On Saturday we had a great day out visting local Charleston Farmhouse. It’s only a few miles away, a beautiful cottage in the Sussex countryside that for the best part of the 20th Century was inhabited by artists from the Bloomsbury Group. Yep, it’s true they lead crazy bohemian lives (ie lots of love triangles going on), but what I was most interested in were the paintings they did, lovely, painterley and expressive. And also the patterns they freely painted onto fabrics to upholster soft furnishings, decorate their walls and also directly onto their furniture. (I’ve mostly included photos of their interiors and furnishings but their paintings are just as good).
They set up the Omega workshops in London where they took their art and applied it as a craft. This is something I’m really interested in, but having studied in fine art, I’ve been subtly taught to be snobbish about crafts. However, I feel this group of artists just took a step outside the box and celebrated the fact that they have a good aesthetic and applied this to decorative elements without concerns of what the art establishment would say. All very inspiring. As I couldn’t take photos there, these photos come from the Charleston Farmhouse site where you can also get directions and visiting hours.
