A QUARTET of neighbouring artists and crafters have come together through a common love and admiration of the local countryside to arrange a "pop-up" gallery with an exhibition of their work next month.

The exhibition, Drawn by Nature, will be held at North Tawton Bowling Club clubhouse on Saturday and Sunday, November 11 and 12.

The artists are Celia Olsson, Emmeline Webb, Jo Purdue and Janet Jarvis.

Speaking for the group, Celia Olsson explained: “We each display our work at various venues amongst all the other fantastic artists from the South West throughout the year and the four of us, all local to North Tawton, thought that it would be a great idea to put our work demonstrating our common bond on show at a single artistic display in our home patch.

"We are all so very different in our subject matters, styles and approaches and outputs but we are all inspired and drawn together by our local surroundings, the lush greenness of the woodlands and meadows contrasting with the rich ruby-red soil, the starkness of some areas of Dartmoor and the range of domesticated (and domestic) and wild animals that live locally.”

Newbie to the area Emmeline Webb has been absolutely amazed at the rich vein of talent that resides in and around North Tawton.

She said: “Little did I realise that all this was going on when we moved to the area from Hertfordshire two years ago and I am thrilled at joining with the others in this exhibition.”  

All four artists have had busy other careers but love to use their artistic skills to use local subjects to inspire and create.

Jo Purdue creates colourful textured semi abstracts, often taking ideas from Dartmoor “but” she says: “I also love to use the local wildflower meadows and flowers with the aim of creating a sense of place and mood of the area, especially of the moor, but quite often of nowhere in particular, just wherever you want it to be.”

Janet Jarvis specialises in the fur and feather living locally.

She said: “I just love to capture the detail of the fleece of a Devon Longwool sheep or the curl on the forehead of a Red Devon bull in my pastels and the characters in a line of cattle in my looser-styled acrylics.”

Celia is also a landscape artist with a "loose" style and an experimental approach with water colours and mixed media to achieve different effects and textures.

Celia loves “to bring back memories, colours and atmospheres from all the places that I visit, but especially from beautiful Devon, which inspire me to bring them to life on paper.”

Emmeline gets her inspiration from local countryside walks especially around and about North Tawton, but also Dartmoor and the South West Coastal Path.

She said: "I am a mixed media artist and I'll start with a painting, sketch, lino-cut or collage which I’ll repeat to form a design or pattern for my homeware and interior creations.”

The exhibition will run from 11am to 4.30pm each day, when Janet, Celia, Jo and Emmeline look forward to seeing you and showing and discussing their work.

As well as the original work, prints on paper or canvas, cards and other items will be on show.

There will also be refreshments available, and, Jo adds: “We intend to give a donation to a local charity from the event.”