For
thirty years I wrote about the arts for the
Essex County Standard and met many of the
talents who live and work in the Esssex-Suffolk
border. Looking back, one thing stands out
– their individuality.
Catharni Stern,
Paul Rumsey, John Doubleday, Waj Mirecki,
James Dodds, Barry Woodcock and many, many
others, produced pictures and artefacts uniquely
and unmistakably theirs, as recognisable and
familiar as their own faces.
Among these
intensely original talents was, and still
is, Dione Page. The artist tells me that she
grew up during the war on her father’s
farm at Maldon, where Suffolk Punches ploughed
the fields. Her family home was a manor house,
once moated, with a banqueting hall and a
resident ghost. She remembers drawing on newspapers
at the age of four, and having attended schools
in Danbury and Colchester. Her talent led
her to the Colchester School of Art under
the Headship of John O’Connor RWS with
tuition from Hugh Cronyn and Carel Weight
RA.
For about four
years she worked as a graphic design artist,
initially for Charles Debenham, another local
original, and first used the three tools that
have served her ever since: lumigraph pencil,
gouache and wax pastel. In 1966, she married
Nelson Blowers, who has framed her pictures
from that day to this, and they have produced
three children.
Not every local
artist finds local inspiration and Dione Page’s
first pictures were memories of Wales. She
went there, on holiday with her family, attracted
by the mountains and waterfalls. These early
works were friendly yet virile. Water gushing
over bare rocks was a favourite theme. Welsh
chapels and cottages sat for their portraits,
the buildings standing out firmly from their
backgrounds, their severity lightened by just
a touch of colour.
This bold quality
has matured over the years. Outdoor scenes
have been succeeded by still life and black
outlines by bright colours. Fruit, often larger
than life, on willow pattern plates, and flowers,
poppies and lilies in particular, for the
artist is a keen gardener, are prevalent.
As often as
not, still life and landscape join forces.
A country mansion stands in the background,
dwarfed by outsize flowers, with a plate of
fruit in the foreground. Or the scene is maritime,
Essex fishing boats and a foreshore filled
with anchors, fishing tackle and shells.
What makes a
successful artist? Expertise in his chosen
medium, I would say, and individuality, a
personal point of view on what is presented.
Dione Page’s large, welcoming pictures
tell us that the world can be a good place,
a happy place, and life worth living. There
should always be an artist to remind us of
that.
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