A collaborative arts project linking communities across the Durham Dales
About the Artists
Sue Abel, Lynn Finlinson, Jenny Mountain and Rosi Thornton currently work together on a number of Weardale projects as ScrapBank Recycled. They have collaborated on the textile map panels with writer and poet Jo Colley and filmmaker Matt James Smith to deliver the Connecting Weardale project.
The project has been managed by the artists, and involved hosting a number of community-based, whole day sessions with residents from the different communities of Weardale. These sessions took place in Stanhope Community Centre, a central Weardale location, and included provision for local bus arrangements to allow participants from different parts of the Dale to take part.
Sue Abel
Sue Abel is a painter and visual artist based in Weardale, County Durham. She loves sharing creative opportunities with people and encouraging them to explore different techniques and mediums. Her recent work includes landscape and portrait painting, hooky & proggy mats, fabric dyeing, batik, and sculpture.
Jo Colley
Jo Colley is a writer, with an interest in the digital presentation of text, especially poetry. She won the 2013 Read Our Lips Prize for Dream On, a poetry film and also makes podcasts. She runs a small poetry imprint called Blueprint Press. Her latest collection, Sleeper, was published by Smokestack in February, 2020. She was recently poet in residence for the Northern Poetry Library and has taught Creative Writing at Teesside University.
She tweets @jocolley, posts on Instagram as @jocolley and co-blogs about fashion, culture, femaleness and death at Foxy Fash.
Lynn Finlinson
Lynn Finlinson has lived on Bradley Farm near Wolsingham for over 30 years, and has found the rhythms of farm and rural life a never ending source of inspiration.
She is relatively new to having her own art practice, but has pursued creative processes and techniques since the 1990s, including in textiles, photography, silversmithing, and fusion glass. More recently she has worked with Jenny to facilitate a variety of community art-based projects, and now being involved with ScrapBank Recycled has rekindled her love of textiles!
Jenny Mountain
Jenny Mountain is a painter based in Weardale, County Durham, interested in people and landscape . A community artist with a versatile range of skills in visual and 3D art, Jenny works in textiles, drawing and printing, mosaics and sculptural forms including clay, willow and glass.
She loves to introduce art in places and communities to improve lives, develop creative memories and bring people together to share rich experiences.
Matt James Smith
Matt Smith is a freelance filmmaker, video producer, camera operator and self-shooting producer/director based in Durham, North East England.
His website is https://mattjamessmith.com
Rosi Thornton
Rosi Thornton is a visual artist based in the north east of England. Her interests combine pattern, print, colour, and cloth, which she uses creatively in textiles, quilts, printmaking, and handmade books.
She believes passionately in recycling, skill-sharing, and art within communities, and runs a textile project called REJIG which brings these interests together.
She posts on Instagram as @rosithornton and can be found hyping up textiles on Facebook as REJIG, and at www.luckyfisharts.co.uk