When was the last time you shared some love for a saltmarsh ?

Salt marshes are the weird intertidal landscape of mud andgrass, occupying huge swathes of coastline around the world, continually exchanging their existence above and below water as tides rise and fall about them.

Deluge is a new exhibition of different media curatedby Art Gene in Barrow, celebrating salt marshes through three artists’ work. Over three years, Oscar van Heek, Dana Olarescu and Linde Ex have all visited three different locations, including Barrow, to respond in different ways to the glories of salt marshes. Read a great review of the exhibition from Corridor8 here.

Behind the Scenery’s Tom Speight has been along to find outtheir stories…

What’s bright blue, lives on the harbourside in Maryport andonce was a pub called the Queens Head ?

The answer is Shipping Brow Gallery, now just over a yearold and very much now a local landmark. The building had been home to Maryport Maritime Museum since 1975 but a new lease of life dreamt up by Dolly and Brian Money has seen it turned into an art gallery with both permanent and temporary exhibitions.

Painter Jim Osborne became its second ever artist in residence in September. His new group exhibition, along with Cockermouth printmaker Jack Fawdry-Tatham and Keswick painter Celia Burbush, called Tales from Elsewhere, takes place this March.

Tom Speight has been along to find out what makes theGallery - and Jim and his paintbrushes - tick….

The Catalyst project is an ongoing collaboration between the University of Cumbria, Art Gene, the Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership and the Cumbria Arts and Culture Network.

Its aim was to find three artists with Cumbrian connections– to fund them to the tune of £25,000 each, to give them an opportunity to make a substantial piece of new art connected to the county over a year. Over 220 people applied.

Emma McGordon was one of the three award winners. She’s a poet, writer and storyteller originally from West Cumbria. She’s making a film about the area she’s from – something she’s never done before.

Tom Speight met up with her on the beach at St Bees, one of the key locations in Emma’s so far untitled film…