Open Studios at Art Hub Woolwich, Saturday 13th September 2025
Above: Contemplative Moon, 2025, watercolour on paper, 23 x 30.5 cm, £1,100 (unframed)
I'm very much looking forward to taking part in the Open Studio exhibition at Art Hub studios.
When: Open for one day only on Saturday 13th September 2025, 12 - 6pm.
Where: Art Hub, Building 77, Bowater Road, Westminster Industrial Estate, Woolwich, London, SE18 5TF
This exhibition will be an opportunity to see new watercolours made looking out from my fifth-floor studio window and at ground level next to the Thames Barrier.
There will be over 50 studios and workshops open, showing painting, drawing, sculpture, ceramics, illustration, framing, printmaking and more....
Visitors will have the opportunity to meet and buy direct from the artists, and see some of the workshops in action.
I hope you can join us!
Scroll down to find out more about some of the watercolours I'll be exhibiting....
Above DETAIL from: Contemplative Moon, 2025, watercolour on paper, 23 x 30.5 cm, £1,100 (unframed)
In the early part of 2025, the moon was often visible during the day. Its presence made me increasingly aware of the many layers of of space and activity above the surface of the city: birds, helicopters, planes, clouds and beyond that interplanetary space.
As I painted these vertical layers of activity, the moon began to feel like an observer looking down onto the ground level activity taking place amidst the houses and river Thames...
Above DETAIL from: Contemplative Moon, 2025, watercolour on paper, 23 x 30.5 cm, £1,100 (unframed)
I wanted to paint the close knit domestic spaces within the homes huddled against the river...
Above: Contemplative Moon, 2025, watercolour on paper, 23 x 30.5 cm, £1,100 (unframed)
...and put them into the context of the vast, expansive space above.
Above: Tower and Gulls, 2025, watercolour on paper, 23 x 30.5 cm, £1,100 (unframed)
Tower and Gulls (above) takes another distinctive feature of the sky as its starting point...
Above: DETAIL from Tower and Gulls, 2025, watercolour on paper, 23 x 30.5 cm, £1,100 (unframed) .
I began Tower and Gulls when I noticed freshly made, sharply defined intersecting contrails. They looked like rips in the fabric of the early summer sky, as if the planes had pushed the blue apart as they travelled through it.
Above: DETAIL from Tower and Gulls, 2025, watercolour on paper, 23 x 30.5 cm, £1,100 (unframed)
I also wanted to paint the way in which the historic brick chimney tower and contemporary tower blocks seem to mediate between sky and land - reaching upwards and, I imagined, sometimes being enveloped by descending cloud.
Above: DETAIL from Tower and Gulls, 2025, watercolour on paper, 23 x 30.5 cm, £1,100 (unframed)
Because my studio is on the fifth-floor, I often see gulls flying past at my eye-level. I love the way in which seeing their substantial bodies close up, as they skim past my window, feels like an encounter with their physicality and the feat of flying.
Above: Tower and Gulls, 2025, watercolour on paper, 23 x 30.5 cm, £1,100 (unframed)
Here's a reminder of the whole image.
I hope you've enjoyed this preview of some of the watercolours I'll be showing at the Art Hub Open Studios and are feeling inspired to come along.
When: Open for one day only on Saturday 13th September 2025, 12 - 6pm.
Where: Art Hub, Building 77, Bowater Road, Westminster Industrial Estate, Woolwich, London, SE18 5TF
If you have any questions please feel free to ask by emailing: AlexandraBlumDrawing@gmail.com
I’d love to hear from you or meet you at our Open Studios!