May Day … Worker’s Day
Today, the Turbine House is open to the public. I have had some visitors so that has been nice. The sun is shining which is welcome after yesterday when it rained non-stop all day. Unfortunately, there is a lot of cloud and filmmaking has been hampered. Then the light sensor in the building is super sensitive … there will be a lot of edits!
The dolls did dance round the May Pole to celebrate May Day as it was called until 1st May 1891 when it was designated International Worker’s Day. The day that for centuries had been a day to celebrate spring, flowers and fertility was to become a day of political agitation. So, while the local families enjoyed the dance around the May Pole and the tomfoolery of the Chimney Sweep, the workers were addressing their political needs.
The workers were acknowledging the end of the Second Industrial Revolution when communities shifted from an agrarian economy to a manufacturing economy. Previously workers who had worked the land, made tools, built homes, roads by hand are now replaced by machines and industry. This led to increased production, efficiency and regular income.
While many workers and employers celebrate on May Day the achievement of industrialisation others are marching in the streets demanding better pay and improved working conditions.
Today … the Shepherd
Today is Sunday and I took my dolls and the equipment required for what is going to be my living and working quarters from dawn until dusk for the next week. It seemed like a mammoth task toing and froing with boxes of stuff. Now complete I am pleased. The real work starts tomorrow when I turn what is essentially a pump house suspended over a mighty weir into a studio. It is far from home comforts, its noisy and not conducive to film making. Yet it is light and airy and has a beauty only experienced when experienced if that makes sense. So, my dolls will find the space a joy too I am sure.
Once have set up my studio and placed my dolls I will return to my stories and the individual characters and the roles they will play in little animated motifs.
Last week you met Margery today it her father who is a shepherd who is one of the most skilled and respected members of his community. He works for the local farmer who would have to trust him implicitly before entrusting him with a flock of sheep whose welfare depended on him.
It was a lonely experience but while it was poorly paid it was a regular income and during lambing time, he could earn a little more. Furthermore, if he killed a sheep he was entitled to its hide and the head and liver etc that could be boiled and made into a stew and a welcome treat for his poor family.
Shepherd families in the villages and tiny hamlets where our family lived continued for many generations, handing down rural skills and methods building up a good reputation with farmers and neighbouring shepherds providing medical advice and cures.
John was fine looking man, his gait like many whose work is restricted to tending sheep is free from swaying and rolling movements like those used to walking with a plough. With a smock flowing gracefully behind him, with a crook on his shoulder and a dog at his heel he would walk majestically with steady even pace, head thrown back with his sheep following it was a picturesque figure in the landscape.
All this aside, farm work was long hard and poorly paid, and the family lived mostly in poverty. There were few ways to relieve it, but they are mostly illegal and harshly punished but it seems that most families had to take the risk. Poaching for instance John was not averse to bringing home a hare or a rabbit under his smock if the opportunity arose.
John and his family were near the river side where there was a supply of water for washing and cooking. He spent most time on hillside in the meadows away from the marsh land and increasing urbanisation. He would spend the winters at home and attend the market and festivals when necessary.
Coming soon …
As I make plans to transport my precious family to the Turbine House, I consider them carefully. I have well over a hundred and each one has its own character, while they don’t all have names, they all have history and a story to tell. Given the opportunity I would wax lyrical ad infinitum about them as if they were my over indulged children.
I sculpted their bodies and clothed them to the finest degree.
This doll is called Margery she 6 years old and is a Goose Girl, she wears no shoes, and her frock is a hand-me-down and repaired again and a again by her granny. Each day after she has searched the hedges and hideaways for eggs, she takes the geese on to the heath to graze, in all weathers this is not an idyllic as it sounds. The heath is common land but increasingly the nearby landlord fences off areas and makes it private. Should Margery stray or dare to ‘trespass’ the punishment is very harsh; deportation to Australia is not unlikely.
Later in the day when Margery returns home, she goes with her mother, granny, and little brother to pick stones from the farmer’s field. The removal of the stones improves the soil, and the stones are used to repair the roads. The income from this back breaking and tedious task is minimal but goes a long way to help Mother buy clogs or pay for the repair of some hand-me-downs for Margery when she goes to school … very soon she hopes.
Not long now …
In a couple of weeks, I will be Artist in Residence with Matt Hulse, a fellow filmmaker in Reading Museum. I am returning to continue filming my dolls who will be celebrating May Day.
I began making and filming my dolls a few years back when researching for my MA in textiles as a project for my professional practice. It was surprisingly successful, and I am now recognised as a Stop Motion Animator and Costume Designer. That is not to say my other creative skills are no longer required on the contrary my needle work, drawing skills and storytelling have developed and feed into my filmmaking and relative merchandise.
I am taking all my dolls to the museum so they will form an exhibition while I film with a select 20 or so. They will be characters who will enact short episodes that illustrate a story of May Day festivities as they may have happened in the mid to late 19th century.
I will post daily so please drop by.
The important things of life …
In a few weeks I take up residency in the Turbine House at Reading Museum. I have done it before and well aware that while it is a beautiful building it is not the ideal place to exhibit and work, as it is without any mod cons, so preparing for every eventuality is a good idea but not feasible. So, I have to do the best I can. My studio space at home has all bases covered as a textile artist, print maker, illustrator, and sound maker. I am reluctant to call myself a musician as it suggests the sounds I make with my piano and ukulele is music. I usually make my films in a studio in town as it is better equipped. Nonetheless, the tools I need to be an artist or at least create the work I enjoy is huge and to transport it on public transport or on Shank’s pony is no mean feat.
I have over 100 dolls all needing staging even the most basic structure needs to be several metres long, with legs and stable. They will need to be in perfect repair, so a sewing box is vital. I will not be writing or making books but writing and drawing equipment is required for storyboards etc. The aforementioned film equipment is vast and substantial transportation is a concern. I will also need a sales table I am not good at marketing, but it seems that fund raising for the expense of this exercise alone is huge and can no longer be overlooked. So, while I agonise over the list of things to be done … I rest assured that my dependency on tea will be catered for fully.
Artist in Residence …
In a few weeks I will take up ‘residency’ in the Riverside Museum at Blakes Lock in Reading. Not actually living in but spending all my waking hours for one week only, in the Turbine House as an ‘Artist in Residence’
Although, I have been preparing for this for many weeks the task has been on my mind since last summer when I previously enjoyed the opportunity to work in such beautiful public space.
Then I began a journey with my dolls that has become a joyous obsession.
I took 12 dolls in costume who were to become characters in a story that was set in a community beside the Kennet and Avon Canal a little way from its junction with the Thames. The stop motion animated film made in tiny sequences tells the story of a family and their friends as they prepare for a picnic. I was joined by a local film maker and producer of note who also filmed the preparation with the intention to join our works into a ‘proper film’ to celebrate the rich culture of Blakes Lock.
Due to time constraints the film wasn’t completed.
However, the interim time has been fruitful. I have self-published some booklets that explain and complement the proposed film. As we consider the next stage conveniently in early May, the emphasis will be on previous May Day celebrations. Perhaps 150 years ago when the industrial revolution had bought much change to rural life and that of my imagined Shepherd family. Changes that were not conducive to a community who could see their age-old skills and traditions eroded and forgotten.
Of course, there was much to celebrate many people enjoyed better working conditions and a regular income. However, others were less satisfied. On May Day while some encircled the May Pole and celebrated on coming spring and furtivity others were waving banners for improved workers’ rights, equal opportunities, and votes for women.
I am not sure how my Coat Hanger Dolls will cope with such a convoluted situation … they are just dolls who can dance a bit!
Better late than never …
There has been a hiatus on the blog posting front lately. For which I could name number of likely causes. Perhaps, my mental health, however with the best will in the world there are only so many blogs I can post that feature my ups and downs and wavering in between and since ‘medication’ the fluctuations have been less interesting!
Then I could suggest that my Jury Service was the culprit (the pun was very much intended) Very soon after I got the demand to attend, I went into overdrive much as I did when I was expecting the a visit from the in-laws. I cleaned the house and completed all outstanding tasks, so that I could devote my time and mind fully to the judgement of the defendant.
Which was going to be difficult for me, as I my criminals need to look the part, with a swag bag and a handy crowbar. Before me stood a fresh-faced young man, who had not harmed anyone physically but had done much damage with the misuse of a computer. What become apparent was a web of technical jargon that was pretty much like listening to a foreign language, fortunately we were provided with a glossary and an iPad so we could keep with the proceedings, but the case was complex.
Nonetheless all this doesn’t explain my lack of interaction on the ‘socials’ and otherwise.
During lulls in my public duty and other events I have been thinking of ways to engage more fully and promote my work, particularly my films. Professional production and corporate intervention seems possible but the former needs money and the latter, along with talent much luck.
While I enjoy me outsiderness and non-reliance on aforementioned professionals I still have to reconsider ways to promote my work that doesn’t cost the earth.
I have made enquires and even bought iPad that I might use at local events to show my films. While the screen wasn’t huge it was bigger than my phone. Sadly, it didn’t have the technical capacity to do what I needed, so, it had to be returned to the supplier.
So now I am back to square one taking the dolls, books, and relative merchandise to events, while the films just hang out on YouTube and blabbing on socials which raises a titter I suppose.
Joking aside, with mental and physical health stable I am perfectly able to create and promote (somewhat) and spring is on its way … with a fair wind lets see what happens.
Visible Mending and the Scrap Man
As a child I learned much about life, academically and practically at school but mostly at home. The methods used to expound that knowledge was not always kind and or comfortable. I could dwell on lasting effect of lack of kindness and the overuse of discipline, but today I will focus on the entrenched value of making do and mending.
My mum had an old and reliable Singer Sewing machine. That had been acquired in the 1950s from a scrap yard in Southampton.
My father was a frequent ‘customer’ to the Scrap Yard which was a vestige of the old days before household waste was collected from our front gates by the Corporation Dustmen. Scrap men or Rag and bone men would trawl the streets with a horse and cart calling for villagers and townspeople to bring out rubbish and unwanted belongings. He would take the items back to his yard to be sorted and sold on to dealers. We lived by the river beyond the realms of rubbish collection, but my father would take his scrap in a bag on the bus to sell to the scrap man. My dad was a boat builder and also salvaged sunken vessels to rebuild or sell for scrap. I also was able to help in the meagre money-making exercise while I was searching for driftwood for the fire and I learned about the different metals and their value, racking out the remains of the fire was a good way to find portable nuggets.
My mum was delighted with her sewing machine when my dad returned from one such visit, on another occasion, he came home with camera which my mum put to good use when she was able to develop and print her photographs that documented river life for many years to come.
However, I digress I was, beside gathering firewood, making do and mending. Undertaking such tasks as turning cuffs and collars, lengthening and shortening dresses and trousers, turning bed sheets side to middle, sewing on buttons and there was much darning. While my mother’s workmanship was neat and tidy and often invisible mine was less so. However, I did improve and continued to ‘enjoy’ prolonging the life of clothes and household items overlooking the cruel methods and learning the necessity of making ends meet. Sometimes forgetting that mother also taught me fine needlework and embroidery so lately I am inclined to be grateful for that … especially as there seems to be a revival and a need for us to consider the way in which we fill our wardrobes and decorate our homes. The world’s natural resources are at risk and the production of non-natural fibre is becoming increasingly harmful to the world and its atmosphere.
I think my mum would approve of my first attempts at visible mending it gave me much pleasure after a recent infestation of moths! There is still remaining holes I see …
Can I Rock ?
About 18 months ago I began to teach myself to play the ukulele which proved to be more difficult than I thought. So, I found a teacher. Although the lessons and subsequent practice was no less arduous, having a kind and supportive teacher is giving me hope. About the same time, I decided to return to piano lessons. Years ago, I did begin to learn to read music and play the piano but like my learning experiences over the course of my life it was not pleasant and therefore short lived.
I am often asked, and I ask myself ‘why? ‘I want to undertake a new learning experience so late in life. The reply is often brief, and subject changed.
However, I need to address this once and for all. I love music, to sing and dance. As a child l listened to the radio on the Light Programme, Junior Choice, Worker’s Play Time, Family Favourites, Sing Something Simple with the Cliff Adam Singers etc. I loved to listen to the Top Twenty on Radio Luxembourg late at night and write down the names of the records. Hoping one day that I could buy them or listen more fully. I did not have record player (or electricity), but my best friend had a Dansette record player and a growing collection of records to which we sang and danced to Neil Sedaka, Pat Boone, Frankie Vaughan and Alma Cogan etc. Later another friend had 2 older sisters and a huge record collection that included some by the Beatles and Rolling Stones, which was a bit controversial, as I was neither a Beatles nor Rollings Stones fan but it seemed then you had to choose your favourite.
By this time living in a house (not on a houseboat without mod cons), with electricity, a radiogram and TV and a paper round I was in a position to attend art class every Saturday morning in Southampton at the Art College. Furthermore, seek out coffee shops with a juke box and buy my own records in W H Smiths. Providing of course I was able to return home, get on my bike and deliver the Evening Echo and the football results! My choice then was Bob Dylan, Troggs, Them, Small Faces, Manfred Mann and the Animals.
When I left home on 1967 to live in Southampton, my work mates and I listened to the very first track on Radio 1, presented by Tony Blackburn, Flowers in the Rain by the Move. The music we heard from that day was the backdrop, alongside the current fashion, of daily life. From here I was able to go to see bands at the Pier and Top Rank such as the Small Faces, Herman’s Hermits and Spencer Davis Group. Coffee bars too, not so many with juke boxes but now I was able to go to Discos and dance to Tamla Motown, Soul, Ska, Blue Beat and Rhythm and Blues and a friend played Folk music on my wedding day December 1970.
I like all music there has never been a preference as long as it tuneful and has a story. I have grown with a melody in my soul even though the world around me is pretty horrible, I am enchanted by a good song.
I even believed I could sing tunefully or not, with my friends or alone. At school singing was a big part of the scholarship in assembly or at singing classes and I even enjoyed being the local church choir. However, developing that further was out of the question if one did not have an influential parent or musical background. General education in the 1950 and 1960s was not kind so I did not pursue my singing ‘career’. Until much later when I considered joining a local church choir when musical knowledge was required along with an outgoing gusto none of which I could claim to. I was turned away again.
So, here I am suffering the effects of a traumatic early childhood and education, still finding solace in music mostly on BBC Radio 6 and a vast collection of records and some local live events, this may be all I need for the rest of my life. However, there is something missing, something I ached for nearly 70 years ago, to sing, dance and frolic to a tune with no one looking, no one criticising casting doubt and forbiddance. I have established a visual creative world about me, now I want to rock.
Around the corner …
This work by Sally Castle is in a frame on the wall at the top of my stairs and a constant reminder that life is in a state of flux and we never know what or who is round the corner …
In my many years of mental illness, this recent malady bore no surprises. In this time, I have learned that alongside adequate and well administered prescribed medication, placebos do have an effect some more than others. Sometimes a doctor merely saying ‘I understand here is a prescription’ brings a glimmer of hope. Words or a kind implication can go a long way to soothe a trouble mind, clearly this not always true, long lasting or a cure. I am talking about mental ill health and from one who knows, a wrong word, whether kind or not, at the wrong time can have an adverse effect on a person in a heightened anxious place. This latest phase of 6 months I have been down to dark places where life was not worth living. Restraint from self-harm and medication was required I was reluctant and angry and there were ugly scenes in the doctors waiting room, and pharmacy. I was warned two or three times about my inappropriate behaviour. There was no chance that I would listen to kind words or good advice. I was not prepared to wait in line for a long-awaited appointment or understand that the wrong medication would be corrected. I was a 6 year old self-centred girl stamping her feet and spouting profanity, that is not a pretty sight.
Being in a position to look back to this now after a few weeks of medication and a recent assessment and a promise of some further consultation and with an element of humour I think I am out of this black hole and somewhat strengthened. Not cured that will not happen I am a perfectly sensible woman of age but from time to time that abused, neglected, and lonely 6-year-old girl puts her hand up and asks for some kind attention if I ignore her then there will be tears before bed time.
Coat Hanger Doll's House 