Our recent competition ‘My Life in Lockdown’ prompted an astonishing display of creative talent in our community. The judges were hugely impressed by the range of skills and the quality of the work submitted, mostly by amateur artists. We asked some of the competitors to tell us what inspires their creativity and what their art means to them. Jamie Sollis, whose satirical cartoon below was highly commended, started drawing in 2016 at a time of turmoil, after a break of 30 years. He says that art helps him to relax and to reconnect with his childhood.

After a 10 year break artist Sarah Cooper rediscovered her love of painting. Learning from online tutorials, books and other artists, she has worked with oils, watercolour and charcoal. Although she had less time for painting during lockdown, when her studio was given over to home educating her three children, she still managed to contribute to the Portraits for NHS Heroes campaign. The delight of the health worker, whose portrait she painted, reinforced her belief that giving is the greatest joy of painting.

Details of all competition winners, runners-up and commendations plus a video that gives a flavour of all competition entries and highlights winners.

People from across the country are being invited to contribute to a Quarantine Quilt in a creative response to the pandemic led by Crediton-based Significant Seams. This group of local artists has received Arts Council funding to lead a national project, which will inspire people to create quilts in many different areas. Their aim is to collect and stitch together people’s responses to the experience of living through a pandemic, as Significant Seams Director Catherine West explains.

Amid the doom and gloom about the future of our theatres and concert halls, a group of young musicians has been delighting the residents of Coleford with weekly outdoor performances. Music in the Porch started with a call from the National Youth Orchestra and has become a lockdown highlight for performers and audience alike, as the project coordinator Francisca Van Holthoon explains.

If you live in Crediton, or are visiting the shops, take some time to come down to the town square. To celebrate the easing of restrictions, twelve picnic tables with parasols have been installed, to provide a safe space for people to take a break, meet friends and catch up. The ‘Share in the Square’ initiative is aimed at reducing loneliness and revitalising the town centre, as Rod Brookes Hocking of Crediton Town Team explains. 

Award-winning performance poet Tim King is this year’s Bard of Exeter and the much loved host of Exeter’s most popular poetry/spoken word night, Taking the Mic. In April he was due to perform at Poetry in the Pub at the Lamb Inn, in Sandford. But when lockdown put paid to that event, Ysella Sims decided to interview him digitally.

Printmaker and Heart Project Trustee Nancy Murgatroyd has been captivated by the new words and concepts the pandemic has generated. She has been exploring the meaning of ‘isolation’ through her work and urges others to share their creative responses by entering our creative competition ‘My Life in Lockdown’.