About the Festival

The Concept
Amanda Aldous came up with the idea of the Hackwood Art Festival as an exciting way of combining her passion for contemporary art with finding a use for the then unused 18th Century barns at Hackwood Farm.  “I wanted to engage the people of this area in the pleasure and debate about contemporary art in a new and accessible environment outside of the white box”.

The 2006 Festival
Moving on from the first Festival in 2005, 2006 was a resounding success with again a sell-out Gala for 400 people.  With a balmy summers evening and music from Nick Cook and his band, it was deemed a wonderful First Night. All in all, the Festival raised £12,000 for its chosen charity “Youth Clubs Hampshire and Isle of Wight”.

470 works of art by 65 artists were on display at the Festival over a period of three days and one evening.    Prices ranged from £35 for a print up to £10,000 for a large sculpture or painting.  The work was displayed in the two enormous barns and in the picturesque Courtyard Garden.   

There was a huge attendance in 2006 of over 3,000 people, and the licensed restaurant hosted by YCHIOW was permanently packed with people discussing art and enjoying the atmosphere.  Parents could stop and have a coffee or a sandwich and a glass of wine whilst their children enjoyed the diverse [range of] workshops which were on offer.

Ongoing demonstrations were available over the duration of the Festival, with Will Whitmore chipping away at a virgin block of stone and Malcolm West creating a flamenco Dancer out of clay.  Our visitors seemed to really enjoy watching these and other artists at work.

Meanwhile all the workshops were filled with people who were able to actually able to try things out for themselves and learn new techniques.

2007

Artists Application Forms  for the 2007 Festival are now available here.  If you would like to apply to be part of next year’s Festival, please download one now.  Equally if you would like to put your name on our mailing list please go to the Contact page and send us your details.  This year we will again have a major section for Eco Art and there will also be an area of the Festival devoted to print making, techniques and the question of what is an original print.  

Again this year, we will also devote a section of the Festival to portraiture, with more emphasis on commissioning portraits and artists on hand to discuss this with you.