Melanie Stidolph

Lovely to work with Mandy on this presentation of her work that has come together over the last year. Especially at the gorgeous ALMA Artspace!

This solo exhibition of new paintings and textile works has been produced over a year of the artist navigating changing positions. This body of work is a huge departure for Mandy, whose practice has been predominantly lens based for most of her career, its wonderful to see this transformation.

Thank you for the trust Mandy, a delight to work on this with you.

ALMA Artspace, Unit 5 Wesley Yard, Newquay, TR7 1LB

Open: Wed 28 October to Sat 31 October

Daily 12pm-4pm

Celebration Event: Friday 30 October 6-8pm

With singing by From Scratch Choir and music by Smokey & The Mirror and guests.

@mandyleejandrell

Saturday 31 October, 2.30pm

Falmouth Art Gallery

Curator and Cornish Maids founder, Fran Rowse will be talking with Dr Jeanie Sinclair, feminist art historian, along with myself and myself and artist Emma Digerud-White. The talk will share insights into working in Cornwall and the network of contemporary and historical women artists – aged 16 to 76 – that the exhibition has brought together.

Fran Rowse is an award-winning Cornish photographer and curator. Working across photography, digital art, mixed media, and archival practice, her work centres on the overlooked lives and stories of women and girls in the South West of England. Rooted in lived experience as a former fisherwoman from a working-class background, her practice bridges rural communities and the art world through collaborative, socially engaged projects.

Dr Jeanie Sinclair is a feminist art historian researching gender, sexuality and modernism in Cornwall. Her work uses gossip, parties and oral histories to uncover hidden feminist and queer narratives of women’s creative work, collectivism and community. As senior lecturer at Falmouth University, she develops interdisciplinary research on archives, illustration and ceramics. In January 2027 she will deliver the annual Wilhelmina Barns-Graham lecture.

Booking link: Gossiping in the gallery – Falmouth Art Gallery

Image: Dark Shining Wolf X THE WAD wavers at Madron Holy Well

Dark Shining Wolf is my alter ego, formed from the meaning of my given names. Now with its own insta account @darkshiningwolf for news of collaborations, influences and inspiration.

Dark Shining Wolf X THE WAD is the first collaboration with the all female Morris dancing group THE WAD. Shown above is one of the made wavers for upcoming performances.

Dark Shining Wolf head and neck scarves for humans and their beasts are available from my online shop at the link below. Browse and shop in person at these brilliant cultural organisations in the South West:

• Tremenheere Sculpture Garden
• Falmouth Art Gallery
• Newlyn Art Gallery & The Exchange

Delighted that Dark Shining Wolf ‘artist squares’ have been selected for the following showcases:

• Present Makers, Thelma Hulbert Gallery, 7 Nov to 24 December
• Creative Kernow Associates X Make South West, Dec-Jan

melaniestidolph.com/shop

@darkshiningwolf

10 – 30 October

Opening night – 10 October, 6-8pm – all welcome

A work from my photo series Last Summer (2017 – ongoing), is included in Cornish Maids at Falmouth Art Gallery in October. Nearly 100 works by women made in Cornwall. Curated by Fran Rowse.

Fran Rowse is an award-winning Cornish photographer and curator; her work centres on the overlooked lives and stories of women and girls.

www.falmouthtowncouncil.co.uk/events/cornish-maids

🎪 This Saturday! 🌞

𝕯𝖆𝖗𝖐 𝕾𝖍𝖎𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌 𝖂𝖔𝖑𝖋 will be taking part in the Newlyn Art Gallery Summer Fair!

Saturday 29 August

11am to 5pm

FREE entry

Selling 𝕯𝖆𝖗𝖐 𝕾𝖍𝖎𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌 𝖂𝖔𝖑𝖋 artist squares – Treyarnon / Kennack Sands / Trenoweth 🦀

Purchases for whippets and their owners may attract a discount on the day.

Lots of lovely makers, musicians and food – including the 🐟 Cornish Sardine Festival Newlyn!

Thank you to artists Ali Bassett and Marianne Nicholls who run The Shop at Tremenheere Sculpture Gardens.

First stockist in Cornwall for Dark Shining Wolf!

You can find them Tuesday- Sunday, 11-4pm at Tremenheere Sculpture Gardens in Penzance.

Lots of beautiful things by artists and makers, pottery, jewellery, painting and, and, and…..

‘(Griselda) Pollock argues that the virtual feminist museum opens a different kind of time; not a timeline but a field of encounter. To be with ‘Anchorhold’ is to feel that field. What holds this together is not influence but resonance. These women have not passed something forward, one to the next; rather, we see a net, not a genealogy. Each node in tension with every other, across time and distance.’

Thank you to Dr Ella S Mills for her wonderful expanded reading of the context for the exhibition Anchorhold – Rachael Coward & Melanie Stidolph, at ALMA artspace, Newquay. This exhibition marks the beginning of an engagement with St Buriana of Cornwall and interpretations of her life as an Anchoress.

‘Julian of Norwich wrote from enclosure and became a point of contact for an entire community. The world reached her through her squint, in fragments, and she received it with extraordinary care. Stidolph and Coward are not enclosed in the same way; they are working, mobile and collaborative, making work in and from the world. But there is something anchoritic in the quality of attention this exhibition asks of us.’ 

Dr Ella S. Mills is an art historian, curator and artist mentor based in Devon, and together with Vashti Cassinelli founded Cassinelli Mills – ‘holistically supporting the legacies of artist-women and non-binary artists past, present and future’.

The full text is now live on the Art Cornwall website – thank you for the feature.

www.cassinellimills.com

www.alma-artspace.com

www.rachaelcoward.co.uk

Creative Field Notes – 16 June 2026

Thank you to Ceda Parkinson and Millie Burdett, poets, authors and wonderful interviewers of all things creative and Cornwall…

We have such a treat for you this week… listen in to our fascinating conversation with @melaniestidolph and @rachaelcoward as they talk about their shared exhibition ‘Anchorhold’ currently on display at @almaartspace until Tuesday 16th.

We’ll be covering the story of St Buriana, the true meaning of an ‘anchorhold’, what it is to consider yourself an artist in the current climate and invaluable advice to anyone looking to share their work for the first time.

Don’t miss out on our conversation with these two inspiring women, listen back to the Creative Field Notes episode from 13 June here ⚓️🌊✨

Photo: Left – Ceda Parkinson, Right – Millie Burdett

So pleased that ’Still, Held’ has been selected for the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition!

I loved making this work with the staff and patients from Camborne and Redruth Community Hospitals and participants at IntoBodmin. The photograph is part of an installation at Camborne and Redruth Community Hospitals.

Cathy English from the hospital extended an invitation to Hospital Rooms and I was so proud to be selected as one of the 12 artists to work on the commission. Thank you for all the support from the Hospital Rooms team – the founders; Tim A Shaw, Niamh White and the Cornwall team; Anna Testar, Izzy Eastick and Stephanie Thomason.

It’s the 10th Anniversary of the amazing Hospital Rooms this year! Bravo them and all the artists and hospitals that work with them to transform mental health settings. 🌸

Big thank you to those that encouraged me to apply and to the selectors. ❤️🌟 🙏 Richard Paul @richardgpaul for safe delivery to RA!

Selectors:

Eileen Cooper / Michael Craig-Martin / Ryan Gander / Oona Grimes / Katherine Jones / Goshka Macuga / Humphrey Ocean / Peter St John

Dark Shining Wolf is a new venture from my alter ego – the title comes from the meaning of my given names.

Three designs – each featuring a still from 16mm films shot around the rocks, pools and quarries of Cornwall, part of an ongoing desire to regain a connection with nature after falling out with it.

Pre-orders for first shipping are open until 25 May. For humans and dogs (and any animals in-between), for heads and throats (particularly fine on the long necked whippet).

Thank you to CKA X Make South West – who have selected the pieces for the Make South West store later this year.

www.melaniestidolph.com