Refinding: Jessie Flood-Paddock with Kenneth Armitage

Published on the occasion of the exhibition Refinding: Jessie Flood-Paddock with Kenneth Armitage at the Tetley, Leeds. 6 May - 30 July 2017. by the Tetley and The Kenneth Armitage Foundation.

In 2013, Flood-Paddock was awarded the Kenneth Armitage Fellowship, which enabled her to live and work in Armitage’s studio for two years. During her residency, Flood-Paddock became interested in Armitage’s work on oak trees produced between 1975 and 1986.

Armitage was inspired by the ever-changing, ancient oak trees of Richmond Park. He said, “I suddenly saw them. It was a bright spring day with blue sky and little white clouds, and everywhere I looked it was a revelation, the trees were alive.” Throughout this period, he would visit the park as often as three times a week to sketch and eventually make the tabletop bronzes and the large sculpture, Richmond Oak, shown outside The Tetley.