However, what can you do but live with it? The array of autumnal colour when I got there was glorious - I felt as if I'd caught it at exactly the right moment - and I thoroughly enjoyed a couple of exhibitions too. That'll do nicely.
Which was that he asked a number of people he knew to suggest a place to him, somewhere that meant something to them in some way, and write a page or so about it in any way they chose. Then he would go there and make work about the place. Place. It's another angle on what fascinates me - the links between the landscape (urban and rural) and ourselves, what we do to it and what it does to us. I was bound to be drawn in.
The painting of Badbury Rings grabbed me instantly - a hill fort, very Wiltshire plains (even though it isn't) - and I especially loved the list of butterflies, birds, plants he found there and added into the image. Because I do that collecting thing too. See? I'm so not consistent, but whatever, I'm allowed. I liked the rubbing of a sign added into a welsh location too. The puffin skull might well have been my favourite 'thing' there, but just because it's so beautiful in itself - it was actually part of a little St Andrews collection that was far too golf orientated to appeal to me (though as the location in this piece was a golf course, I think, fair enough). There were housing estates and stretches of road traffic and Glastonbury in the festival season, there was very large and very small, there was a sculptural piece of a signpost with a bird on top. I'll be visiting again on my next trip, and no doubt a completely different set of work will appeal then. Or not.
Out of the half dozen or so artists taking part - and not surprisingly they all had their own appeal - I particularly liked Moira Huntly's landscapes (they made me want to go straight out with a sketchbook, and not much does that to me), Sandra Bee's more bucolic images (I particularly liked her oak tree) and above all Jeanette Hayes' colourful and quite abstracted work, which gave me plenty to think about.
Having checked the gallery website, I can see I caught this exhibition in the final week - very glad I did.
It was a busy few days, and at times chock-full of inspiration (though I should have made a list for later!). Now I have at least a good solid fortnight of 20:20 sorting ahead, plus making sure I have work for the Leeds and Sheffield print fairs (which take place the next two saturdays). After that, space in which to go out and make the most of what's left of autumn. I'm looking forward to that.