Tuesday 26 February 2013

Kersey Pottery

   One of my pleasures is Studio pottery.  To me there is something deeply satisfying about a well-made, hand-made pot.  It appeals on both a sensual and intellectual level.  Through it I feel a real connection with the Arts and Crafts movement.  I have  small collection of pots that I hope to display sometime on this blog.
As you will know from my last post the bf and I stopped off in Kersey on Friday.  What I didn't tell you is that we paid a visit to the Kersey Pottery.  Here is their website. The pottery and show-room are located just up from the ford that bisects the main street.  (I think it's The Street to the north of the ford and Church Street to the south, but I'm not sure.)  You turn through a gate and down a grassy track.  The pottery is on your left formed from an old stable.
   The show-room was looking a little bare. It turned out that the show-room is closing and the pottery re-locating to a nearby village.  If I remember rightly they will not be re-opening the show-room.  I feel quite sad about that.  I remember visiting the pottery when I lived near-by in Monks Eleigh in the mid nineties, when I was working on the completion of the Cathedral at Bury St Edmunds.
   Anyway the bf was feeling generous and bought me a small hexgonal vase.  It was a wonderful tactile quality to it.  I love the thick gloss glaze and the simple decoration. (I hope to post an image tomorrow.) It's tomorrow, and here is the vase.

 
 

I have also decided to change the way I present my favourite websites here.  There will now be a new section for Studio Pottery.  Enjoy.

Monday 25 February 2013

Kersey and Lavenham

     What's this?  Twice in one day?  Just feeling a little bored, and a bit under the weather - the sniffles and a sore throat.  So why not? The other thing is...every time I go to the bf's I always find plenty cultural stuff to blog about, stuff that in the end just gets shunted to one side.  To give one, brief, example: on my previous visit we watched Michael Powell's last film, the infamous 'Peeping Tom'.  I've said nothing about it - yet.  Just not had the time.

     Friday was bitterly cold.  Even so we broke our return journey at Kersey and Lavenham.  Hardly the weather to stand about and take photos, but I felt obliged....

     Kersey is a small and definitely (and, I suspect, self-consciously) picturesque village nestling in a deep valley.  In the Late Middle Ages it grew rich on the wool trade.  Subsequent poverty was the preservative. What interested me on this visit was the increasingly bolder use of colour wash on the cottages.  One time the limewash would have been invariably white - at a push 'Suffolk pink'.  I don't know if these bolder colours are more authentic.  They are certainly attractive.  The pub exterior (not shown) still retains it's early-to-midcentury interpretation of 'Tudor' - that is 'black and white' and lanterns and scrolling ironwork.  I don't think it should be despised for that.



     The view down the main street, (The Street), of Kersey from the north, pink washed cottage in the background, ochre and rust closer.  Blue rubbish bins make a temporary and piquant contrast in colour.  Other properties still in white.



     The north end of the main street.  The colours on the house on the left are most effective.  I'm pleased that no attempt has been made to strip the plaster back to reveal the timber frame.  In most cases can it be justified?


  
   A view of 'Ancient Houses', Grade 1 listed.  Marvellous late Medieval bay windows.  Perhaps the the timbering on the nearest end of the house to the camera should have been left under its protective coat of plaster?





   A view of the main street on the way back to the car


   We also went to the church, but the interior was a real shocker, with a chaotic re-ordering.  The screen, which has some lovely medieval paintings on the dado was relegated to behind some chairs.  Shame.  From there we drove to Lavenham through remote back lanes.
   Lavenham is a large village, almost a small town.  And like Kersey it is self-conciously picturesque.  It reminds me somewhat of 'Tilling' in E F Benson's 'Mapp and Lucia' books.  Far too cold a day for much sight-seeing I was determined however to photograph a couple of things.



   This is my favourite building in Lavenham, the 'Little Hall Museum'.  It was originally built in the late 14c for the Caustons.  Between the two World Wars it was purchased and restored by twin brothers.  They filled it with their collection of Middle Eastern artefacts.  I should think that their restoration exaggerated the medieval/Gothic aspects of the building.  I find the 'repairs' to the leaded windows a bit suspect. The colour wash must be a more recent thing. Here is the website.  The museum is open from the end of March until the end of October.  On the left is the restaurant  - 'The Great House' - where our hosts treated us to a delicious lunch the day before.





     Finally in Lavenham I took a photo of this florist's - 'The Gardener's Home' on Water St.  They have lovely displays.  Quite my favourite shop in the village.

Weekend away

      I was lucky enough to have a long (I mean long) weekend away at the bf's.  This included a night with friends in Suffolk who live in a 16th century timber-framed house, which they are currently restoring. (They have finished the interior, including excavating a kitchen/dining room in the cellar, and are now working on the outside.)  Our hosts very kindly allowed me to take some photographs.  Unfortunately they were in the midst of 'spring-cleaning' so I was unable to photograph very much.  Here are the more presentable ones I hurriedly snapped on Friday morning.







Tuesday 19 February 2013

Benedict of Nursia

     Good morning (bleary-eyed here).  Another bad night's sleep.  Possibly too much to worry about in my life.  My father is still ill.  My aunt is facing the future with cancer.  And I am their nearest relative....

     I thought I'd post this article I wrote a year or so ago and was not used.  Re-reading it it can get a bit strident, but I was striving to make a point abot Benedict and his world - he was not alone.  Arrogantly (?) I wanted to challenge the assumptions of the reader in the pew, and present a different perspective on Church history.  One not based on hundreds of years of 'propaganda'.  (Ask most people and I reckon they would still believe that Pope Gregory the Great invent Gregorian Chant.  He didn't.) Although I hadn't space to mention them in my article the real fathers of Western Monasticism were St Martin of Tours and St John Cassian.  Both of them worked in Gaul.
In my article I write that Benedict worked as part of a great network of Monasticism.  To give a further example: uniquely in Late Antiquity there were monasteries attached to the Great Basillicas in Rome, eg St Peter's.  I believe that the Monastic rules used there are still (?) unknown.  (There is no confirmed use of the Rule of St Benedict in Rome before the 10th century.)  Anyway the Liturgy of these Basilican monasteries formed the basis for the liturgical instructions of both the Regula Monasterium (Rule of St Benedict) and the 'Rule of the Master' - more of the latter in my article.  Not only that, Eastern forms underly and influence directly the rule and the liturgy it contains.




St Benedict of Nursia – July 11th  

     We know so little of the life of St Benedict - Abbot of Monte Cassino and so-called ‘founder of Western Monasticism’ - that it would be possible to condense all that we can verify into one sentence; perhaps even leave a blank page for there is so little hard fact that some modern scholars have doubted his existence.  For another, the Rule for which Benedict is famous can merely ‘ascribed’ to an abbot called Benedict.  The problem is this: for the details of Benedict’s life we have to rely on Book 2 of the Dialogues of Pope Gregory the Great – a text of doubtful authenticity – and there is little other evidence, even within the Rule itself, to corroborate Gregory’s story.
     According to the Dialogues (which gives no dates) Benedict was born in Nursia in modern Umbria, probably at the end of the fifth century.  Like many others in a civilization that was disintegrating, Benedict as a young man looked to the religious life for structure and purpose. He became a hermit.  His rigorous askesis earned him a reputation for holiness and as a result Benedict’s life became problematic. There was an unsuccessful time as abbot of a local monastery, from which he tried to return to the eremetic path, but like a guru in modern India, he drew followers, and they had to be organised into a community.  Worst of all Benedict attracted animosity, and it was this prolonged antagonism that eventually led him and a select number of followers to head south to the area between Rome and Naples, to a hill top above the city of Cassinum – Monte Cassino.  And it is for this new community that the Rule was compiled, and from which, according to the Dialogues, Benedict successfully converted the local population to Christianity. 
     This traditional view of Benedict as ‘pioneer’ monastic and evangelist – a latter-day Moses - is now largely discredited.  There was already a strong monastic tradition in Rome and across Italy.  Benedict worked within a network of ascetics and monasteries that spanned North Africa, Italy and southern Gaul, and further east to Egypt and Palestine.  The rule reflects this: influences include the rules of Pachomius, John Cassian , Augustine, and Caesarius.  The main source however is the Regula Magistri written some three decades earlier by an unknown abbot of an unknown southern Italian monastery.  Most scholars now accept that the most famous and spiritual chapters of Benedict’s rule are taken verbatim from the Regula.  
     So, how is that that Benedict, who died in obscurity sometime between 547 and 550, came to be regarded as the ‘Patriarch of Western Monasticism’?  There is the rule itself.  There is much to commend it: written in elegant clear Latin it is sensible and moderate in its demands on those who follow it.  The popularity too of the Dialogues helped spread the cultus of Benedict across Western Europe.  However the real impetus came with the rise of the Carolingian Empire.  The Emperors wanted religious conformity across the Empire, and this meant the Roman Rite and, thanks to another Benedict - Benedict of Aniane, Benedictine Monasticism; everything else was simply suppressed, sometimes by force.  Thanks to the zealousness of that second Benedict the Celtic, Gallican and Ambrosian monastic traditions within the Empire were destroyed.





Saturday 16 February 2013

Some more work


     I thought I'd share these ink and watercolour drawings I've been working on intermittently for the last few weeks.  They follow a sequence as I was trying different approaches to the image.  The germ of the idea was Samuel Palmer's 'Blacks' - a series of intense black and white 'watercolours' (mixed media - ink and watercolour, chalk, bodycolour).  Another influence was the 'imaginative' side of Neo-Romantics like Craxton and Minton.  These are certainly more about atmosphere than a desire for botanical accuracy. I'm not sure after a few weeks 'away' from them whether they are any good.  I must admit to a feeling of ambiguity towards them.




     The top image was first I worked on (from a sketch on a shopping list).   The lower image is full sized sketch based on the first and further ideas I played with in a note book.


Thursday 14 February 2013

Valentine's Day

 
     Now that I have confirmation that my card has been received I thought I'd 'show-off' a picture of the card I made for the bf.  Apologies for the 'rope-y' photography....

Wednesday 13 February 2013

A Watercolour


      I thought I'd share with you one of my paintings - a watercolour/mixed media of Dennington church in Suffolk, the original sketch is on view in an earlier post.  At present it awaits a mount.

Monday 11 February 2013

'Follies'


     My brother lent me this book on Saturday.  Entitled 'Follies' it is one of a series of guides produced for the motorist in the sixties, by 'National Benzole'.  Do they still have petrol stations?  Perhaps they were issued in competition to the famous 'Shell Guides' - who knows?  In any case 'Follies' was first published in 1963, edited by Sir Hugh Casson, and researched, written and illustrated by Paul Sharp, and published for National Benzole by Chatto and Windus.  Just the right size, perhaps, to nestle happily next to the tin of travel sweets in the glove compartment...




       The illustrations alternate between line and colour.  I think the latter are more successful.  As you can see they have a lithographic quality that is rather attractive.  I particularily like the narrow colour palette. They also show the influence of John Piper, which for me is seldom a bad thing.  (In a the notes at the end of the book - first mention of the artist at all, poor chap - it states that 'the colour drawings were worked out as auto-lithographs.')

     As I type this post I am listening to 'The Late Paul Barnes Show', broadcast originally late Saturday night/early Sunday morning.  (Good old i-player)  It's one of the best, if somewhat eccentric, jazz programmes on British radio, and local radio too.  I recommended it.

Gift tag



 
 
      I made this tag on Saturday morning to accompany a birthday present.  I hope you, and the recipient, like it!  It's based on Medieval Cosmati work, such as you would find all over Italy.  (The craftsmen were from Rome)  There is only one example of such work in Britain: at Westminster Abbey.  I made no attempt to marble the paper.  My sole aim was to match the wrapping paper.
     There are a number of Victorian examples of Cosmati work in Britain:  Peterborough, and Truro cathedrals (both deigned by Pearson) and Durham (Scott).  I don't consider them to be in anyway inferior just because they aren't Medieval.

Thursday 7 February 2013

Another half hour in the garden...

     Since I have ceased to be a full time carer (my father has gone into permanent care) I've begun to look at those things which I have neglected of late.  One of these is the garden.  Gardening, and gardens, are a great pleasure but the commitment of looking after another person, particularly when they are so ill, made gardening a chore, just another call on my time.  I attempted to maintain thigs at a certain, passable level, but I itched to do more.  The small veg patch at the end of the garden was particularly neglected. 


 
 
     However since Christmas, and weather permitting, I have tried to spend a few minutes each day out there tidying up ready for the spring.  This morning I had a go at the veg patch.  Believe me it was worse.....
The idea behind this small patch, is still as it was when I first cleared the ground  four or so years ago:  to grow those things that are not found in local supermarkets, or if they are for sale are only available in wasteful amounts.  For instance: chard, radishes, lambs lettuce, board beans, runner beans, rockett.


Wednesday 6 February 2013

Stamford, and three discoveries....

     I had to pop over to Stamford today and browsing around before my meeting I made three lovely discoveries...

     Firstly I popped into the Robert Fogell Gallery on High St Martin's to seee what was new and found a number of wonderful prints of fens by Carry Akroyd.  Here is a link to her website. 

     Secondly in a nearby antiques place I came across a set of four charming coffee cans designed by Susie Cooper.  She has always been my favourite of the three so-called 'Pottery Ladies', but, perhaps, the most over looked.  This is a shame.  The cans are, I think, post WWII - the period of her work I personally find the most satisfying.


 
     I have no idea of the name of the design.  It has a suggestion of Fornasetti to it, and an almost timeless quality.  Utterly Charming.

     Thirdly browsing the magazines in a newsagents I found in next month's (March) 'World of Interiors' I found an article on St Catherine's Monastery on the Sinai Peninsular.  I had to have it, although I had undertaken not to spend anything today.

Tuesday 5 February 2013

About time I restarted this....

     It's been a difficult few months, what with illnesses in the family....but I hope now that things are, perhaps, settling down to blog on a regular basis....what have I failed to post?
Well, it would have been good to record the sole piece of Christmas 'crafting ' I undertook this year - a vase full of painted twigs (Farrow and Ball 'String' and twigs from the garden, decorated with retro baubles mainly from charity shops)
     Another trip to that marvellous bookshop in Ely 'Topping and Company' when I treated myself to 'English Style' by BenPentreath and the 'Mark Hearld Workbook'.
A break from the post caring confusion when the bf and I motored over to Suffolk for lunch with friends.  Their's was a most colour co-ordinated Christmas tree! (that's not to mention log-fire etc...)

And if you want to know I'm currently re-reading 'The Lord of the Rings'.