Himalayan balsam in full flower!

The bees are gathering pollen and returning to the hives dusted with white.  I am experimenting with the petals . . . . . .

'Flower Bed' joins the World War I Commemoration Event at Brindle Village Hall

The turf on the campaign bed has survived, with regular watering, from November.  Some docks and dandelions have grown quite tall.  For the event in the village hall I wanted to replace all the poppies that had been placed on the bed following the service back in November but didn't want to pretend they had not been moved/to place them just as the congregation had done.  So I made a poppy-chain and replaced it to form the outline of a sleeping figure.

Clockwise or anticlockwise?

I'd have expected the layout around the table, of the twelve monthly husks, to have been clockwise - and when looking at paper pinned to the wall that looked fine.  However when walking round a table reading I am so conditioned to move left to right, and thus anti-clockwise.  So I am going to place them that way for the exhibition installation.

Tableau

I have to choose a title for the installation for the MA show.  Although my project is focussed on English countryside the Cuerden Psalter is thought to possibly have been made by French craftsmen as it shows considerable French influence.  I have decided on tableau -  

A group of models or motionless figures representing a scene from a story or from history; a tableau vivant.

Origin:  late 17th century (in the sense 'picture', figuratively 'picturesque description'): from French, literally 'picture', diminutive of table.

June - mowing with a scythe - Bell Sykes Meadows

The 'labour of the month' for June is frequently depicted as a figure mowing grass with a scythe, to make hay.  Lancashire's Coronation Meadow is at Bell Syke's Farm, Slaidburn within the Forest of Bowland AONB.  A variety of activities have been organised by the AONB, through the Haytime Project, including a Marvellous Meadows Day and Scything course tutored by Steve Tomlin.  So I have learnt about the grasses and wildflowers as well as drawing the mowing of the meadow.

Pastoral Plays

Having made the grass figures they demanded to be allowed to interact with another.  I was reminded of a few grainy sepia photos of Pastoral Plays put on at Mottisfont Abbey (probably between the wars?) in which the village children took part, dressed up as fairy folk and flowers.  D's Gran had told me that she had deliberately fainted so that she was taken inside (into the Whistler Room) to recover.

Harry Becker

Having signed up to join the scything course at Slaidburn I started looking at drawings and paintings of folk scything.  Harry Becker (1865 - 1928), a Suffolk artist, made hundreds of drawings, paintings and prints of agricultural labour - including mowing.  They all have an enormous immediacy about them.