As mentioned in my last blog, I’m now very pleased to announce Staircase Gallery officially open! – a permanent area to display my framed prints at the prestigious Joe Cornish Gallery in Northallerton, North Yorkshire (as partly seen by some opportunistic snapshots from my iPhone).

Having been given the nod of approval 3 weeks ago whilst on the Isle of Arran, I got the message along the lines of ‘by the way, we are holding a grand opening on the 28th”(!). It then dawned on me that I had very few recent images in print, mounts or frames to display at launch.
Therefore, with some help and advice from my photographer friends on Twitter (Thanks guys!), I finally ordered an Epson 4900 Large Format Printer along with a roll of Epson’s Ultra Smooth Fine Art paper. After a few initial cock-ups, I was finally happy with the results from the printer and set to work on ten images shortlisted from my portfolio. After preparing and printing them, they were finally ready for mounting. Only having 7 days left to deliver them to the framers for mounting, collecting the mounts for signing, re-delivering for framing before delivery to the gallery it seemed like a military operation!

Which is the reason I write this blog as I have a lot of people to thank, otherwise my images wouldn’t be hanging in the gallery in time for the grand opening. First and foremost, my Mother, who did a lot of running around to the Wensleydale Gallery in Leyburn. Claire, Jo and Joni at Joe’s gallery for all their advice and help ~ and most importantly, their permission. To Joe Cornish for his nod of approval and inspiration. To Antony and Andy atWensleydale Gallery for the quick turnaround of mounting and framing my images to such high standards and finally to my good friend and fellow landscape photographer, Peter Leeming for his excellence and knowledge in hanging all my images with such accuracy, whilst I simply stood by feeling a little helpless!

Thank you to you all!

I’m pleased to say that the open evening was a great success, starting with a toast from Joe Cornish to all us new arrivals, before opening the doors to the public. I wouldn’t like to think how many people turned out for the evening, but at times it felt like a rugby scrum there. A sure sign that there is still an amazing interest in landscape photography and of course, photography in general.
With the advent of this new concept, Joe Cornish Galleries, Northallerton  has got to be one of the largest single galleries in the country for promoting photography, so why not pop in when you’re next in the area and have a look for yourself?

Enjoy!
Mark