2021 in Review

Happy Holidays to all of you! Wishing you all the best during this holiday season. Here is to a happy and healthy 2022! Here is a look at 2021 in review for me and my art business. Here are the goals I made for 2021- you can read about how I maintain my goals here!

2021 in Review - my goals

Post consistently to social media (5x a week to instagram, 1-2x to facebook, every day to Pinterest, twice a month to my email list, blog post 3-4x a month, YouTube 2x a month)

I did well with these goals and was able to really grow my following. I was more intentional this year with planning what I wanted to post and doing it ahead of time and not last minute. I took the summer off from posting on YouTube to allow me to focus on other projects and relax after a stressful year of teaching during the pandemic. 

Apply to art calls twice a month - I want to have more exhibitions this year!

With Covid there are still less available exhibitions but I did participate in a few exhibitions including Landscape Transformed in Orillia, a paid opportunity with Create Waterloo to do my Patched installation in Regency Park during the month of July. I had a grant project from the Region of Waterloo Arts Fund for a series of acrylic painting tutorials - link to playlist and link to blog. I also participated in the Mask Required exhibition at Gallery Stratford. I have a current exhibition for SHOW. 21 which is a juried group exhibition of emerging artists -with 10 other artworks present. My work Precariously Perched is on display until February! My solo Patched exhibition at the Kitchener Public Library has been tentatively rescheduled for next year. 

Spend time in nature for inspiration- I find this really helps with my art practice.

Once a month Gordie and I made it a habit of hiking, campinging or walking outside. I’ve taken lots of photos that I have shared on Instagram

Make consistent art sales- I would love my art to be my main source of income.

I have started to make more consistent sales with my art and in April I started a Teachers Pay Teachers Store

Keep my website updated monthly- I like reviewing my website at the end of each month to make sure everything is current.

In August, I created my www.jackiepartridgeart.com website where it focuses more on acrylic painting, YouTube channel, my TPT store, art teaching articles and tips. My www.jackiepartridge.com website now focuses on my contemporary art, my paper art in my shop and blog posts related to my art news and contemporary art practice/what I am working on in the studio. I have liked keeping these areas separate but I have definitely doubled my workload! 

Set boundaries for teaching for more work life balance- no work on Friday nights and Saturdays, no emails past 7pm, no marking on the weekend.

This past summer I worked the month of July at a day camp at my school. I was very intentional not to start working on school stuff until the end of August so that I could have a break from school. I did well not responding to emails after 7pm and will continue to do that this year as it gives me more time to relax. 

Make art during school breaks- Teaching full time has made me really miss having time to make my art.

During school breaks I started working on cyanotypes and creating print designs - you can see them here! I also worked on my painting tutorials from a grant from the Region of Waterloo Arts Fund- you can watch them- here.  I also installed Remnants outside and photographed it this year. I finished my Patched installation video. 

2021 in Review - 

Overall, 2021 was a great year for me. It was my first year teaching full time in the classroom. I had a lovely small class of 12 grade 4 students. We had a fun time going to the park, learning together and seeing them grow. This year with Covid was challenging! We were online twice. We wore masks and it was hard to not see each other smile. 

I made it a habit of going outside more. It was hard to see people less and not being able to hug people especially when I’m not really a hugger. 

I worked on starting to new streams in my art to continue to grow my business. I read a lot of books this year including: Everything is Figureoutable, You are a Badass at Making Money, 

My friends are having babies. My sister-in-law got married.

2022 Goals 

1. Exercise 2x a week

2. Purchase a Home 

3. Have 5 exhibitions or publications 

4. Grow my mailing list by 200 people 

5. Grow my YouTube to 500 subscribers 

6. Have 200 products in my TPT store

Thank you so much for following on this journey. I appreciate you being here and supporting me along the way.

Here are some FREE Ways to Support me (if you aren’t doing them already)

1. Join my mailing list -Learn about new art

2. Subscribe to my YouTube Channel

3. Follow me on Pinterest 

4. Like my Facebook Page

5. Follow me on my instagram

6. Follow my TPT store if you are a teacher

Lastly, I would appreciate it if you like something I post to like, comment or share to help me to reach more people! 

Exhibition at Show.21

From November 22 until February 27, 2022 I will have my work Precariously Perched on display at Cambridge Art Galleries- at Queen's Square Gallery as part of their group juried exhibition for emerging artists.

This was the first paid CARFAC fee exhibition I took part in and I am grateful for the opportunity to be able to exhibit my artwork and to be paid for it. Paid exhibitions help allow artists to be valued for their work of making the work, delivering and installing the work, picking up the work and advertising the work like the video I created below.

You can check out their link to see more information

I will be showing art with: Olivia Brouwer, Lupita Guerrero, Anahí González, Anne Hamilton, Brubey Hu, Abby Nowakowski, Lauren Prousky, Brenda Mabel Reid, Racquel Rowe, and Ahmri Vandeborne.

See a video about the installation below:

About Show.21 in Cambridge

Established in 2005, Cambridge Art Galleries’ biannual exhibition SHOW presents the work of emerging artists based in Ontario. Selected from an open call of submissions, SHOW.21 presents the work of eleven artists with connections to Waterloo Region and surrounding areas.

Here is the digital exhibition brochure

About Precariously Perched by Jackie Partridge

Precariously Perched is a site-specific installation that uses tiny pins and balances twisted strands of maps on the pins.  You can see and read more about the project here!

Precariously Perched resembles a walk or a horizon line. Some twisted strands of maps rest on pins while others fall to the floor signaling a passage of time. In this exhibition, I have twisted strands of maps and pins wrapping around a column by the window and then they start at the wall near the top and decline down like a mountain towards the bottom of the wall. 

Precariously Perched by Jackie Partridge - installation in Montreal - see the exhibition in Cambridge by visiting Cambridge Art Galleries.

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Clouds Installation

Clouds is an installation of 150 found  doilies by Jackie Partridge that have been embedded with poured abaca pulp. This installation was created in 2016 while I was studying my Master of Fine Arts at Concordia University in Montreal.

I experimented with this installation by testing out different lighting and playing with different perspectives and camera angles when documenting this installation. This installation took over 4 hours to complete. 

Next time I would present this work I would create pillows on the floor to invite viewers to lay down and look up at the clouds. 

I created this work with found doilies and I poured on abace pulp. I placed the doilies in the paper press to squeeze out the extra water. Then I let them dry flat for 24 hours. I hung the doilies with different lengths of thread attached to rods on the ceiling. I would love to continue to create thousands of these and hang them in a larger venue. 

Doilies are a symbol of history and domesticity. I see them as floating ghosts of all the grandmothers I grew up with when I was younger. When I was born I had 8 grandmothers including great-grandmothers and great-great grandmothers. Each doily is special and unique. Some are colourful and others are plain. Some are intricate and detailed and some are simple and plain.

The floating doilies were hung with thread cut at various lengths to look like floating clouds in the sky.

These are made with vintage doilies collected from thrift stores, garage sales and my grandmothers.

There are still pieces available from this installation in my art shop - you can check them out here! 

These vintage crochet doilies look beautiful framed in a white or wooden frame! 

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Winding Road- Art Installation by Jackie Partridge

Winding Road -art installation from 2016 completed in Montreal by artist Jackie Partridge. Here is an art installation from my archive. Winding Road is an art installation from 2016. It is made from Mylar, ink, and thread. It measures 18’x 3.’ I made this work while completing my MFA at Concordia university in Montreal, QC.

I loved using ink and seeing how it pooled to dry making interesting overlapping line drawings. This artwork was inspired by driving along the countryside and looking out the window. This work later turned into an art book - you can see that here!

I chose to paint and draw on a frosted mylar because I like how it looks foggy and isn’t fully transparent. It has a really nice effect when it is backlit with lights in an art exhibition. 

I later turned these paintings into Fielding Through and Field of Green. For the work Fielding Through I sewed some of these pieces together using white thread and my sewing machine to create an accordion style book that was able to stretch and pull a part. For Field of Green some of the larger pieces were hung on the wall behind the sheet curtain of painted fabric. 

As an artist, I often rework my artwork to add to it or to morph it into new artwork or installations. I like that art is able to change and evolve over time. By taking a look at my current artwork below you will be able to see some similarities between pieces as art is inspired by previous pieces.

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Winding Road ink on mylar installation by Jackie Partridge

Detail of Winding Road by Jackie Partridge

Related Articles and Artwork

Fielding Through - inspired by this piece

Field of Green -inspired by this piece

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Fields -Mirror Installation by Jackie Partridge

Fields is made from colourful sewn thread and flax handmade paper. It measures 18’x 3.5.’ I made this work in 2015 while completing my MFA at Concordia university in Montreal, QC. 

I created this artwork by sewing on a dissolvable fabric and layering different colours of thread. Sometimes, I would have a different colour in the bobbin and a different colour in the tread. I sewed in a back and forth manner to resemble the repetitive motion of planting and harvesting crops in fields. After sewing, I dissolved the fabric and took the pieces to the paper making studio where I squeezed flax pulp through a tube in patches of the sewing. Once I was done applying the pulp I put the artwork through the paper press to squeeze out excess water as part of the paper making process. Then I let the artwork dry flat; it took about 24 hours to dry. There are about 10 separate panels of this artwork in total. 

The pieces of this art installation are quite delicate and fragile. I suspended them with thread that tied onto the individual pieces. 

Usually this installation is hung against the wall but in this installation from 2017, I got to hang this textile artwork in front of the mirror. I loved how the thread was reflected and looked like a long continuous line drawing. When the artwork hangs against the wall it does create some really beautiful shadows.I would love to add to this piece and make it larger in the future. 

You can see the original installation of this piece - here!

Detail of Fields installation

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1963-1974- Artwork by Jackie Partridge

This is an older work from 2015 called 1963-1974 by Jackie Partridge. The artwork is less than 2’ by 2’.  I completed this artwork during my undergraduate degree at Lakehead University. I created it as part of my art portfolio when I was applying to my Master of Fine Arts at Concordia University in the Fibres and Material Practices Program. 

Polaroids and machine sewing - form a patchwork quilt of memories with old family photos. The photographs are arranged by colour to help the chevron pattern emerge. My grandmother was sorting through family photos and gave me a collection of photographs. I asked if I could cut them and turn them into an artwork and she said yes. There’s something weird about cutting up family photographs and replacing a part of them to form a new memory. I sewed the photographs with a zig zag stitch on my sewing machine in white thread.

Polaroids are such a nostalgic medium and have become trendy again. Working with this medium of found Polaroids really speaks to the time period and the moment that captured the photograph. I love the colours from the pictures and how they have faded over time. Some of the photographs even have my grandmother’s handwriting on the bottom of them. 

I am very interested in quilts, sewing and textile art because when I grew up I had 8 grandmothers including great-grandmothers and great-great-grandmothers. The craft of quilting and sewing are very important to my family heritage and to myself. 

You can see the detail of 1963-1974 below!

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Sewn Polaroids by Jackie Partridge

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Trail - Arm Knitted Installation by Jackie Partridge

Trail detail by Jackie Partridge, arm-knitted lace strips

Trail by Jackie Partridge is a work from my art archive that I made while living in Montreal and going to school for my MFA. This fiber artwork is very performative as I used the knitting process to create it. The act of knitting is very repetitive and labour intensive. It is the same motion over and over again. Learn more about this textile artwork below!

Trail

1’x 20', found lace, sewing and arm knitting, 2016. 

The work was displayed at Ancienne École des Beaux Arts for the end of year MFA exhibition “Maureen” in 2016.

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This art installation is made by cutting long strips of found lace curtains. The strips of lace were sorted by colour from a yellow cream colour all the way to a pure white at the bottom of the piece. The colour created a nice gradient. The strips were then sewn together to create a very long strip that was then wrapped like a ball of yarn. This process was repeated twice. Like knitting, I used my arms as the “knitting needles” and continued to knit for over an hour to create this 20 foot long installation that was suspended from the top of the staircase. I knit continuously since I used my arms as the knitting needles.

When this piece is lit it produces some beautiful shadows from the design of the white lace. 

I have also displayed this textile artwork outside in the snow. You can see the photograph at the bottom. I liked draping it in the snow and seeing how it dragged across the snow. 

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Outdoor installation of Trail by Jackie Partridge in the snow

Conceal - Art Installation by Jackie Partridge

Conceal is a project that was inspired my a previous work Trapped this work is from 2017 by artist Jackie Partridge.  In the installation below I use the same hand dyed and hand embroidered dishcloth quilt from Trapped. The dishcloth quilt is made to resemble an aerial view of farmlands. Farming runs in my family as both sets of grandparents and great-grandparents owned farms. I grew up in Wellesley, Ontario, a small town surrounded by farmlands. I watched the land over time develop into subdivision after subdivision. This artwork became symbolic for concealing or covering, protecting and hiding the land. The dishcloths are dyed with inks and acrylic fluids with bright colours of greens, browns, yellows, oranges and pinks to represent the colours and beauty of farm fields. I really wanted to highlight the beauty and vibrancy of the landscape.

I am interested in quilts and fibre art because when I grew up I had 8 grandmothers including great-grandmothers and great-great-grandmothers. So the craft of embroidery and sewing are very important to my family heritage. 

With my art practice I often reuse elements and photograph different artwork outside to change and transform the context of the work itself. I see my art evolving and transforming through time similar to how the landscape is in a constant state of change.

This quilt inspired artwork is draped over rocks at my grandmother’s house in Kinmount, ON. Their property is a special place where I enjoy spending my summer. I find being in nature to be a very inspiring place for my work and me as an artist. Photographed by me in summer 2017.

I see the quilt as a symbol of protection, warmth and comfort. Like most quilts are. 

You can see my current art practice here!

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