March 2026 Newsletter

Welcome to my March newsletter! It’s been a busy month with the return of some nicer weather and the chance to actually stand outside and paint without it running off my canvas, as well as getting ready for my studio sale (more on that below). Thank you for subscribing as always!

Jacksons’s Art Prize

I am really pleased that one of my paintings “An Ancient Way of Seeing” made the extended longlist of the Jackson’s Art Prize! It’s a huge honour to even get that far, with over 16,000 entries and some extremely established and talented artists entering. My friend Gordon Dalton (who produced the very first Plymouth Art Weekender - coming back this year) made the final shortlist! Huge congratulations to him. There’s a People’s Choice award where you can vote for your favourite shortlisted artwork, and it’s well worth seeing the final entries.

I’ll be entering some of my paintings into various open calls this year, focusing on those which prioritise plein air (outdoor) painting. I’ll let you know how I get on!

Studio Sale

Firstly, I have been busy photographing, sorting and prepping everything for the upcoming studio sale. As promised, here is your download to the PDF of the artworks included in the sale (only available to my newsletter subscribers - sign up now if you haven’t already). With artworks ranging from £50-300, this really is the time to grab one of my older works.

There’s a real mixture of pieces in the sale with framed artworks, sketches, experiments and unfinished paintings. All are very much priced accordingly and as I desperately need to overhaul my studio space, I’d love as many of them to find a new home as possible.

You are all very valued - to show my appreciation I will be making the sale private for a couple of days before I open it up to social media followers, so you will have the chance to look (and buy) before the page goes fully public. I will send out a password and a link to access the page when the times comes. And you are welcome to come and view them in person if you want to! Just see the section below about visiting my studio space.

I will slowly be adding the works in the studio sale to my website and I will email out the sale page to you all when it’s complete and I’m ready to make it live. No promises on time scale, I have an admin-adverse mind which does not like staring at a computer screen.

Approaching Rain

Oil on linen panel, 30 x 20cm, unframed

£240

Unloading

Oil on linen panel, 18 x 24cm, unframed

£50

Morning Light from the Citadel

Oil on linen panel, 30 x 20cm, white Ayous wood floating frame

£300

Come and Visit My Studio!

One keen collector has already popped over to view the works in the sale and has snapped up a couple in advance, as well as reserving a couple of paintings which aren’t in the sale. If you would like to come round and view my works in person, you are more than welcome to. I live in the Stoke area of Plymouth with on street parking available, and bus stops and Devonport Train Station very close nearby. The studio space is in my loft (with a steep flight of loft stairs), or I can bring paintings downstairs where its a bit more comfortable (there’s heating and a sofa). Just send me an email (email address only available in my actual newsletter email) if you’d like to visit. There’s absolutely no pressure to buy anything at all, I enjoy chatting about art and connecting with people, and it’s lovely for me to meet the people who are kind enough and supportive enough to follow me on this art journey

Some Dry Weather!

Finally, some sunshine! After the persistent wetness, I have been able to get out and make some painting progress, rather than hoping for a few quick snatched sessions here and there. I’ll go through my thoughts and processes in these paintings more fully in my next newsletter, but it was such a relief to be able to finish the two tree paintings which I have been looking at and mulling over for some time, waiting for the right conditions (as in not constantly raining!) to go back and complete them. Both needed a second session, as both of them required time for the initial painting stage to dry before I could attempt to work on them any more in fear of losing the brush strokes and patterns. The forest one has sold - a huge thank you goes to another lovely collector! And the cork trees one I am keeping to enter to some art prizes.

I made a decent start on the river piece but the light changed too much as I was painting, so I had to call it there. And I’m not quite sure about the vertical one yet, things didn’t quite go to plan on the day - I set off in a rush to make the ferry, forgetting to take my ADHD medication, and also the food I need to maintain energy. I nearly fainted trying to paint before I realised what I had done! Fortunately I wasn’t driving and there was a cafe nearby where I could recover.

Paintings Sold and Reserved

It’s been a busy month, and I am so grateful that a few of my more recent paintings have either been sold or reserved. Thank you so much to those lovely collectors who have bought pieces! I honestly would be nowhere without you and I am so thankful for your support. I’m sure the pieces will look great when they are framed and hanging on your wall!

Sold

Sold

Sold

Reserved

Reserved

Previous Newsletters

There’s been a good few new subscribers recently and I realised that for those of you who are new, I’m not sure how you can see my previous newsletters! So I have set up a section on my website where you can go to read them: https://www.joemeldrumart.co.uk/journal

Social Media

A lot of you have probably first come across my work on social media first. So thank you so much for taking the step of signing up to this newsletter where I can properly take the time and insight to discuss creating artworks and all things related to this art journey.

Social media is very difficult for me - we all know it is an addictive, dopamine-fuelled place which harms our mental health and our cognitive abilities. But without it, I probably wouldn’t be able to reach new people and do the career side of being an artist. Increasingly I will be posting less about art, and creating posts which encourage people to join this newsletter (I’m fairly sure this newsletter harms no-one’s mental health or cognitive abilities)! So thank you for signing up and please know that you are in the best place to hear about any art progress and updates.

Thank you again!

As always, thank you so much for being a subscriber and for all your help, support and love! It’s a pleasure to be able to share my art journey with you all and build connections with people who love painting - whether that’s viewing them, creating them or learning how to paint. If there’s anything you’d like to chat about, please please just send me an email (address included in my original newsletter only) or message on social media. I love to hear from you!