Christine Kinsey
Christine Kinsey (born October 1942) is a Welsh painter, now based in Pembrokeshire.[1][2] She was the Co-Founder and Artistic Director of Chapter Workshops and Centre of the Arts, Cardiff, now called the Chapter Arts Centre.[3][4][5]
Biography
Kinsey was born in Pontypool, and has developed a group of female characters who emerge repeatedly in her paintings. These characters enact roles within the themes that she explores in her work[6] including what it was like to grow up female in the industrial valleys of south east Wales;[7][8] and Cymreictod (a sense of feeling, being Welsh). Her touring solo show Cymreictod – Women of Wales 1989-91 was reviewed in the magazine Spare Rib.[9] Kinsey also examines the depiction of women within a western Christian culture.[10]
Words and poetry have always been an important influence in Kinsey’s work. In 2014, she curated the exhibition Correspondences – contemporary painting in response to the life and writing of R. S. Thomas at Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Pwllheli. The exhibition included work by 14 contemporary artists based in Wales including Kinsey, Osi Rhys Osmond, Iwan Bala, Ivor Davies and Mary Lloyd Jones. The catalogue for the exhibition included poetry by Menna Elfyn and Myrddin ap Dafydd.[11] Later the same year, the exhibition was then amalgamated by curator Lynne Crompton with work from artists responding to Dylan Thomas at Oriel Q Gallery, Narberth.[12][13] At an event to mark R. S. Thomas’ centenary in 2013, Kinsey was invited by event organisers the University of Wales Press and Swansea University professor M Wynn Thomas (R. S. Thomas’ biographer and executor of his literary estate) to talk about the ways in which the poetry of R. S. Thomas has influenced her art.[14]
Her work is represented in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth; Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea; Contemporary Art Society of Wales, Cardiff; and Newport Museum, Newport.[1]
References
- Peter W. Jones, Isabel Hitchman (2015). Post-War to Post-Modern: A Dictionary of Artists in Wales. Llandysul: Gomer Press. pp. 446–447. ISBN 9781848518766.
- Osmond, Osi Rhys (Summer 2010). "Narrow Skies and Tilting Perspectives". Planet: the Welsh Internationalist. 199: 35.
- Osmond, Osi Rhys (Spring 2009). "Chapter: Forty Years of Radical Cultural Activism". Planet: the Welsh Internationalist. 194: 28–37.
- Hutchison, Robert (1977). Three Arts Centres: A Study of South Hill Park, the Gardner Centre and Chapter. London: Arts Council of Great Britain. pp. 73–95. ISBN 0728701383.
- Heywood Thomas, Nicola. "A New Chapter". BBC. BBC. Retrieved 12 December 2016.
- Clarkson, Jonathan (2006). "Mind the Gap". Planet: the Welsh Internationalist. 179: 119–121.
- Price-Owen, Anne (November 1994). "Valley Girls". Planet: the Welsh Internationalist. 107: 16–22.
- Hourahane, Shelagh (1999). Maps, Myths and the Politics of Art in Certain Welsh Artists. Bridgend: Seren. pp. 75–76. ISBN 1854112511.
- Simpson, Penny (Jan 1990). "Cymreictod - Welsh women; paintings and drawings by Chris Kinsey". Spare Rib (211): 31.
- Martin O’Kane, John Morgan-Guy (2010). Biblical Art from Wales. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press. pp. 314–316. ISBN 9781906055745.
- Price, Karen. "R S Thomas is celebrated in a major new exhibition in North Wales". Wales Online. Wales Online. Retrieved 12 December 2016.
- "Correspondences". Oriel Queens Hall Gallery. Queens Hall Gallery. Retrieved 12 December 2016.
- Croxford, Rebecca. "Correspondences". South Wales Evening Post. South Wales Evening Post. Retrieved 12 December 2016.
- March, Polly. "Academics, poets and musicians unite in evening to mark RS Thomas' centenary". BBC. BBC. Retrieved 12 December 2016.