, Susan Templeman and Del Swain at the Annual Exhibition Opening Night
Myself
with Sally Corte, on behalf of HCAW, receiving Kevin Oxley's landscape
painting, at the Piggery Lane Studios and Gallery on Saturday
