New gallery pops up in Banbury

As one Banbury art venue closed its doors - Naomi's Cafe - another opened at the weekend as the Church Lane Art Gallery popped up.
Church Lane Art Gallery, Melanie Charles NNL-170227-094037001Church Lane Art Gallery, Melanie Charles NNL-170227-094037001
Church Lane Art Gallery, Melanie Charles NNL-170227-094037001

Organised by Barry Whitehouse, proprietor of Parsons Street’s The Artery along with town team coordinators Iain Nicholson and Neil Wild, the gallery will showcase work of local artists until the end of March.

Mr Whitehouse said: “It’s to see if the town can sustain a professional gallery.

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“We were given the opportunity to trial it for the month so if it proves sustainable within this time we will look at extending our time here.”

Church Lane Art Gallery NNL-170227-093600001Church Lane Art Gallery NNL-170227-093600001
Church Lane Art Gallery NNL-170227-093600001

He added: “We’ve got a wide variety of thing in here. We’ve got paintings, sculptures, glassware, pottery, all different kinds of art and it’s all for sale.”

Liz Dixon, one of the exhibitors and a former engineer, has a very unusual medium with which she creates her art.

Liz said: “I was at a craft fair about five years ago and one of the traders had just one piece made from Powertex. It’s a water-based, non-toxic, environmentally-friendly fabric hardener.

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“I started making sculptures initially and tried to get them into galleries and sell them at craft fairs.”

Church Lane Art Gallery, Liz Dixon NNL-170227-094235001Church Lane Art Gallery, Liz Dixon NNL-170227-094235001
Church Lane Art Gallery, Liz Dixon NNL-170227-094235001

Steve Green, whose remarkable life like portraits are on display, said: “For that type of detail you are looking at around 80 to 100 hours of cutting using different scalpel heads.

“It’s all taken from photographs or someone gives me an image then I run it through various different apps just to get the lines right where I want to be cutting. Then its just hours and hours of cutting, these are all done using layers of card. It’s like an old style printing process bought up to date basically.”

David Blakemore, a Cotswold still life and landscape artist said: “I think it’s a wonderful idea. I understand Banbury is crying out for more art and I don’t think you can ever get enough art.

“When Barry asked me if I would like to show some of my art I was pleased to do so.”

The gallery, on the corner of Church Walk and Church Lane, will be open until the end of March.

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