Guest: Corrina Rothwell

The work of Corrina Rothwell always makes me stop and smile.

If you're a regular Copy+Paste reader you may remember that I featured some of Corrina's work earlier this year here, in one of our 'I'd Like To Copy' posts, where Kirsty and I share the people and things which have been inspiring us.

Luckily for us, I don't have to 'copy' Corrina as she's now here in person to share some of her originals with us:

Hello!

My name is Corrina Rothwell and I'm a Rochdale-born Nottingham-based artist and illustrator. I'm self-taught. Until a year ago I was working with machine embroidery but I grew bored and frustrated with that after 15 years of it. Now I work solely on a graphics tablet, which I adore.

My inspiration comes from right under my nose or from inside my head. I'm very lazy, I don't look very far. But I don't have to! There's so much material just in plain old everyday life that is amusing, poignant, entertaining, aggravating and lends itself to pictorial interpretation.

I usually start a new series of work when I have something specific to work towards – very rarely do I draw just 'for the hell of it'. In between drawing spells I collect ideas in the form of either notes or photos on my mobile phone or a few words scribbled in my diary or notebook. I used to be a sketchbook person but not now. I think that's because when things from the 'outside world' inspire me it's usually the words that come to me before the images. I guess what I'm doing these days is illustrating my own words....

I've just done a series of 10 pictures called The Rothwell Chronicles for a one-night event at my friend's gallery in Nottingham. This is the name of my blog – I started this year with a promise to do a picture-a-day on it, but I caved in around the end of February. Anyway the idea was to just do a picture about something, anything that had happened or I had thought about during that day, as a kind of disciplinary exercise. But I don't really like being told what to do, not even by myself.

The Rothwell Chronicles is actually a bit redundant as a theme, because really you could put all my work under that umbrella – it's just me chronicling life as I see it.

I'll share a few of the Chronicles pictures with you and try to explain how they came about......

1) Beetroot Before Bedtime: This is a kind of follow-on from an embroidery I did called The Beetroot Appreciation Society – I am a huge beetroot fan and basically I got a kick out of making it look like a bloody massacre. So much so that I did this one:

After having a few beers one night I came home and devoured a load of beetroot. I kind of forgot about it, as you do, until I came down in the morming and saw the, er, bloody mess.

2) Cashew Queue:

Every time I went in the main Post Office in Nottingham this would tickle me so I thought I'd better make it into a picture. There was the automated voice saying 'cashier number nine' and to me it sounded for all the world like 'cashew'. They've got a different system now, and it sadly no longer sounds nutty.

3) Dogfood – I didn't actually hear anybody saying this, but it really disgusts me that some people have more sympathy for the dog than the person, so this was my sardonic take on it:

4) Pyjamas – this is one of these things that a lot of people probably do but don't really talk about, sticking your coat and boots on over your jimjams to go and get a pint of milk in the morning:

A lot of my pictures are like this actually, capturing those little things that you do, and it's always really nice when people say 'oh my god I do that!' or 'that always happens to me!' like in Mascara Trauma:

It makes me feel lovely and normal!

Corrina Rothwell.


Thank you Corrina.

See what I mean about stopping to smile when seeing her work? How could you not? Things like that are indeed always happening to me - how about you?

If you want to feel even more 'lovely and normal' then here are some other places you can get a dose of Corrina's very human humour:

Corrina's website: http://www.corrinarothwell.co.uk/ and blog: http://www.rothwellchronicles.blogspot.com/

Places to purchase her work:
http://www.blackolivestudio.co.uk/ – 'Dottie' range of greetings cards
http://www.purplehoot.com/ – e-cards
http://www.debbiebryan.co.uk/ – Nottingham shop/gallery
http://www.palaceartfair.co.uk/ –a London art fair in October 2010 and
http://www.nottinghamcontemporary.org/ - where, for the duration of the next exhibition Corrina will have some prints on sale.