Local artist Hayley Fern is well known by many for her ambitious project to draw every church building in the Diocese of Leicester. We’ve followed her closely as she’s spent school holidays and spare moments sketching our many parish places of worship on her arty pilgrimage.
Hayley’s first ever solo exhibition is now on display at Coalville C.A.N. until 19 August, featuring nature inspired paintings alongside a selection of her church drawings.
The exhibition is both a testament to her talent, and strength of faith, having had a challenging time since embarking on the ‘Hayley Draws Churches’ project three years ago.
In October 2022, Hayley suffered a stroke, out of the blue, which forced her to step back from her job as an art teacher.
“It was a scary time, and it changed my life completely, but I felt such a lot of love and support. My church family and my work colleagues were incredible, everybody was checking on me,” she says.
“Painting flowers came off the back of doing a lot of art therapy after my stroke. That was a very different way of painting for me. It’s much freer, much looser, using a lot of layers of colour,” explains Hayley.
“I used to crochet but because of the weakness in my left arm I just couldn't do it and I found painting the gentlest, most relaxing thing to do.”
Hayley says her nature paintings were never meant to be shared, but she’d been encouraged by the team at Coalville C.A.N. to think about putting on an exhibition and once she realised she'd got about 40 of them, she thought, ‘I've got a bit of a show here’.
“I was really unsure about how to put the two sets of artwork together. We were going to do two distinct areas but actually, combining the nature and church pieces I think works really well. For me it was always a case of how to express my faith, and the two expressions of faith I feel are my strongest are through nature and church.”
Hayley is now almost fully recovered from her stroke, has returned to teaching and continues to really enjoy painting churches. She even found that after all the busyness of preparing her exhibition, drawing the next church on her list, St Mary’s in Lutterworth, was the perfect way to unwind.
“I love having that time drawing in the company of a church. There’s something about the smells and the sights and the atmosphere in churchyards that is incredibly calming,” she says. “I find as soon as I enter that space there's a sense of reverence.
“I often nestle myself under a tree to take a moment to just absorb the atmosphere and have a time of just looking at the church before I start drawing.
“I always say a prayer and say thank you to God for bringing me to this place. Since my stroke I just feel so much more grateful for everything.”
Hayley says that for each church she’s sketched, there's always been a little anecdote - something happens every time.
“It might be the conversation I have with the first person I see; sometimes it's the extreme solitude of finding a church and not seeing a single soul at all – feeling I'm in the middle of nowhere. I suppose I could talk about any picture that anyone asks me about and say something,” she says.
Getting to talk about her work has been one of the Hayleys great joys of her exhibition. “It’s just such a wonderful experience bringing my art out of the church yards, where I'm almost entirely on my own. It’s opened-up conversations with so many people.
“Old friends, colleagues and people from church have come by, but I’ve also met people who only know me from seeing my work online. The whole thing has just been lovely.”
As well are sharing her work, Hayley is excited to see what others bring to the table. She’s made many connections, including with local historians and poets, and is excited what might come of this, wondering if ‘Hayley Draws Churches’ could one day become a book.
Hayley has drawn 87 churches so far, having spent about 250 hours in churchyards, and is still going strong.
“I feel like there's going to be a bit of momentum coming up to church number 100. I'm going to try and make a little bit of an event of it and perhaps invite other artists to come and draw with me.”
Nature and Nurture is on display at Coalville C.A.N. until 19 August.
Hayley will be there, as artist in residence, on Wednesday 14 and Friday 16 August, 10am-3pm.
For full details see the Exhibition's Facebook Event.