I’ve written a couple of blogs over the last few weeks that I didn’t actually publish. I’m not sure why, but I’m going to just go with the idea that if I thought they were any good, I’d have finished writing and published them!

Today though, I do really have something worth writing about. It’s a story of real community and collaboration, of crazy ideas, hard work and lots of love…

About this time last year (wow! It was that long ago, I just looked it up!!) I was asked to be part of a group exhibition of artists that were either inspired by or worked alongside the river Severn. I almost said no, as I always seen to be completely snowed under with commissions and never get any time to make anything other than that.

I didn’t say no though…I decided to commit to doing something, that had become just a little outside my comfort zone. I joined the Severn Sisters and we put on our first exhibition at 7Q Gallery in Chepstow.

The exhibition looked fantastic and pretty good sales were made, but I want to tell you about our “second” event….Open House……

It was all the brave idea of Annie Brennan, who we’ve now all named our “mother superior”. An idea based around similar exhibitions that she’d visited/heard of in city centres - all of the “sisters” putting on an exhibition over a weekend, in her house. So, after some meetings, some snacks and a few drinks, with no advertising budget and no idea if anyone would come, we decided to go for it!

Well… I think the only words to describe this past weekend are resounding success!! There were 13 of us involved all together, and simply by some social media sharing and a bit of leaflet printing on our home printers, people did find out at about it - loads of people in fact! It just goes to show that if you put your mind to it, and give your very best effort, anything is possible!

For me though, the real success has been finding this amazing group of women (and one token man of course) that have just been so supportive to each other throughout the organisation and the actual event. Over the past few weeks, but especially during the Open House itself, we chatted about so many things and shared so many laughs. Theres obviously been hugs, but to be honest, it feels like the Severn Sisters are just one big constant hug. The way that the group just gelled was obviously noticed by our visitors as one of them thought that we all lived and worked together in Annie’s house!

We’re all different ages, from different places and backgrounds and have different views, likes and dislikes, and that’s absolutely ok. I feel so privileged to have been asked to be part of this amazing little community and I can’t wait to start thinking about what we do next!