The spines have it

The British Library is the title of a work by Yinka Shonibare, who has come to be known for his trademark use of African fabrics. It's showing in Margate till 30 October.

As you enter Turner Contemporary, you see books to the left of you, books ahead of you, and books to the right of you. Colourful books. Move ahead, and you see the gleam of gold on their spines - the names of immigrants who have enriched British culture and society. They are hard to read  as they flicker against the rich patterning, and many or most will be know to an individual browser - and some spines are nameless.

The pattern placement on the second spine on the right particularly took my fancy -

...wonder what the rest of the fabric is like? What's on show is just a narrow segment of the entire pattern.

Couldn't resist a couple of panoramas -

The camera does inexplicable things to people moving past.

Pots du jour

This week I'm stitching chimneypots with holes -

Some on fabric bordered with metal (black holes?) and some on metallic fabric bordered with ordinary thread. Some of the sets of holes are "joined up" in the manner of depicting constellations. 

Dippy chimneypots, week two

The pots dipped last week are dry, but "needing things doing"

Ready to dip. Spot the four that are made of bamboo leaves

Experiment: the dried clay was scraped off some of the beads;
will it make a difference?

Supplies of the porcelain castig slip are getting very low, and very thick. Adding water
(lots of stirring) and putting it in a narrower vessel

Eight chimneypots ready to fire to 1280 degrees. The one on the right
has been bisque fired 

Poetry Thursday - Poetry House Live

"To a human being a house is not just a house, it is also a place of meanings, associations and memories. This is even more true of the houses where great poets have lived, the settings for their lives and their stories. Poetry House Live uses physical theatre to bring to life these meanings and these stories, in a show that is by turns funny, trai and surreal" (Graham Henderson, chief Executive, The Rimbaud and Verlaine Foundation)

"An original production featuring seven stories about seven famous European poets and exploring the places they called home at key moments in their lives. Each story has been adapted from new writing by some of Europe's leading playwrights."

The hall had four banks of chairs, each facing in to a central square. In the middle of the front row of each was a performers' chair. Performers, the GoodDog Theatre Co, were Louise-Clare Henry, Julien Nguyen Kinh, Nouch Papazian and Simon Gleave. Minimal props and maximal versatility.

Incomplete (Luis Munoz) - a one-act drama about the Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca, set inside the Residencia de Estudiantes in Madrid around 1926, just as Lorca is embarking on his career. (Props: top hat and cane)

Croquis Nocturne (Adam Gordon) - offers a window into Rimbaud and Verlaine's visionary relationship while they lived in Camden at 8 Royal College Street in 1873. (Props: an imaginary key, imaginary wine bottle and glasses)

Les Lesbiennes (Richard Dalla Rosa) - invites us behind the closed doors of a bedroom at the Hotel Pimodan and explores where the French poet Charles Baudelaire may have found his inspiration. (Props: maids' aprons, a bedsheet)

Decent People (Sigurbjorg Thrastardottir) - tells the story of Icelandic celebrity poet Halldor K Laxness in an imagined encounter between him and two joiners fixing a window in his 1960's home. (Props: rectangular frame, tool belt, wooden mallet, large notebook)

Salute (Gabriele Labanauskaite Diena) - set in present-day Lithuania, the spirit of the controversial but greatly appreciated poet Salomeja Neris returns to the home where she lived in the 1930s and is confronted by objects from her past (Props: print dress)

The Ivy Door (Maria Manolescu) - set in the home of Gellu Naum and his life's love near Bucharest, where they look back on the story of his best-loved creation, the children's character, and penguin, Apolodor. (Props: wagon loaded with a few bricks, false beard, fluffy stuffed penguin)

John's Last Dream (Roberta Calandra) - a poignant drama about the poetry and worldview of the English poet John Keats, struggling agains crippling illness while living in Rome.

8 Royal College Street, Camden, before purchase and rescue in 2006  (via)
Michael Corby said he bought the house to save it from being stripped of its history

Gljúfrasteinn, the 1960s house of Halldor Laxness, is now a museum (via)

Salomeja Neris's house, Palemonas, in Kanaus, built in 1937 (via)

Gellu Naum with his life's love Lyggia at home in Bucharest (via)

Keats House, Hampstead (via)

Found photos

These use the camera's macro feature -

and were taken into a "flies' eyes" lens, this sort of thing -

(via)

Being printed photos, I thought they might have been taken "long ago" on a film camera, but it's more likely that they were printed out on 4x6 photo paper. I once had a cute little printer and lots of the paper, but it was profligate with ink and most of the paper didn't get used.

Drawing Tuesday - Camden Arts Centre

The Making & Unmaking exhibition was full of textile interest - I'd already been twice, and was intrigued by the Anya Gallacio's nets strung round the garden -

 Their structure more complicated than an ordinary net - more like lace -

 This time I got excited about the glinting silvery snails trails -

But they led nowhere, in drawing terms. Instead, warm-up with a garden medley, enjoying the sunshine and shade -

In the exhibition, Rodney McMillian's Shirts 1-6 pretty much filled a wall - "recycled shirts, fabric, thread" - the added fabric making strange folds, leaving the shirts wearable, but would you? -

 Mags had worked in her "exhibition sketchbook", to which she adds relevant photos and notes (her annotated view of the exhibition is here) -

 ... and also in her general sketchbook -

 Najlaa found, among other things, a carpet design from the 1920s -

 Carol studied details of the knotting on a huge indigo ... what ... figure? suit of armour?

 Jo found sculptures of interest in the garden -

Coincidence of the week -

Later, back home, I tried to colour-in my quick sketch of a fabulous huge painting by Marina Adams, but without the magenta - an unmixable colour - it didn't work. (I now have a tube of magenta on hand and will try again.) -

The other sketches are of stuffed fabric pieces by Caroline Achaintre - "her work draws on Primitivism and Expressionism".

Identifying birds by sight and sound

Day course run by the Field Studies Council at the Olympic Park. Getting there was "interesting" and unfortunately there was an inescapable music event with eight booming sound stages, but in true british spirit we carried on regardless! Fortunately, after some hours in the wetland area of the park getting the "jizz" of various birds, we could retreat to a quiet room in the Velodrome and use online resources to compare different species. 

Recommended resources -

Apologies for fuzzy pic; it shows the useful feature of  collected birds in their habitat

Of the apps, Bird Guide by Ispiny was recommended.

Online resources abound, no doubt - the BTO website has videos, and BirdID has quizzes and an exam. Much to investigate... what I'm looking for is a site that compares birdsongs....

Edward often got out the Collins book to point out differences between juveniles and mature birds

"Haunt of coot and hen"

Mallards - note the curly tail feathers, regrown after the moult

Keeping an eye on some goldfinches

Will I be able to make sense of the notes?

House karma

Needs TLC

Materials on hand

Fresher, more welcoming

Less shabby

New planting

"Please buy this house"

Waiting for the guy with the ladder to come and give the windows back their sparkle.