RACHEL

Sea notes. A record of what I see, what I notice – me and my way of being, by the sea

18.5.23

Cayton Bay, 8.30pm, tide going out

Overcast and cloudy, light breeze, felt mainly on my cheekbones

A wide and open expanse of sand, mainly smooth

No-one has been here during this ebb tide. I ponder on being be the only person to witness the detail of this sand as it is now. It will be different next time round.

Water trickles from the wooded cliffs and spreads out across the sand, an expanse of reflective sheen.

It reflects the bright sky as I walk towards the water’s edge, but becomes dark, reflecting the woods, as I turn to look where I’ve come from. Other trickles meander their way round occasional rocks, carving channels and forming mounds of sand in repetitive but irregular patterns. Note to self - find out about the physics of this…

The sand on Cayton Bay is not uniform, some pale, some a gorgeous dark chocolate brown and sometimes black with larger grains. The map of the receding tide is drawn by the mixing of these sands.

Some tiny pebbles are sitting in hollows, the sand around them taken, the pebbles left behind. The colour of the sand changes to accentuate this – a pale arc around the top edge and a darker tail that points to the sea.

There are hundreds of worm casts. I am intrigued by their squiggly curves and draw them. About fifteen centimetres from each one is a small and perfectly circular hole or crater. Note to self – research the what and why of this.

I’m at the north end of the bay, and the waves here are gentle and lapping. The wind is ruffling the sea’s surface. The small ripples move north and are perpendicular to the pattern of grooves in the sand beneath them, making a lovely criss-cross. Further south the waves get wilder and begin to crash.

The tide is going out and each wave deposits its delicate border of foam and sometimes a faint line of sand. In the shallows the two-tone sand is being pushed to and fro to the rhythm of the waves, making soft-edged bands that are constantly changing.

I walk back up the beach to find the last wave line, a record of the highest wave of the high tide.

Biographies

The artist’s portraits were drawn by their peers on the program during our last meeting

SARAH ADAMS

Studied Fine Art Printmaking at GLOSCAT and the Royal College of Art, before returning to painting. Based in Cornwall, the main focus of her work is coastal landscape, with a particular interest in geology and the intertidal zone.

@sarah.padstowstudio www.sarahadamspainting.co.uk

ANNE-MARIE ATKINSON

My interdisciplinary practice includes installation, mark making, and digital media, often with a socially engaged focus, and asks how art can call in better futures and more authentic connections. I am based in Leeds and am a lecturer at Manchester School of Art.

@annemarie_atkinson www.annemarieatkinson.co.uk

AGNES BECKER

Artist, science communicator and creator of We Are Stardust - a place where art and science collide to enrich your experience of and relationship with our messy, beautiful universe. I create artwork that inspires connection with the more-than-human world and online adventures that encourage you to rewild your soul.

@wearestardustuk www.wearestardust.uk

BARBARA CHENEY

I am inspired by the landscape and seascape to make abstract and semi-abstract works. Current interests include flow, overwhelm, and boundaries meeting and being crossed; and environment and development issues.

@barbaracheneyart

HANNE HUSA DALE

Born and based on the Norwegian west coast, and lives in Bergen. Her creative practice has long revolved around drawing, photography and textiles; she is interested in the stories we tell ourselves and others, and the interactions between nature and culture, inner and outer worlds.

@hanne.dale www.hannedale.com

JOANNA LEAH

An artist, researcher and academic whose practice explores choreographic tactics in diagrammatic drawing, writing, installation, and performance. Often no distinction between word and line; her work is concentrated on line-making that embodies and facilitates material forces such as gravity, rhythm, liquid and pulse in movement motifs to harness environmental and cultural materialisms of the ‘moteur’ in place, to configure specific notation of spaces.

@joannaleah.art www.joannaleah.com

ILONA

Born in Poland, studied interior and furniture design at The Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow. After moving to the UK to live and work, she pursued for her MA in Fine Arts at Arts Bournemouth University in 2018. In her recent drawing practice, she is looking to mediate her day to day experiences by investigating a variety of materials and exploring new working processes; looking to attract the viewer’s attention to the intricacies of everyday experience.

@ilonaskladzien www.ilonaskladzien.com

CARRIE STANLEY

A contemporary figurative artist focusing on the human condition. She uses a variety of media and prefers to work on a larger scale to have physical connectivity to the work.

@carriestanleyartist

Rachel Welford

Artist based in Scarborough on the North Yorkshire coast. Originally trained in fine art (BA(Hons) Fine Art,(Painting) Wimbledon School of Art). An interest in transparency, reflectivity and ephemerality led to a Masters Degree and PhD in Architectural Glass at the University of Sunderland where she now teaches.

@rachelwelford www.rachelwelford.co.uk