Jessica Zoob

It’s such a generous festival’, says Jessica Zoob with her usual infectious enthusiasm. She is talking about Artwave (which launches on the 25th), the annual opportunity to see what all the locally-based artists have been up to for the last year. I’ve popped round to her sun-filled house for an insider’s view. It will be the third time that Jessica has opened her house and she is raving about it. “It’s so fantastic”, she exclaims. “There’re so many different people that take part. It’s a real feast, and such an amazing opportunity to go in and out of people’s worlds.” Jessica’s world is, as ever, lit up by her beautiful abstract canvasses and her bubbly presence which fizzes over as she takes me round her latest work. “And”, she adds en route. “I think it’s much easier to imagine buying something and hanging it in your own home if you are already seeing it in a domestic setting”. By now we’re in her new garden - a water-filled ‘fairy grove’ (as her neighbour put it) which exactly suits the mood of Jessica’s work. After a diversionary hunt for a ‘rather squat toad’, Jessica is still talking, “I love the human contact - getting to see how enthusiastic people are when they buy something and knowing they will look after it”. This is very important to Jessica. She is so passionate about her art, or ‘her babies’ as she refers to them, that she can’t bear to think of them going to the wrong home. Though it’s not just about buying, “I want people to know that it’s completely fine to just come and see what’s happening”, she adds. “After all, it’s a bit of a party”. ER