An Ystrad Mynach artist’s landscape paintings feature in a new exhibition in Cardiff Bay.
Gigi Jones’ work forms part of a collaborative multi-media exhibition of paintings, music and poetry being showcased at the Senedd from February 6.
The exhibition is being sponsored by Caerphilly AM Jeff Cuthbert and introduced by Dai Smith from Arts Council Wales.
The paintings, created by Ystrad Mynach based Gigi Jones are inspired by the landscapes and rich history of Gelligaer and Merthyr Common in the Rhymney Valley.
These will be on show in the Pierhead Futures Gallery, while in the Senedd, projected images of them will be accompanied by a live performance of music created by world-renowned Welsh composer Mervyn Burtch MBE, and poetry by eminent Welsh poets Tony Curtis and Grahame Davies, written in both English and Welsh.
The project aims to encourage interest and participation in the Arts from Valleys and City audiences, as well as promoting interest in the less well-known treasures of Welsh landscape and heritage.
Gigi said: “I think of the Welsh landscape in some ways as a large stage set with ever–changing light effects suggesting infinite new ‘scenes’, story lines, histories and human conditions.”
Titled ‘Common Sense’, the exhibition will tour a variety of venues in South Wales, project-managed by Ms Jones.
In each venue, there is free access to the collection of paintings, which are displayed on mobile exhibition screens, and visitors are able to hear the accompanying music and poetry on the headsets provided. Following its month-long stay in Cardiff Bay’s prestigious Pierhead Futures Gallery, the exhibition will return ‘home’ to the Valleys in March, and will fittingly finish its year-long tour in June 2013 at Cyfarthfa Castle in Merthyr Tydfil.
For more information, visit www.commonsensewales.co.uk