Fragments

Today I returned to Tyneham for the first time since the private view.  I didn't know what to expect or what I'd find.  When I approached the village I could still see George's Smock hanging in Gardeners Cottage so that came as a relief.  But the piece In Flowerless Hours is no more.  I suppose it is quite poignant that these fragile flowers, coated in porcelain, wouldn't last forever.  They were wet and trodden on, their petals crushed into the ground, with one lone flower holding it's shape, I picked it and put in my bag.  I decided to take this display down, the ink on the sign had bled so no longer described the work.  Somehow this added to the significance of change and decay.  So, far from being sad I knew that displaying my work in an outdoor isolated place, some would not survive.

The Epistle is another piece that has changed since Saturday.  The envelope that was once part of the work lies in the mud on the floor of the Post Office.  This change is not bad.  It had a significant affect on my feelings seeing it lying there.  I picked it up and put it back in the letterbox along with the wax and fabric letter which had also deteriorated.  The wording of the letter can no longer be read, ink combining with the dye.  The wax has worn away where countless visitors have touched it and again the notion of this doesn't fill me with sadness.  It looks as though at some point the letter had become detached completely and someone has tied it back up, taking care over it, understanding what it means.

Toil

Touched and crumbling, the pieces will now go back to the Earth from where they first came.

The remaining pieces were intact just a little wet, by Monday things may have changed further.  It's out of my hands and I'll just have to wait and see.  This poem I think is quite fitting.....

Informational Decay

I heard an echo in a hollow place.

No sound of blowing wind or drifting sand,

some ancient voice was this, a captive trace

of gone-by speech, of argument, demand,

of plea or question, comfort or command.

Long years this message had remained unheard

in empty halls, in untenanted lands,

a letter lost, a homeless, wandering word.

I could not judge it solemn or absurd,

the language, one I'd never learned to speak.

Was it then call of beast or cry of bird

from whiskered mouth, or brightly colored beak?

No. No, this was human speech, now lost.

A warning wasted, at an unknown cost.

Tiel Aisha Ansari

Recollection - The private view, which was also open to the public....

A few pictures of the private view, the weather stayed dry....no matter how hard you work that cannot be planned :)

Tyneham is isolated but that didn't put people off travelling specially to see the exhibition. Old friends met and families gathered; ultimately that's what it's been about for me. The story of what happened touches people just like it did me. I have created these pieces in response to a village I had never heard of before last summer.......now the people who called it home have their memory stitched into the fabric of time for the story to be retold to future generations through recollection.

Setting up the exhibition

It's the 30th March and a beautiful sunny day, Today I have set up the exhibition and hopefully it will stay dry for tomorrow. The following photos are from the day.......

If the smock fits........

 

Lost in Recollection

Terry my Tyneham mascot

Finally after months planning my first solo exhibition the day has come to set up........I have a van hired for the morning and hope the fuel and pasties are old news......The village is closed to the public so along with a sand lorry we cannot go in until the afternoon.  Still there's plenty to do but also time to relax and have some lunch with Mum, my exhibition assistant for the day.

The exhibition runs from 1st - 9th April 10am - 4pm, with a private view this Saturday.  The car park requires a voluntary donation of £2 but it's worth it for the work that goes into keeping the village.

How to get there.......

If you can make it......hope to see you there

No Welcome Home

This piece has been made to sit on the floor in front of the empty hearth in the Gardeners Cottage.  The collected wood has been made into buttons and stitched to make a rug.  It represents those people who were never able to return but also those who visit and tread carefully through what was once someone's home.

He Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

William Butler Yeats

Yesterday's Paper

This piece is to sit on the window in Gwyle Cottages - it is a fabric newspaper waiting to be read......Yesterday's paper contains quotes from Arthur Grant who used to live in the cottage.

There is no place like home...and there's no place like Tyneham

Tea and Sympathy

The Rectory is one of the biggest houses in Tyneham and has some beautiful features that can still be seen.

There are many rooms and corridors and after looking at the property I thought about the rectory and what it once stood for in the village, so the idea came to make tea cups to sit on a shelf, which is now used to board out the windows.  I have experimented in a number of different ways to make them including with dried leaves but I settled on the use of photographs overlaid with text from a war time story relating to tea.

The shelf in The Rectory the cups will sit on

Newspaper from 1939 used to make the decorative shelf trim