Heather at home in her westcountry sculpture garden with her Arabians Rara and Riverdance.
From the beginning my twin passions were drawing and horses, my hero was Leonardo da Vinci, and my dreams were of becoming an artist living in a wooded valley with clear flowing water at my door and horses grazing all around.
I was a wild young thing. I hated the confines of school especially in the summer and was a disruptive student unless in an art class. I took A level art two years early and predictably failed everything else except for English language but by some miracle that was enough to win me a place at Walthamstow College to study fine art; there, drawing was considered the first essential. I was enthralled...... Nothing beats drawing from life, I had already years of experience from drawing my ponies in the field, en plein air but drawing figures was new and I excelled in the life room. After a foundation year I went on to the now famous Goldsmiths College in London where sadly, at the time, figurative work was unfashionable, tutors seldom ventured into the life room and I gradually lost heart.
At the end of the first year at Goldsmiths I was asked to leave the course. Apparently, I was told by the head of painting, I did not have the stuff that painters were made from, with luck, I might scrape a place on a course, somewhere, to do graphics. My confidence was shattered. I was not interested in graphics.
Shortly after starting at Goldsmiths I met Bert Jansch, the legendary folk guitarist whom I subsequently married. We moved from London to Sussex where I spent time drawing, painting and illustrating album sleeves until we relocated to a remote hill farm in Wales where I began to breed Welsh Cobs; it was fascinating to draw mares with their new born foals and there were plenty very close by as my neighbour bred Arabians and Thoroughbreds. It seemed like paradise to me but the solitude did not suit Bert who had recording commitments and tours both in Europe and the USA. We separated amicably and remained friends for the rest of our lives although in latter years we did not see each other much.
That time in Wales was my real apprenticeship; I specialised, making in depth studies of my neighbour's arabians and thoroughbreds as well as drawing and painting my own ponies and horses. The accuracy of my equine drawings enabled me to command high prices for commissions and for some years that suited me very well but ultimately I felt i was merely following in other artist's footsteps. I was frustrated and lost, floundering about not knowing how to find my own artistic voice.
I sought advice from Arthur Giardelli, a contemporary artist of international standing with a well-deserved reputation for being a gifted teacher. He told me to go and look at a hedge and draw what made a thorn a thorn, not just what I saw, and, perhaps more to the point, to never stop working with horses but find a way to make them mine. I am forever in his debt.
I knew that to approach galleries prematurely would be a waste of time. It could even be counterproductive. I had to find my 'voice'; my unmistakeable thumbprint, so I kept experimenting while also continuing with private commissioned work in oils.
Newton Abbot and Devon & Exeter racecourses were part of that process. I had moved to Devon where quite by chance the property I bought was close by both race course. Going to the races became a regular activity; I sketched the horses in the parade rings and my paintings naturally reflected the bright colours of the jockey's silks. I began to sculpt, experimenting first with clay and plaster and later with copper wire which was a bit like drawing in the air. It resulted in some rather interesting and classical looking pieces that reminded me of da Vinci's horse sketches but they lacked the power and essential nature of the horse I sought. Then out of the blue the answer came in on the tide. Driftwood. It was like a thunderbolt, I had never seen sculpture like it and knew I was finally ready to show my work to the world. It was like line drawing with wood. As a child I never could have dreamt that it would be driftwood horses that would make my name. Courcoux and Courcoux, a gallery specialising in contemporary fine art, took me on as one of their 'house artists'.
The first driftwood horses were small-scale and that remained the case until I was offered a solo exhibition at Saltram House. The beautiful stable courtyard cried out for a monumental sculpture. It had to be a life-sized mare and foal. When I sat on that first big thoroughbred mare I knew she would carry me anywhere I wanted to go. The consequences of the change in scale were huge, and happened very fast; the press loved the life sized horses and so did the public. In 2000 I was invited to take part in 'The Shape of The Century' - 100 years of sculpture in Britain. A select exhibition including Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth, Elizabeth Frink, Anish Kapoor, Anthony Gormley and David Nash, all of whom had impeccable established reputations as leading contemporary Britsh sculptors.
I needed to move to a bigger place where I could concentrate on work for private and corporate commissions. There was, and is still, increasing public demand for monumental contemporary horse sculpture.
That was the start of another phase in my life. I found a small house high on the hill above a wild wooded valley in devon, the clear flowing stream is my boundary, There were stables and garaging which converted into sculpture studios. The land had been untouched for forty years and was virtually impenetrable; creating a private sculpture garden in it became another of my passions, a place to display outdoor sculpture was essential and became easily my biggest sculptural project.The largest single work in it was a horse head that I named Fable it seemed like a giant to me at nearly twenty foot tall. Ten years on, the house has been extended to incorporate a sculpture gallery. The valley is still a place of wonder to me, rich in wildlife it has become a favourite devon sculpture garden where a fine selection of my work is always on display for clients to see in the privacy of a fabulous setting. It is open for charity twice a year. I also open my house and studios each autumn as part of Devon Open Studios. My driftwood sculptures are now increasingly cast in fine bronze and there are plans to exhibit with European galleries. My workshops are bulging and I have just opened a contemporary sculpture gallery in Ashburton which is open by appointment only.
Olchard Press was founded to publish my first book, Heather Jansch's Diary - a life in the year of... an artist's diary, you can buy it online from this site. Bert died in October 2011 when I was writing the sequel to it. The writing abruptly took a different turn and so it is that the second offering and forthcoming publication from Olchard Press will be my memoirs of our life together and my personal tribute to him.
It will be published in 2013 by Olchard Press under the title:
Living with the Legend - Bert Jansch
a personal tribute by Heather Jansch
Like my Diary it will be a visually rich hardback with many different textures and will contain a previously unpublished compilation of my original drawings & illustrations for the Bert Jansch albums, Moonshine, Rosemary Lane, Birthday Blues, and Sketches, together with facsimiles of his letters home and handwritten lyrics. This is not a dry litany of tour dates nor a weeping recollection of times past, but a vital, funny, and essentially tongue in cheek glimpse into the domestic life of two creatives with very different approaches who remained friends to the end of their days. Bert was already a legend in folk music circles by the age of nineteen. I was hugely privileged to be part of it.
Here is a taster....
"It was 1966, the heady days when the Capital thronged with talented fearless youth to whom anything seemed possible. David Bailey’s photographic genius was making Jean Shrimpton’s face and figure unforgettable, sending shock waves through the established order on both sides of the Atlantic. They were the new fashion Icons. Michaelangelo Antonio’s famous film, Blow Up, had just been released. There seemed no limit to what could be achieved, everything was rocketing. It was the heyday of Carnaby Street and of the famous clothes shop, Biba, in Kensington. Mods and rockers were rife."
EXHIBITIONS
Forthcoming sculpture show.
2013 Gardens Open for Charity with the NGS.
2012 My own sculpture gallery and workshops at Number Twelve, East Street Ashburton Devon.
2012 Open Gardens and Open Studios in my Devon sculpture garden.
2012 The Darley Stud, Stallion Parade, Newmarket.
2011 Devon Open Studio and Open gardens for the NGS.
2010 TAMED. The SPANISH BARN, Torre Abbey, Devon with Damien Hirst and Richard Long. July and August. Three major new pieces of equine art in driftwood and in bronze.
2009 Established Olchard Press and published my first book.
Wrote, compiled and illustrated Heather Jansch's Diary
Goodwood race course.
Devon Open Studio and Sculpture Gardens.
2008
Love London Recycled, London Zoo. Full size horse in oak.
Open Studio.
Sculpture garden features in NGS Open Gardens Yellow Book.
2007
Open Studio.
Artist in residence solo installation Arte Sella Borgo Valsugana. Italy www.artesella.it
2006
Open Studio developing sculpture garden and trail.
Artist in residence Arte Sella Italy.
2005
Open Studio.
Newby Hall Yorkshire life-size works mixed show.
2004
Open Studio.
London Contemporary Arts Fair.
Paris. Jardin du Luxembourg Life-size works.
2003
First Open Studio at my place, Sedgewell Coach House. Devon.
Mixed show The Garden House, Wrexham Life-size works.
Eastnor Castle Mixed show Life-size driftwood works.
The Royal Albert Museum Exeter.
2002
Dartington Cider Press October/November small bronzes.
Solo show Courcoux and Courcoux Stockbridge .
Open Studio. Development of woodland trail and gardens, sound installations, temporary and permanent site-specific installations.
Mixed show The Foal Yard. Cambridge. June small bronzes.
Salisbury Cathedral. 'In Praise of Trees'. Mixed show.
Art Parks International Sausmarez Manor Guernsey.
London Contemporary Arts Fair.
South West Academy of Fine and Applied Arts, mixed show.
2001
London Contemporary Arts Fair.
Solo exhibition Saltram House NT Plymouth.
Solo show Dartington Cider Press. Bronzes.
Artist in residence. The Eden Project. Cornwall. Driftwood sculptures for the Warm Temperate Biome and ongoing research and development.
2000
Solo show Courcoux and Courcoux Stockbridge.
Sculpture in the Gardens Cotehele NT Cornwall. Life sized works.
1999
Mixed show 'The Shape of The Century-One Hundred Years of British Sculpture'. Canary Wharf London.
Artist in Residence Newbury Spring Festival.
Artist in Residence Appledore Arts Fair.
1998
Artist in Residence Appledore Arts Fair.
Solo show Saltram House NT Plymouth.
Solo show Courcoux and Courcoux Stockbridge.
Mixed show 'Procession' Devon Guild of Craftsmen.
1995
London Contemporary Arts Fair.
1993
Solo show Seymour Gallery Totnes paintings and sculpture.
1991
Solo show Dartington.
1990
Solo show Theatre Mwldan Cardigan.
1989
Solo show Courcoux and Courcoux Salisbury.
Bath Arts Fair.
London Contemporary Arts Fair.
1987
Solo show Devon Guild of Craftsmen Driftwood Sculptures.
1986
Solo show Classics Gallery Devon.
1984
Solo show Plough Theatre Torrington, painting and sculpture.
1981
Moved to Devon. One-Year Sabbatical.
1970
Moved to Wales. Traditional equestrian portraits in oils and watercolours to commission only.
1968
Married legendary Scottish folk guitarist Bert Jansch.
Various illustrative work, album covers for Bert Jansch and books etc.
Trained in Fine Arts at Walthamstow and Goldsmiths College London.
Maiden name: Sewell.
Born Essex 1948.